Face Off

If you believe all the hype most of the American media has been pushing, tonight is supposed to be the 2012 presidential campaign event to end all campaign events. Forget the fact that the actual election isn't for another five weeks, forget the fact that - historically - political scientists say presidential debates don't usually matter much. Forget the fact that no one really knows which version of Mitt Romney will actually show up at Denver University tonight - as more than one pundit has mentioned.

The fact is, debates do matter, if in no other way than as an emotional rallying point for the supporters of each candidate, as we saw with the debates in Nebraska, Virginia, and Massachusetts on Monday night.

Of the three congressional debates, the most well-covered debate in the media on Tuesday was the Warren-Brown debate in Massachusetts. In short, Sen. Scott Brown acted like a coward and a bully, running from his associations with both 'Multiple Choice Mitt' and the Republican Party, while desperately trying to convince everyone he was independent.

Brown tried to smear Democratic candidate Elizabeth Warren with attacks on her Native American heritage again, and was extremely condescending to Warren when the two candidates talked over one another at one point. Brown made a major mistake though, when asked to pick who his favorite Supreme Court justice was, by naming the most extremist Justice on the most extreme Supreme Court in history - current Justice Antonin Scalia.

Meanwhile, in Richmond, Virginia, retired Army colonel and Democratic House candidate Wayne Powell went into political battle with current Republican House Majority Leader Eric Cantor. This was Cantor's first debate in a decade, having ducked out on his previous challengers - and it was obvious why Cantor had previously chosen the cowardly cop-out.

Powell nailed Cantor for abdicating his responsibility to Congress, to Virginians, and to the American people by refusing to even try to compromise with House Democrats. Cantor even tried to position a gutless one year extension of current tax policies as a positive position on tax reform. Powell blasted Cantor for that shirking of responsibility too.

Meanwhile, in the Nebraska Senate debate, former U.S. Senator and Governor Bob Kerrey got into details on multiple topics, including energy, campaign financing, taxes and spending. In contrast, Republican state senator Deb Fischer gave virtually no serious details - especially on taxes and budgets - while spouting slogans, platitudes, and what were obviously pre-scripted responses. Frankly, we wondered if extremist conservative anti-tax lobbyist Grover Norquist was hiding behind Fischer's podium the whole time.

In summary, all three debates had a massive amount of hype - and very little substance. While the Democratic candidates in all three debates seemed far better suited for higher office, we highly doubt any of these debates really changed the minds of serious voters.

That, in fact, is exactly what we expect from the presidential debate tonight: that the event simply won't live up to the hype. As we noted to start today's commentary, political scientists say presidential debates don't usually shift presidential campaign outcomes heavily one way or the other - and we tend not to argue with proven facts.

What might shift the effects of the debate more than anything President Obama or Mr. Romney might say is the post-debate spin. Frankly, no matter which Mitt Romney shows up tomorrow night, we highly doubt the overall spin will end up in his favor.

Surprised? Not Hardly.

Please pardon us today if we don't recap all the Congressional debates that went on last night. Not only was the third Senate debate between Bob Kerrey and Deb Fischer going on in Nebraska. In Massachusetts, the second Senate debate between Elizabeth Warren and Scott Brown was also happening. In Virginia, it was the first - and only - debate between retired Army colonel Wayne Powell and Republican House Majority Leader Eric Cantor.

Tomorrow, we'll give a quick break down of each of those debates from Monday night, along with a  preview of the Presidential debate Wednesday night. Suffice it to say we were not surprised by the performances of Ms. Fischer, Sen. Brown or Rep. Cantor. To say the Republicans in these debates were without details while cowardly ducking questions would be a severe understatement, especially in the case of Ms. Fischer.

No matter how clear the performances of most candidates in most debates are, as well-known Democratic strategist Donna Brazile recently noted, debates don't always make a difference.

Or, as Paul has said many times over the years, some kinds of people would vote for a pelican for office, as long as it had an "R" behind its name - especially in the western two-thirds of Nebraska. We're more than willing to admit there are other places in the U.S. where there are those who just as blindly vote for any name with a "D" behind it.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but we think both kinds of people are incredibly stupid. In our collective opinion, those Americans who are blind to new facts and details are far more harmful to the continued stability and strength of America than most of the hyper-partisan leaders in either major party.

Those kinds of blind fools are the same idiots Steve Benen pointed out that have been desperately attempting - for almost four years now - to fit their hatred of President Obama and his administration into a "Watergate" frame that simply doesn't apply. Six times now, right wingers have attempted to claim something is "Obama's Watergate" - and six times they've failed.

We guarantee some of those on the right are already thinking the miscommunication of information regarding the terrorist attack in Libya that killed four Americans is yet another chance to revive the "Obama's Watergate" meme.

Those who've been blinded by their own hatred can't even see when crimes they've accused others of have been committed by people they support. The perfect example of this is the bogus voter fraud campaign that right-wing extremists waged against community organizing group ACORN in 2009 and 2010. After right-wing extremists effectively destroyed the organization with fraudulent lies and videos, ACORN was found to be not guilty of any voter fraud.

However, as the current exploding voter registration fraud scandal has proven, the Republican Party has been involved with their own kind of voter fraud since at least 2004 - with major issues from California to Florida.

While this kind of hypocrisy and stupidity does boil our blood, the fact is, it shouldn't.

Just as the pelican-loving idiot voters will most likely never change, there will always be those in any political system, from every ideological background, who simply can't follow the rules. The difference between us and the pelican-lovers?

We're not blind to the fact that each situation and candidate should be looked at individually and evaluated on its own merit.

We hope you choose not to be a bird-brained fool either.

Debatable Conduct

There are few things in life that are not debatable. One of them is the forecast for political news events in America through the end of this year. That timetable is packed - especially over the next five weeks.

To start with, there will be plenty of debates between Congressional candidates between now and election day. Bob Kerrey and Deb Fischer have already had two debates, with another scheduled for tonight. Sen. Claire McKaskill and Rep. Todd Akin have also had their first debate, which didn't go quite so well for Akin. The first presidential debate between President Obama and Mitt Romney will happen on Wednesday night. Finally, the ultimate forum for formal debate, the Supreme Court, is back in session this week.

In short, Americans have a lot to discuss, though it seems we're often reluctant to actually say anything of value at all in our political debates. HBO's 'The Newsroom' pointed out this summer, more clearly than ever, that the current American presidential debate format isn't really set up to address any ideas seriously, good or bad.

What's worse, in our current American political atmosphere, once a candidate has said something significant - especially if it's bad - too many people tend to just keep shoveling the lies down their political gullet, reluctantly swallowing the party line instead of standing up and debating even whether that's the right thing to do.

On Sunday, it was a surprise to see New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie - who usually seems to swallow almost everything in front of him that's edible - unwilling to swallow and regurgitate the new Republican Party line on Akin.

Akin, in case you'd forgotten, is the House backbencher from Missouri who stated earlier this year that some kinds of rape are effectively justified. On Friday, Akin got into more trouble, saying he opposed the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act that was the first piece of legislation President Obama signed into law. This was just a day after Akin had misogynistically whined that McKaskill's debate performance wasn't really "ladylike."

Gov. Christie made his position clear on ABC's 'This Week' saying that the Republican Party should NOT be behind Akin after the "reprehensible" comments from the Missouri legislator. While we disagree with most of Christie's policies and style, at least he showed he was his own man.

Bob Kerry did something similar in his Friday debate performance against Deb Fischer.

Kerrey refused to repeat strictly Democratic party lines, as he assertively questioned Fischer on both issues of spending and taxation, and on the issue of earned benefits like Social Security and Medicare. Fischer's 'solutions' - if they could be called that - were nothing more than boilerplate GOP rhetoric. Fischer may as well have had Karl Rove and Grover Norquist pulling all her strings from the rafters.

Kerrey spoke out in the debate, noting what common-sense clear-headed Nebraskans have said for years is really undebatable: That our government MUST take in more revenue to pay down our bills AND we must find ways to cut unnecessary expenses from those earned benefit programs, at the same time. Not surprisingly, Fischer just continued spouting the extremist right-wing slogans she'd obviously been force-fed.

We'd love to see a real debate tonight between Kerrey and Fischer, and another this Wednesday between President Obama and Mr. Romney, of the kind outlined in 'The Newsroom'. We're just not going to hold our breath it'll happen.