By Don Schmitz
It was refreshing to watch the vice presidential candidates debate between JD Vance and Tim Walz. The BBC reported that the debate “felt like a civil and relatively restrained conversation about the issues at the top of American voters’ minds going into the 5 November election.”
Agreed, and as you may have noted I am increasingly searching for reporting from foreign sources as the media in America has abandoned any impartiality being shills for the left or the right. The history of American televised debates began in 1960 between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy. Those who listened on the radio thought Nixon won, but those who watched the smooth and polished Kennedy on TV thought he carried the day. Kennedy won the electoral college handily, but the actual votes were razor thin — less than 112,000 votes, or 0.2 percent. Nixon supporters urged him to demand a recount, suspecting fraud in Illinois and Texas, whereupon he replied “our country cannot afford the agony of a constitutional crisis.” Those days seem gone, perhaps because both Democrats and Republicans believe the other party is destroying the country. The decline started in the 2000 election between Al Gore and George W. Bush. The concept of a respectful interchange was lost when Gore walked over and tried to intimidate Bush standing next to him glowering. Small potatoes by today’s standards sadly. Worse was the jarring challenge by Gore of the election, the recounts in Florida, studying “hanging chads,” and the Supreme Court ruling that the Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris’s vote certification would stand. Some Democrats tried to stop the Congressional certification, which they did again in Bush’s reelection, and Trump’s election in 2016. The wrenching tragedy of Jan. 6 for the certification of President Biden is the worst example of all.
Negative campaigning has been common forever in America. John Adams called Alexander Hamilton “the bastard brat of a Scotch peddler,” Republicans accused Franklin Delano Roosevelt of being a Communist, and more recently Democratic Rep. William Clay of Missouri charged that Ronald Reagan was “trying to replace the Bill of Rights with fascist precepts lifted verbatim from Mein Kampf.” Criticizing President George W. Bush, billionaire Democratic contributor George Soros said, “(He displays the) supremacist ideology of Nazi Germany.” In a 2017 study, Oscar Winberg used the term “insult politics,” which are an “ad hominem attacks of a disparaging nature aimed at an individual or group.” This approach has been used to great effect by Biden, Pelosi, and Trump, whereas historically candidates would allow surrogates and media allies to do the gutter sniping.
Of course, none of this would transpire if it didn’t have a positive result for the candidates, which points the finger directly back to us as the voters and body politic. When Democrats call Republicans racists, xenophobic, homophobic misogynists, their base laps it up. Hillary Clinton called Trump supporters a “basket of deplorables” in 2016. When Republicans call Democrats socialists, racists, communists, and anarchists, their base applauds. Right now, I know many of you reading my column on both sides of the aisle are saying to yourselves, “Well, they are, and I can prove it”! OK, believe what you will, but don’t be shocked that our political leaders are using your rhetoric, they want your votes. However, Americans are growing weary of the vitriol. A 2019 Pew study found 85 percent say debate is more negative and less respectful, and only 76 percent believe it is fact based. 78 percent say heated rhetoric raises the risk of violence.
After an assassin barely missed killing Trump, Biden affirmed: “The political rhetoric in this country has gotten very heated. It’s time to cool it down.” Yet within days the labeling of Trump as a threat to democracy and a Nazi started right back up again, and a second assassin tried to kill him. Enough. Even if our deeply jaded views of each other are true, there is a better way.
I’ve never been impressed with those who utilize ad hominem attacks in a debate, which is supposed to be illustrative to the audience of the issues and positions. Yelling over each other and personal insults do nothing to accomplish much. We can stay true to our beliefs, and fight hard for them, without being crass. In 1984, Reagan was running for reelection against Walter Mondale, and at 73 Reagan’s age was an issue. When queried about age by the moderator, he replied; “I will not make age an issue of this campaign. I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent’s youth and inexperience.” Mic drop, as Mondale along with the audience laughed. Reagan won reelection by 49 states. It’s not hopeless: the Mitt Romney v. Barack Obama debates were the epitome of classy decorum and intellectual detail. Vance and Walz have shown us that we can return to those days, and we should.