Manchester, New Hampshire

I MUST POLITELY DISAGREE with my good friend and colleague, Mr. Barnes, the gentleman from around the corner in my office, whose reaction to last night’s debate, posted below, suggests a certain good-natured satisfaction with the whole proceeding. Fred says that we scribbler types are often disappointed with presidential debates because they’re boring, and fail to highlight whatever truly meaningful differences exist among the candidates, and whatnot–but, but, but. The implication being that there’s value even in the boringest, least substantively clarifying debates because somebody always wins, and someone else always loses, and since elections are about winning and losing . . . well, you get the point. Me, actually, I’m almost never disappointed by these debates, because they’re almost never boring–they almost can’t be boring–to the candidates themselves, none who has a pulse, at any rate. This is big-time politics at its most fraught and consequential for the human beings most immediately involved. Real careers are at stake. Dick Gephardt’s career is over, for example. We’re electing a president. I like to see how my next president behaves when the television cameras are on and he’s standing next to the other people each of whom is trying to deny him the winner-takes-all-prize he’s (usually) been planning his entire working life around. You can tell a lot about a man when his knees are shaking, even figuratively.

Which is one reason why I found this particular debate so exasperating.