SHOULD CANDIDATES HOLD DEBATES FOR PORK?

[jakaswanga]

SHOULD CANDIDATES HOLD PUBLIC DEBATES FOR PORK?

I hope this topic was not debated before the last elections, such that a similar thread is already burried somewhere deep in the archives of Jukwaa. But here I go.

Should the media houses gang up to come up with a forum, or formats, to force the candidates running for President of the republic, to engage and be engaged live on TV debates? whereby the formula can later be extended to other candidates for other offices like governor of Nairobi too.

I think so, and because I have no intentions of discovering the wheel twice over, I would suggest our journalistic rambos, top predators in the game that is, be sponsored by their Houses to the USA to learn the fines.

Formats. For example [1] Duration.
[2] How many candidates maximum per debate.
[3] Single anchor journalist, or panel of?
[4] Nature of questions and their % distribution
--confrontational or leading? Levels of toughness.
[ii] Open or bonhomie? [iii] Demeanor: British bone-crushing ala Paxman,
[..] or submissive like French journalists before their emperor-president?
[5] Chance to make [propaganda] statements, or
[ii] journalist is inquisitor come strict schoolmaster.
etc etc etc

Without a standardisation of bars or hurdles, debates would be irrelevant anarchy I think. Competitions in cheap promos.

PS: And, importantly, what sanctions to absenteeism?

[raiswakesho]

90% of Kenyans vote everything else other than issues therefore a national debate to influence the 10% is unnecessary. I'd rather have such debates during runoffs when all the jokers have been sifted.

[jakaswanga]

Aug 26, 2012 21:45:59 GMT 3 raiswakesho said:

90% of Kenyans vote everything else other than issues therefore a national debate to influence the 10% is unnecessary. I'd rather have such debates during runoffs when all the jokers have been sifted.

Rais,

How about thinking about it as a much more structured forum of the usual weekend funeral politics? Only this time one does not get away with all the nonsense, because opposition is standing right beside him?

you could be surprised how entertaining it could become to viewers, and before you know it, you have a winning pro gramme. Worth experimenting with I would say.

[OtishOtish]

Aug 26, 2012 21:58:36 GMT 3 jakaswanga said:

How about thinking about it as a much more structured forum of the usual weekend funeral politics?.

Don't under-estimate such events unless you can come up with better ones for announcing assassination plots.

[b6k]

Aug 26, 2012 18:34:05 GMT 3 jakaswanga said:

SHOULD CANDIDATES HOLD PUBLIC DEBATES FOR PORK?

I hope this topic was not debated before the last elections, such that a similar thread is already burried somewhere deep in the archives of Jukwaa. But here I go.

Should the media houses gang up to come up with a forum, or formats, to force the candidates running for President of the republic, to engage and be engaged live on TV debates? whereby the formula can later be extended to other candidates for other offices like governor of Nairobi too.

I think so, and because I have no intentions of discovering the wheel twice over, I would suggest our journalistic rambos, top predators in the game that is, be sponsored by their Houses to the USA to learn the fines.

Formats. For example [1] Duration.
[2] How many candidates maximum per debate.
[3] Single anchor journalist, or panel of?
[4] Nature of questions and their % distribution
--confrontational or leading? Levels of toughness.
[ii] Open or bonhomie? [iii] Demeanor: British bone-crushing ala Paxman,
[..] or submissive like French journalists before their emperor-president?
[5] Chance to make [propaganda] statements, or
[ii] journalist is inquisitor come strict schoolmaster.
etc etc etc

Without a standardisation of bars or hurdles, debates would be irrelevant anarchy I think. Competitions in cheap promos.

PS: And, importantly, what sanctions to absenteeism?

Jakaswanga, Citizen's Breakfast Show has been airing joint interviews (not quite debates) with prospective candidates of the new County slots. All it would take is a bit of tweaking & then slotting it in prime time as opposed to AM. With the old school retiring (at least most of them) it could be something that the "younger" (& young at heart) politicians would go for.

[furaha]

Jakaswanga,

In principle it is good idea but also one that is hard to implement in a country that does not yet have a political debate culture. The political culture is one of back room dealings and
party-hopping, based on perceived ethnic strength. But it is important to keep up the demand for issue-based politics and that includes public policy debates among contenders for electoral office, from country level on up.

It might be easier to push this notion at county level where it is less complicated for the electorate to link individual politicians promises to their subsequent performance. At that level monitoring is less complex. But it also requires civic education for the electorate. They have to be aware of what one might reasonably expect from a new county government. Asking for a eight lane super highway to your county because Thika has one, is not going to fly... Voters have to be keenly aware of the options available and of the choices favored by different candidates. So you have to work from both ends. Isn't this the kind of work that John Githongo and others are supporting through Inuka ni sisi? I don't know how far they have come but last time I checked they said they were quietly chipping away.

But it is also important to keep plugging away at the national level, making it clear that politicians who shy away from debate on policy issues are emperors without clothes. Create expectations, create demand. And the voters will respond. Remember how they booted out some 70 percent of incumbent MPs for non-delivery in 2007. Incidentally, that is also one of the reasons why we should not delude ourselves about 2013: The rigging will be worse than ever because the candidates know better than to trust the voters...

[Omwenga]

Aug 26, 2012 18:34:05 GMT 3 jakaswanga said:

SHOULD CANDIDATES HOLD PUBLIC DEBATES FOR PORK?

I hope this topic was not debated before the last elections, such that a similar thread is already burried somewhere deep in the archives of Jukwaa. But here I go.

Should the media houses gang up to come up with a forum, or formats, to force the candidates running for President of the republic, to engage and be engaged live on TV debates? whereby the formula can later be extended to other candidates for other offices like governor of Nairobi too.

I think so, and because I have no intentions of discovering the wheel twice over, I would suggest our journalistic rambos, top predators in the game that is, be sponsored by their Houses to the USA to learn the fines.

Formats. For example [1] Duration.
[2] How many candidates maximum per debate.
[3] Single anchor journalist, or panel of?
[4] Nature of questions and their % distribution
--confrontational or leading? Levels of toughness.
[ii] Open or bonhomie? [iii] Demeanor: British bone-crushing ala Paxman,
[..] or submissive like French journalists before their emperor-president?
[5] Chance to make [propaganda] statements, or
[ii] journalist is inquisitor come strict schoolmaster.
etc etc etc

Without a standardisation of bars or hurdles, debates would be irrelevant anarchy I think. Competitions in cheap promos.

PS: And, importantly, what sanctions to absenteeism?

Brother Jakaswanga,

Your is a great idea about debating among vying candidates but I have several reservations:

First, ours is a political culture driven by sound-bites and I am unaware of any policy or issue anyone can explain, let alone make sense in sound bites.

Once anyone tries to explain policy or an issue, everyone is tuned off or asleep 2 minutes into it.

To sustain even an hour long public debate on TV would only attract people like you, I and some other Jukwaists whose minds are already made up with respect to who they'll support or vote for.

Second, we have a serious issue of tribalism and ethnicity which cannot be resolved by the candidates merely debating for even the worst of tribalists can and will find ways to say the right things on debate while doing the very opposite in real politics.

Better we try and find ways to soften these hardcore tribalists and the only one I know that's effective is trying to change the hearts and souls of our very own brethren on these fora and on the ground.

I previously blogged about a friend who is no longer a friend because he discovered I am a Raila supporter in Why Do People Hate So Much: A Personal Story Involving A Friend, omwenga.com/2011/06/05/why-do-people-hate-raila-so-much-a-personal-story-involving-a-friend-who-no-longer-is-because-of-my-support-for-raila/.

I occasionally send a text to this fellow, which he invariably never responds but was not too surprised to receive a call from him the other day.

We can in our own small way make a difference in turning people's mindsets and viewpoints, especially if genuinely couched on the belief we must strife to find that which unites and not divides us.

Third and somewhat related to the previous point, if debates were to occur, the only effective mode of conveying them would have to be through broadcast media and given the low number of viewers with access, the net contribution they'll make would be minimal to the extent those with access already know these candidates very well and can make an informed decision about them.

Notwithstanding all this, however, I think debating will be very effective only in the diaspora where there are a number of Kenyans that are completely tuned off or otherwise not in touch with the goings on with politics at home.

These Kenyans do get some excitement when people visit from home and if these can be candidates coming in one venue to debate and have it broadcast, many will surely learn a thing or two about these candidates.

With the government giving every indication they're not in a hurry to make it possible for the diaspora to vote as provided in the constitution, I don't see this happening until the next circle, anyway.

[jakaswanga]

Omwenga Yo, debates, when well organized and structured, are very great learning affairs. Even if the target audience is perceived to be emm .. gullible. I do not know whether you still remember your primary school debates, eg: a teacher is better than a doctor. Mother is better than father. Christianity is better than Islam. Polygamy is better than monogamy etc etc.
Don't you remember that, outside sports, these were some of the high points of primary school? with the debating master coaching on how to present arguments, the formal --British way of expressing disagreement. Always addressing the speaker, never the opponent directly. Always my learned friend or honorable member. I am sure you remember how this all changed 'verbal behaviour' and logical flow in presentation of the boys and girls!

If we have to take our politicians through 'primary school' in debating, so be it then as we must start somewhere!

Omwenga, Furaha, b6k,

Perhaps you can help me here. I have not managed to revise it, but I believe in the crucial days of the USA, in the run up to the civil war, there was a traveling circus of debates between congress aspirants, and also presidential aspirants. The most famous show were the ones between Abraham Lincoln and his opponent, Stephen Douglas, some of them held in cattle-market places, later becoming so famous that thousands would attend (forcing the invention of a loud speaker system --joke!)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln%E2%80%93Douglas_debates_of_1858
These debates have become legendary because of the eloquence and clarity of mind with which the protagonists dealt with the key subjects, some of them, like the issue of slavery, splitting the young nation to the core, and later indeed into civil war.
That is America 200 years ago! surely we can manage such a feat today in Kenya?

Unless what you are telling me is that the candidates are of such an inferior level, that there is no hope in hell of such a feat in our country.

[b6k]

Aug 29, 2012 20:04:42 GMT 3 jakaswanga said:

Omwenga, Furaha, b6k,

Perhaps you can help me here. I have not managed to revise it, but I believe in the crucial days of the USA, in the run up to the civil war, there was a traveling circus of debates between congress aspirants, and also presidential aspirants. The most famous show were the ones between Abraham Lincoln and his opponent, Stephen Douglas, some of them held in cattle-market places, later becoming so famous that thousands would attend (forcing the invention of a loud speaker system --joke!)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln%E2%80%93Douglas_debates_of_1858
These debates have become legendary because of the eloquence and clarity of mind with which the protagonists dealt with the key subjects, some of them, like the issue of slavery, splitting the young nation to the core, and later indeed into civil war.
That is America 200 years ago! surely we can manage such a feat today in Kenya?

Unless what you are telling me is that the candidates are of such an inferior level, that there is no hope in hell of such a feat in our country.

Jakaswanga, it's difficult to compare the two political systems (US/Kenya) since they operate, at least on the face of it, in diametrically opposed ways. In the US, flawed as it is, you still have a system wherein it is understood that those willing to participate in it usually do so voluntarily at great detriment to their own personal well being, financially speaking. For the most part, an American politician will most likely be taking a serious pay-cut in order to participate in the process. It is a service to country.

In Kenya the opposite is true. Our politicians are not volunteers for service for the better of the country but mercenaries who are after the hefty perks, in terms of the big salary, & "other" goodies that come with the job which can only be referred to as "eating" be it from tenders, kick-backs, or whatever the case may be. Our politicians therefore are gunning for lucrative cushy jobs that increase, exponentially , what they would've accumulated legitimately in business, law, or whatever their careers may have been. In short, it is a vocation, not a service.

Do you really expect such looters to come up with legendary debates when their minds are concentrated on what they can eat/loot?

[jakaswanga]

Aug 31, 2012 8:56:45 GMT 3 b6k said:

Jakaswanga, it's difficult to compare the two political systems (US/Kenya) since they operate, at least on the face of it, in diametrically opposed ways. In the US, flawed as it is, you still have a system wherein it is understood that those willing to participate in it usually do so voluntarily at great detriment to their own personal well being, financially speaking. For the most part, an American politician will most likely be taking a serious pay-cut in order to participate in the process. It is a service to country.

In Kenya the opposite is true. Our politicians are not volunteers for service for the better of the country but mercenaries who are after the hefty perks, in terms of the big salary, & "other" goodies that come with the job which can only be referred to as "eating" be it from tenders, kick-backs, or whatever the case may be. Our politicians therefore are gunning for lucrative cushy jobs that increase, exponentially , what they would've accumulated legitimately in business, law, or whatever their careers may have been. In short, it is a vocation, not a service.

Do you really expect such looters to come up with legendary debates when their minds are concentrated on what they can eat/loot?

No, b6k, indeed I wont compare them much, even 200 years apart. ;D Though we should not have any excuses for [Kenya] always being at the bottom of everything, except when the negatives are being heralded

Your analysis of our political elite is correct. But also says a lot about our journalists and media. This is where the structure of the debate, or the format, comes in, as a disciplining, organising force. Depending on the aptitude of the media houses, a panel of hot journalists can definitely take the politicians through their paces on various topics. A sustained inquisition can ferret out a fake very quickly. But I think this is one of the reasons these candidates have been seducing Macharia in the background. To destroy any idea of tough questionnaire debates. (reduce them to women's mag celebrity interviews)

I reckon politicians anywhere getting away with nonsense also means worthless journalists, or cowed journalism, as in dictatorships.

--I will just be posting on the Obama thread, reviews of the speech by Romney's running mate on the GOP ticket, Paul Ryan, at the caucus in Tampa. Journalists, even friendly ones, have torn him to pieces for peddling provable falsehoods. One of the hottest studs in Congress in the last years, is on the run from journalists, on defensive from accusations of being less than not smart. That is a tribute to hot journalists. Even the conservative journeymen at Fox have called him an ordinary cheat. Not ready to cover up for him.

Those tame twitter things I see Karua, Raila and Kalonzo engaging in are a sham. And they know it.

Also, it looks like the culture of debates has caught on around the world. So it is adaptable to local conditions! There was a pistol fished out in Iraq. In Greece it came to blows in the studio --nobody had had the foresight to plan for Mr. T, so the boxing match went on for quite a while. In Korea a karateka kidnapped the mike. In Taiwan, a candidate threatened the journalist who asked him an impossible question: I will send you to mainland China, to learn some manners!

But the public keeps asking for more! Debates are a winner! And good entertainment.

[destiny]

I have said Ruto would emerge tops in any debate, his fortunes in the opinion polls would surge- give the devil his dues- the man has a sharp brain and a fast tongue. He would thus be the biggest beneficiary, although I doubt these guys would agree on the anything apart from hiking their already bloated salaries. Martha Karua would easily romp home second- seen how she floors grown men in Bunge?>>>>>>>>>> Good idea but not coming any time soon, anything that exposes deception and fraud will be resisted by the big shot elites gunning for the big house on the hill.

[kamalet]

Tuju and Ruto would come tops in my view.

Unfortunately it is not such fora and issues debated that decides who becomes president in Kenya. You can be certain it will be more mundane matters that will determine the presidency, and the lot we have leading us is a good example!

[Deleted]

I was reading this piece, taking for ever, getting distracted multi-tasking...all the while thinking hmm interetesting piece...worth signing into jukwaa to post. i read on and come across what is surely a criticism of the moderation @ jukwaa. i thought double hmm! i'll post it here now!
i'll say that though the moderator @ jukwaa has been lacking and is called out by JOE ADAMA, as "the interlocutors are not seated comfortably in the throne-like furnishings so beloved of Kenyan leaders whether on the jukwaa or in Parliament." I say though that this moderator takes exception to the lumping of jukwaa with kenyan parliarmentarians.


PRESIDENTIAL DEBATES-NOT GAME CHANGERS

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 2012 - 00:00 -- BY JOE ADAMA

Prime Minister Raila Odinga.
The live-broadcast ICC proceedings and chief justices’ vetting paved the way for the united media sectors’ titanic debate initiative, but all Kenyans need to be clear-eyed and clear-headed about the limits of the forthcoming multimedia political extravaganza, argues JOE ADAMA

The live vetting process for nominees to top posts in Kenya’s revamped Judiciary in 2011 on FM radio and TV demonstrated that there is a very large audience, in the millions of listeners and viewers, in this country, for issues-based content.

Months before the vetting of Dr Willy Mutunga for President of the Supreme Court and Chief Justice of Kenya came the veritable thriller of the live televised and FM radio proceedings from the International Criminal Court at The Hague, whose climax was the towering clash between Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta and the then ICC Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo.

On the afternoon and evening of the Ocampo versus Uhuru encounter, a number of listenership and viewership ratings records were surely smashed in Kenya.

Only a World Cup final could transfix and bring this country to a standstill the way this court encounter did. Kenyans’ appetite for live FM radio and TV coverage of issues of the most dramatic national interest has therefore been thoroughly whetted in recent years and months.

This is the tested and tried background against which Kenya’s inaugural presidential debate announced this week by the multimedia news sector will take place beginning on November 26, 2012.

This media event seeks to emulate some of the dynamics of the American presidential debate face-offs and is the first of its kind in Africa.

It was unveiled midweek by no less an array of media personages than the CEOs of the electronic, print and online houses at Nairobi’s Serena Hotel, traditional venue of some of the most signal political developments of the multiparty era.

The contenders so far declared for the race to succeed President Mwai Kibaki at State House were invited to participate in the debates by the combined media CEOs.

Eight TV stations and 32 FM stations nationwide will air the unprecedented debates. The participating TV stations are KISS TV, NTV, KASS TV, KTN, Citizen TV, K24, KBC and QTV.

First Huge Advertising Spend of 2013 Campaign?

The presidential contenders are Prime Minister Raila Odinga and his deputies Uhuru and Musalia Mudavadi, Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka, Cabinet ministers Charity Ngilu, Eugene Wamalwa, Moses Wetang’ula, MPs Martha Karua (Gichugu), Peter Kenneth (Gatanga), William Ruto (Eldoret North) Mutava Musyimi (Gachoka), Cyrus Jirongo and former Permanent Secretary Prof James ole Kiyiapi.

The target audience is expected to top both The Hague proceedings and the Judiciary nominee vetting hearing combined or any sports event of recent years.

It could also see the first mega-million-shilling advertising spend of the General Election campaign as advertisers scramble to position themselves across the radio and TV channels in a bid to woo a more-or-less captive audience.

The advertisers that open, play at intermission and cap the debates are likely to pay top dollar for the opportunity. It will be interesting to see whether civil society and other civic education/awareness providers will be in on the massive advertising action too.

Kenyans have never before made their presidential voting decisions on the basis of live broadcasts of debating rivals. Indeed, Kenyans are traditionally leery of presidential candidate promissory notes, from campaign rally pledges to manifestoes to inaugural addresses.

Nonetheless these debates will comprise some of the most significant declarations of intent between November and the actual Inaugural Address by the Fourth President of Kenya towards the end of the first quarter of 2013.

The Reinforcing Effect

But, exciting as the prospect is, all sides should enter the forthcoming great political entertainment clear-eyed, clear-headed and well aware that it is not going to be a game changer.

Most Kenyans, including the media CEOs, have never heard of what US journalist Paul Brandus calls “The Reinforcing Effect” with reference to the US presidential debates.

Writing on the eve of the Barack Obama-Mitt Romney debate under the headline “What history tells us about presidential debates”, Brandus observed:

“In 2012, most Americans who will vote have already made up their minds. Tens of millions will back Romney; tens of millions will back Obama.

They need no convincing, particularly not in this hyper-partisan era, and will see tonight's debate as a validation for their pre-existing views — what I call ‘the reinforcing effect’. We know, for example, that Latinos and blacks will go for Obama, while whites and men will go for Romney.

We also know that when it comes to states, and the quest for 270 electoral votes, that Obama will carry California, Romney Texas, and so forth. Frankly, most states and most voters don't matter at this point. Both candidates tonight will try to ‘reinforce’ the views that the vast majority of voters already have of them”.

And so it is with Kenya. In the battle-state ethnic vote blocs, minds are largely already made up to the point of being closed minds as regards who to vote for in the presidential polls.

The ‘Don’t Knows’ and the ‘Undecided’ of Kenya belong to the category Brandus describes in America as not mattering at this late point in the game.

And while it is true that Kenya is changing and a new generation is making use of digital media, from the news media of mass communications to social media networks that previous generations never had the opportunity to, this first presidential debate will have only a cosmetic impact and be regarded widely as entertainment.

Until recently, the biggest captive-audience political events relayed live by broadcast media in this country were National Day parades held on public holidays and spiced with military guards of honour, march-pasts, mechanized units drive pasts and supersonic jetfighter fly-pasts, capped by the presidential Address to the Nation.

The Kanu one-party state of 1963 to 2002 made potent use indeed of the militarized National Day live broadcast device, using classic propaganda strategies to weave it expertly into the personality cult rule of both Founding President Mzee Jomo Kenyatta (1963-1978) and his successor Daniel arap Moi (1978-2002).

Media Feeding Frenzy Like No Other

Interestingly, the media bosses, led by Royal Media Services Managing Director Wachira Waruru, Chairman of the Presidential Debate’s Steering Council, indicated it would sponsor even the initiative’s post-debate analysis.

Standard Group Chief Executive Officer Sam Shollei said the secretariat will also select what he called “seasoned and independent political analysts to participate in post-debate analysis”.

The idea Shollei added, is to see “whether they think the candidates have addressed the issues or not”. Muthui Kariuki, a seasoned public relations practitioner and media adviser to the Vice President, told this correspondent that this sounds suspiciously like the presidential debate project would be paying selected analysts to return a verdict on the debates.

Kariuki warned of a media feeding frenzy with a difference throughout the inaugural debate, saying there would be a commercial advertising frenzy, a moderator-payment frenzy and a post-debate analysts’ payment frenzy.

Kariuki also opines that the Kenyan debate format is too large and unwieldy and runs the danger of becoming a latter-day House of Babel. In his opinion, only the top five candidates should be enjoined in the debate.

The pre-debate analysis has clearly begun, much of it unsolicited, for instance the present piece, and there will be speculation about how the various candidates are likely to perform.

For instance, some of the biggest beneficiaries, for all it is worth, of the coming debates are likely to be the ones who have put in the most practice in recent times, particularly The Hague pair of DPM Uhuru and Eldoret North MP William Ruto, both of whom are photogenic and articulate operatives.

On the same day that the multimedia bosses were unveiling their joint presidential debates initiative, Ruto was defending his record and character forcefully on the BBC World Service’s Hard Talk programme, one of the world’s most grueling broadcast interview experiences.

His hard-hitting interviewer sounded almost relieved to be done with Ruto at the end of the session. If you have not been on the receiving end of a Hard Talk session you are unlikely to have a more prepared mind, in a live broadcast milieu, than someone who has been and emerged intact.

Every candidate who participates in these debates, including the ones most
unlikely to succeed, will doubtless train with the concentration of an
Olympian athlete, including practicing before mirrors, handlers, family
and friends.

There Will Be Embarrassments

It will be interesting to see how the various candidates make total fools of themselves by, for instance, failing completely to get out of campaign rally mode, where they normally talk at, not to or with, their audiences, many of them rent-a-crowd idle youth.

There will be shouting matches and other embarrassments. There will be genuine surprises, for instance persons whose hidden articulateness and persuasiveness suddenly emerge in a moderated debate environment.

As a blogger on the Nation Media Group website by the name of MzalendoWakwetu commented on Thursday, “This is a very good move but I think they should first weed out the jokers.

I cant wait to see Peter Kenneth and Raphael Tuju taking on these so called ‘frontrunners’ ''. Blogger JohnAchima was even more blunt: “Very little will change. Remember there are some people who understand better when their own man is explaining things no matter whether the other person is using the same words as their man, and this cuts across the total population be it the elite, the middle class or the gandawalas.

That is why you will find the ideals of a Luhya, a Luo, a Kikuyu, a Kalenjin, a Kamba, a Kisii etc living in America, Europe or Australia sounding the same as of those living in Kenya”.

Whatever happens, the moderators will have their hands full. In the American tradition that the Kenyan debaters will be emulating, the interlocutors are not seated comfortably in the throne-like furnishings so beloved of Kenyan leaders whether on the jukwaa or in Parliament.

They are on their feet – or what global US broadcaster CNN describes as ‘toe-to-toe’ – throughout the session, under intense studio lighting. Indeed, the American debaters redefine the line about ‘thinking on your feet’.

Presidential debates broadcast live are only as old as 1960, when the suave John Fitzgerald Kennedy faced off with the dour and sweaty Richard Milhous Nixon, after which the debates took a 16-year break.

In America, there is an independent Commission on Presidential Debates which decides the sites of the encounters, invariably universities.

A single moderator, drawn from the independent broadcast sector and with nationwide household-name recognition, guides the debate, which has the format of who goes first and who has the last word. No debater can have both.

In the lead-up to the recent presidential debate between Obama and Romney, CNN observed: “But although debates aren't typically seen as deciding an election's outcome, there have been a few exceptions over time . . .

Sometimes it's not the debate that hurts a candidate – it's the post-game review. In 2000, cameras caught a visibly annoyed Al Gore sighing and shaking his head when George W. Bush spoke.

“The clip was played over and over again and lampooned on television, to the point that "people began to project onto Gore a personality trait of just annoyance and irritation of people in general ," according to historian Doris Kearns Goodwin [author of the classic Team of Rivals – the Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln].

A clear favourite before the debates, Gore lost his lead during the debate season. He eventually lost the controversial election after the Supreme Court ruled in Bush's favor”.

Watch out for the Gore moments in Kenya and whether their repeated replays have significant post-game review impacts!

www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-94934/presidential-debates-not-game-changers

[jakaswanga]

2017 RESIDENTIAL DEBATE: NO, NOT FOR UHURU, NOT FOR RAILA!

Uhuru Kenyatta has chickened out of the debate, followed closely by the main challenger, Raila Odinga. The election being more or less a two-horse thingy between the two political mafiosi, their NO-SHOW steals the thunder out of the event.

Sort of.

Because it is not as bad as it looks. Methinks the NO-SHOW codes a powerful message, in reverse, one as important as any. This is the message of dread, the message of fear. The insecurity that under sustained interrogation in a setting they do not control, a disaster could unfold. Their wolves toes, which their shining shoes and trendy socks ever desperately seek to hide, could be exposed enough to create doubt of their pedigree; their raven claws, photoshoped as manicured nails and polished fingers, could be seen through and their mutant genotype revealed; their predator tongues, which so sleekly lick Wanjiku sweet at rallies while their tubular sabres drain her life-blood at night, could slip just enough to send the people into fright, grimacing with clouds of other thoughts! Like, kill the beasts!

Recently in far-way Britain, Dame Teresa May opted out of the premiership debates. She had a country to run, no time to waste, and certainly no time to indulge with her lofty presence, some loafers conniving to wreck her scheduled landslide. But no one was fooled. The truer reasons were murkier. The incumbent PM of the UK had a serious handicap. A kind of 'debate frigidity' where, under pressure, she could just mentally freeze and intellectually fizzle out. The gentle British put it famously as 'she can't think on her feet!'. Or, tabloid version, she likely faks better on her feet than she thinks on them!
In the event, Jeremy Corbyn stole the show and converted it into home run after home run.

In Kenya both favourites or fakes are too scared to appear! Word is there would be sustained and repeated questions about corruption, opined by many Kenyans in polls to be at least as dangerous to the nation as (Shabaab) terrorism. So why this innocent until proved guilty babysits for the corrupt, but not for the Shabaab, both evils being even to the public!?

ATPU will eliminate Sabaabo on site, no?

Think about it. Why would Uhuru and Amollo subject themselves to such dangerous questionnaires!?

Well, they say they were not consulted in advance! They are lying of course, but since when did you catch Odinga and Kenyatta dieting on truth serum!?