As bad ideas go, Newt Gingrich’s challenge to President Obama to meet him for a series of Lincoln-Douglas debates has something for everyone.
For Gingrich supporters, it has them chomping at the bit to see the best of the Republican presidential pack as a debater take on a president who pretty good rhetorical chops. For Obama supporters, it raises the prospect of the incumbent disemboweling the challenger over his whackier ideas. For a public exhausted by the never ending Republican debates, it provides an excuse for tuning them out.
In any event, debates have never provided defining moments in modern American political history.
Although John F. Kennedy is said to have cinched the 1960 election by out-debating Richard Nixon, the future president was done in by a lousy makeup job that made him appear tired and sinister, the latter being the case as we were to learn further down the road.
An exception to the defining moment thing was during a 1988 vice presidential debate between Democrat Lloyd Bentsen and gaff-prone Republican Dan Quayle, who had repeatedly compared himself to JFK during stump speeches. This prompted Bentsen to quip, “Senator, I knew Jack Kennedy, and you’re no Jack Kennedy.”
Then there are the specifics of Gingrich’s proposal: The Lincoln-Douglas debates had a highly regimented format — an hour-long opening from one candidate, a 90-minute rebuttal from the other, and a half-hour rejoinder to wrap it up.
This is something akin to sitting through a performance of Wagner’s entire Ring Cycle and would appear to favor Obama, who is quick on his feet while being thoughtful and logical compared to Gingrich, who also is nimble but allows his fertile imagination to override what sensibility he may have.