Jon Sopel: "TV debates can be enriching, but also soul-sapping"

The first televised presidential debate took place in the extremely closely fought 1960 election, and pitched a youthful, telegenic John F Kennedy against the saturnine, slightly sweaty Richard Nixon. In an instant, politics had changed. Image suddenly mattered. How you came through "the tube" became much more an arbiter of success than whether or not you were a fine, declamatory orator on the stump. And with that, the soundbite was born and is now celebrating its 64th birthday.

It took Britain until 2010 to hold its first prime ministerial debates, after years of unsuccessful attempts by broadcasters, when their strenuous efforts foundered. The party that was well ahead in the polls always found a reason not to go ahead.

Television debates prize the pithy over the rambling; they are also revealing of character in ways that the political leaders can’t control. Flashes of temper, moments of vulnerability, the nervous tic, any shiftiness are all picked up by the unsparing studio lights and the uncaring camera lens.

Remember Ronald Reagan, when his age was an issue in the 1984 election? His line that he wouldn’t make his opponent’s youth and inexperience an issue was a mic-drop moment. Pure genius. It was deft and witty, and even had his opponent, Walter Mondale, laughing. Reagan went on to score a crushing victory.

It's great that the TV debate is now as ordinary a part of a British general election as kissing a bemused baby. Hard to think the clocks could be wound back on this. If we want an informed, educated electorate then debates play an important role in increasing political literacy.

But as a forum for detailed policy debate, they have limited value. The leaders are too rehearsed with soundbites they want to land on news bulletins, on X, Instagram and TikTok. And there is no correlation between winning the TV debate and winning the general election.

Remember the outbreak of Cleggmania that gripped the country in 2010? The poll on the night gave the Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, a jaw-dropping victory, taking 43 per cent of audience support, with David Cameron on 26 per cent and Gordon Brown trailing on 20. Those numbers did not transfer to the election.

But as we ready ourselves in Britain for the last of the televised head-to-heads between Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer, in the US they are readying themselves for the first of the presidential debates – the rematch of Donald Trump versus Joe Biden – scheduled for this Thursday. The rerun that next to no one in America wants or thinks is a good idea.

It’s less the Joe Frazier/Muhammad Ali rematch than two old men fighting over a Zimmer frame. The 78-year-old pitted against the one who is 81. It sounds like a ghastly and perverse reality TV show.

The funny thing is, just as the TV debate in the UK is firmly taking root, in the US there are more and more questions over their worth. When I was in Washington a couple of months ago, all the smart talk was that the debates wouldn’t happen.

It’s still possible they might not. Does Biden want to go up against a convicted felon? If Trump is ahead in the swing states, does he need to debate Biden? And in 2020, when I watched them brawl in Cleveland, it was the ugliest of TV encounters, a horror story of tetchiness.

The TV debates can be enriching. But also soul-sapping. Britain has learnt the value of the TV debate, but we should also be aware of the pitfalls.

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