“If debates had been forums where legitimate policy differences were explored in a long-form, meaningful way, then I’d probably be frustrated by this chaotic turn. But they weren’t, they sucked, and now they’re (mostly) dead.”

—Reason’s Liz Wolfe reviewing the Haley-DeSantis debate along with Trump’s counter-programming “town hall” on Fox News

She adds elsewhere in her article,

“Has the old-school debate format been broken? In the past, debate stages were crowded, debates were relatively few, and nobody really dared opt out of them—even during primary season. Now, it’s all just chaos… if you didn’t watch any of the debates or counterprogramming, you probably made a good choice.. it’s actually kind of awesome how the pageantry of debates has been cracked open, how more formats than ever before are being experimented with…and how candidates such as Trump are making unconventional campaigning choices—opting out of all primary debates—in lieu of playing the game.”

It’s too bad, but Wolfe is right. From the very beginning, debates have injected random, misleading factors into the election process. For every instance where a debate legitimately illuminated something important about one of the candidates, there have been 20 where they had a disproportionate effect on public opinion. The main problem is that debating skill, or even public speaking skills, are not necessarily markers of leadership competence. Vivek Ramaswamy has been giving a master class on that.

The second most notable factor undermining debates as a useful civic information tool is the now intolerable level of journalism bias. Repeatedly, agenda-driven journalist moderators have sabotaged the candidates they opposed while assisting those they supported. They insist on asking silly questions, like last night’s challenge to Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis to say something positive about their rival.

The final metaphorical nail in the coffin of these theoretically useful but in practice confounding spectacles has been the erosion of even minimal civility among the participants, a trend I blame on Donald Trump’s success in 2016 using ad hominem attacks and insults like “Little Marco.”

I am certain that President Biden’s handlers won’t let him get near a debate stage, and Trump would be wise to avoid debates as well. If Kamala Harris is a candidate, she would be foolish to engage in debates where her penchant for tossing word salads would be encouraged. The Presidential debate is indeed dead.

Good.