In 2013 I wrote a column about political debates.
I said: "the popular introductory politics textbook by Dickerson and Flanagan reads... the main purpose of the debate is not to produce better arguments overall but to generate powerful short stretches of political theatre that can be played over and over on news programs and be incorporated into advertising..." This is sad but generally true.
Thursday night was not one of those debates.
Maclean's magazine held the first leaders' debate with Paul Wells in the moderator's chair. The format was interesting. Well's eliminated the typical one or two minute introductory comments and headed straight into questions.
The first question was directed at one of the candidates (randomly selected) and then a second candidate responded and finally all the candidates could jump in. Without doubt this led to some jockeying to get into the conversation. My daughter suggested that Elizabeth May needed a few pre-scripted lines like: "Excuse me did the middle of my sentence interrupt the beginning of yours..." but, despite the interruptions, May did fight her way into the melee.
As I watched I was following along with Twitter. In 2013, I wrote: "A... study was published in 2010 in Germany using Twitter as the basis for analysis... [showed] evidence of lively political debate...[but] this discussion [was] still dominated by a small number of users: only four per cent of all users accounted for more than 40 per cent of the messages.
I would certainly like to see a study like this in 2015. The Twitter feed was buzzing last night. There were comments on both the leaders themselves and on policy issues.
Yet, because the debate was not broadcast on any of the national network channels one has to wonder who was watching and who was tweeting? Also, it would be interesting to see the age range of Twitter users since our youth are still not likely to vote in a general election.
I didn't get the sense that there were many sound bite moments in the debate. It felt like the leaders were generally "off script" except for the favourite "go-to" which is the appeal to the "middle-class."
Everyone running for election these days, even candidates in the United States, are trying to speak to this rather nebulous group.
A video is available on the Globe and Mail website to explain the use of the term "middle-class" and I recommend you watch it. Sherrill Sutherland explains that the use of the term is like a catch-all because it can mean many different things. She shows that the "middle-class" can be measured by: income, life-style or by simple self-identification. That is to say, "I think I am middle-class so I am middle-class."
The measures of middle-class income are so widely debated that they aren't really meaningful. It occurred to me while listening to the debate that someone living in poverty might wonder where they fit into the plans of any of the political parties.
Another interesting moment for me was the flair-up over the Clarity Bill. As a teacher I often have to make sure that I don't assume that my students know about historic events. I couldn't help but wonder during the debate who was left behind on the discussion about the Clarity Bill.
The bill was written after the 1995 referendum in Quebec and after a Supreme Court reference case on secession. The government realized that it had had no plan in place if the referendum had been successful. One of the central aspects of the bill was to clarify the necessary majority required for a yes vote to be successful.
The argument is that 50 percent plus one is not enough for Quebec to secede from Canada. In the end, the bill does not actually clarify very much. It lays out some vague rules about considering the size of the majority and the percentage of voters and "other matters that may be relevant."
I am not sure how much impact this discussion had but it was certainly lively.
Overall, the leaders were able to demonstrate the distinctive aspects of their policies and, over the next many weeks, I will have some time to compare and contrast those differences.
