Transcripts For CSPAN Co-Chairmen Of The Commission On 20130908

Next hyped the scenes with the cochairs of the commission on president ial debates, mike mccurry and frank. He was president bill clintons press secretary. They talked about the history and the future of the debate format. How the United States differs from other countries and reaching out to younger voters. From the Commonwealth Club of San Francisco this is an hour and 15 minutes. Good evening. And welcome to todays meeting of the Commonwealth Club of california. The place where youre in the know. I am dr. Mary marcy and im the president of Dominican University and a member of the Commonwealth Club board of governors and the moderator of todays program. Can you find us at commonwealthclub. Org and podcasts of past programs. Today its my pleasure to introduce a very interesting and relevant program. Planning is now underway for 2016. Even though we think of these debates as a regular part of the american political theme, few people understand the history and scope and influence. A few facts might provide perspective. U. S. President ial debates are every 4 years 1 of the most watched Television Programs in the United States usually behind only the superbowl, and indeed one of the most programs in the world. Usually theyre around 70 million plus viewers for each of the debates. While its easy to assume the debates have been with us since the Lincoln Douglas debates or the infamous Nixon Kennedy debate in fact their debate and in the assumption debates would be held is refreshingly non partisan event. One of its founders joins us today. Finally, the debates are an inspiration to emerging tkepl contractsies around the world. In the years with out president ial election the commission worked with developing democracies. Well talk about all of these, about the 2012 process and up coming debates and i think we might hear a few stories from our distinguished guests. It is my distinct honor to introduce mike mccurry and frank. Theyre familiar to much of the american public. Mike is probably most familiar to us from his time serving as press secretary to president bill clinton. In addition to that very public role, he has served in a range of high leadership positions since 1984. In addition to working with the u. S. Department of state and for such notable and Significant National leaders as daniel. A graduate of princeton, hes a partner of Public Strategies washington. Frankenstorm is also an Old Washington hand, albeit mostly pitching for the other team. His most visible roles are chairman. Republican party for six of reagans eight years. Leading longer than any person in the 20th century. He was present at the commission of president ial debates, founding this visionary effort in 1986. Hes a graduate of University Nevada reno and school of law at the university of california berkeley. So ill get us started and let you take it from there. Gentlemen, you clearly do not see eye to eye on most political issues. And you lead arguably the most successful non partisan effort in the nation, if not the world, through the commission on president ial debates. Tell us a little bit how that happened . Tell us about the mission and goals and how these fundamentally opposed views came together ill start since i was there at the birth. As you pointed out, mary, most people dont realize we went 16 years from the Nixon Kennedy debate to the next one. There was no way Lindon Johnson was going to allow barry gold water get up on stage with him. He said no way and after Richard Nixons experience in the 1960 debates with kennedy he also was not interested in debate. It wasnt until jerry ford was appointed president and was running against jimmy carter that there was in fact debates. And it started handled by the league of women voters. Four years later most people dont realize that i was at the first debate that was in baltimore. You know who the participants were . Ronald reagan and John Anderson a congressman from illinois. Jimmy carter refused to participate. Anderson was invited because the league of women voters said you had to be at 15 at the polls to participate. Anderson was 16. Jimmy carter said i wont debate if hes in it. Anderson fell at 12 at the second poll and carter and reagan began the debate. That began the Takeoff Point of the debate. In then in 1984 that series of debates had a great deal of controversy with the media because the two candidates were given the right to veto of moderator. In those days they had a moderator and 3 or 4 reporters and the two candidates vetoed over 90 reporters there. Were two independent studies done starting in 1985. One was at the institute of politics at harvard and the other was center of Strategic National studies at georgetown. Both were studying not just the debate process but both of them independently came to the conclusion there should be created an entity. Both groups came to the chairman and me and we created the commissioner in 1986. And we began our 25year run with the first debates in 1988 and have done every debate since. Mary, thats the history, but i think whats behind that history is really important. There were two National Party chairs, paul kirk who is my former employer, and my predecessor is the cochair of the commissioner. And frankenstorm who basically said it is the interest of the American People to set aside our partisan differences as democratic chair and republican chair in order to establish an independent commission that will guarantee the American People will get a look at the major candidates as president whoever they may be and not to Favor One Party or the other party but to make sure we have what we now have become accustomed to having which is face to face encounters between our candidates for president. That act was probably a bipartisan act but in fact kind of a non partisan act is something that is so rare in the culture of our politics now. I mean, i cant imagine the Republican National chairman and the democratic National Chairman getting together on anything these days. But savoring that moment of history in which people did something right for the interest of the whole country is something that we celebrate. The result of that these debates have become more or less institutionalized. It was not given that president ial candidates would debate. My old boss, bill clinton ducked out of one of the debates in 1986 but now over time i thought he had a conflict. [laughter] ive been on both ends of this on the candidates side and now on the commission side, so i know a little bit of the mischief that goes into this. But now, in 2012, was the first time and then barack obama agreed to all three of the debates that we planed and proposed and said, you pick the dates and the format and you pick the venues and well show up. And i think thats an extraordinary achievement and it goes to frankenstorm a tpraeub frafrank we always manied we would wear usa hats and we kept that pledge and thats why were still here. Something to follow up a little bit on wearing the usa hat part. In an area i dont think everyone is aware, the commission is involved in, and thats the commission what they do in off years. We cheer about the commission and theyre are visible during the year of president ial election. There is a tremendous amount of work in using the debates to reach out to other countries when its a nonpresident ial year. Could you talk a little bit about some of that. Let me describe a great occasion we had last week because people say what is this commission on debates do. Youre only busy once every four years. What do you do during the rest of the time. We have a committed staff led by an executive director janet brown and were in partnership with one of the organizations that help promotes democracy around the world. Weve had help theres a group on the republican side that helps us from time to time. Last week we gathered together all of the people who are just like me and frank who are debate commissioners from 19 Different Countries ranking from ive got it. From afghanistan and argentina arch, haiti, hall dove va, nigeria, paraguay. They are all countries which have now institutionalized some form of debates for their National Leadership. Their situations are much different. As we heard the stories last week, sometimes they do their work at gunpoint and therefore a broadcasting entity will air whatever debates they have. Its extraordinary work and everybody came together to share their best practices. Its important for the United States to be humble in situations like this. We learn some new things about techniques and formats and things from some of our partners from around the world who participate in this. The work of this commission now has gone global and we work with others who are in democratic societies and trying to promote the idea that those who seek National Leadership positions ought to get together to of civil discourse and dialogue and come pair their positions and confront each other on the issues that are important to the citizens of that country. Its gotten to the point where the e. U. For the first time will have president ial debates. Ill be going over to europe in september, late september, and meeting with all the parties who are going to be involved in setting up a process for e. U. Debates. Youll recall in National Elections in the u. K. They had their live televised debates can which was something new for them and some of our staff went over to help with the technical aspects of this. In addition to just the fact of getting people together and agreeing theyll come and sit and debate there is enormous technical difficulties in putting these debates on. The older folks in the audience will remember that great debate in 1976, 17 minutes where jerold ford and jimmy carter and the whole lights went out and everything went dark and they didnt have any clue what they were supposed to do. They stood for 17 minutes and didnt say a word to each other. Yeah. Theres a certain symmetry in the worries about National Discourse that were having a discussion with the commission which is serving as an International Model at the Commonwealth Club which is dedicated to civil discourse but it must be an enormous challenge to bring these candidates together and ensure there is a format that is fair and non partisan. We talked about the enormous Television Audience that the debates have and the enormous coverage they receive afterwards. How do the candidates try to gain the system and influence the format . That world has changed. When we started, paul and i used to sit down with the campaign manageers and it was called the debate over the debate. We would get in constant arguments with them back and forth. The candidates started to sign documents among themselves, 3740 page document, and at one time they came and said, you commission you will sign this document and youll get the moderators to sign the document. I told them very politely what they could do with the document. Wasnt very polite. Ha was the last time realistically that we have contacted them. We choose the sights and the dates. We choose the formats and made major changes in the formats this last time around. And we choose the moderators without any input whatsoever from the candidates. Now, some of the media still to this day knows were proponentses we have no contact and nothing do with the Political Parties or the campaigns. We dont get any money from them. We dont get any money from the federal government. We have reached that point. It was always two step forward and one back over 25 years i must tell you of battles. As mike said, both candidates not a word and realistically four years ago both candidates, no difficulty whatsoever with them. Well make some changes. For example, we always believed that the best way to do the debates is seated at a table. Weve done great deal of study and we believe that the nature and tenor of discourse changes when people are seated. Four years ago and just in the past debates, six years ago now, the candidates came to us and said we would like to do one debate at the podium. Well allow them to have input around the margins but not such the tenor and the process. Barack obama may have wished he was not at the podium in denver last time. He wasnt there actually. While the campaigns i worked in National Campaigns and worked with president clinton when he ran for reelection in 96 and with john kerry in 2004, and the campaigns want to tightly control everything about every single aspect of whatever public appearance the candidate will undertake. We basically take a position, if we build it you have to come. We will accommodate you up to some point where if there are logistics or some things that we can tweak in the format that accommodates your interests as campaigns for the presidency, we will try to work with you. But the fundamental thing and the mission of the commission is to make sure we get something there that gives us that glimmer of insight and that moment where we see something about the character, quality of the candidate for the president that really helps us make a decision. A lot of people are obviously in a very polarized political environment and they know who theyre going to work for. But you get insights in these debates and something you say that triggers a moment where can you say i know what this person is like in the oval office. We want these things to have the maximum value from an educational pointed of view for the maximum amount of americans. We are open to how to do it better and. How we moved the process along every four years were constantly looking for ways to improve it and were heavily impacted by things that happened in technology and all the different ways people interact through social media and internet and things that have changed technologically. As a commission well be dealing with on election day 40 of the American People already voted. 40 of the American People already voted on election day. R with early voting in states is the American People want to like the president. And i have a theory and ive talked to mike about this, television lens is very interesting. Some people can go right through that lens, like butter. You have people like Ronald Reagan and people like bill clinton and president obama that get right through t other candidates hit the len and bounce off. They cant get through. For some reason they have trouble communicating. If youre going to be a leader, youve got to be able to communicate and able to get through the lens. So i have always felt doing a series of different formats, televising them a lot of people do listen on the radio. A lot of people listen on radio or listening streaming or whatever they may do. Thats the best way for people to make up their mind and determination as mike says as to whether or not they can see that person being in the oval office, being aleader, standing up to other leaders in the world in negotiations or whatever it may be. I hear the argument. There may be some credibility to it, but i still think the way we do it is from my view is the best way. One of the things that we have whraerlearned from researct the debates is that people, they hear commentary and they hear all the analysis and the pundantry their positions become effected by what they hear in the commentary after the debate. There are studies it if you put people in the room and ask them to just watch and listen to the debate and then record their opinions, its much, much different than whatever they thought coming out of it is different thafr theyve been exposeed and bombarded by all the commentary afterwards. I thought about that a lot because it is practically impossible it say, okay, people, dont tweet, dont just listen. Just listen to these candidate. Dont start arguing and expressing your own opinion until you heard what these candidates have to stay. Thats practically impossible and undemocratic to do that because we want to encourage debate but how do we get people to focus in and not just be consumed with the sreurbal ticks or some of the things that are distracting sometimes around these the gasping, the sighing, the looking at the watches. We all kind of know what those references are historically and how do we think through what are these candidates actually talking about. Thats at the heart of what the debate ought to be about. How do you take these experiences they have when they come together. Now, our theory of the answer is that there should be a season of conversation. Thats a phrase that our very able executive director janet brown came up with. But these debates are not isolated one time offense. It begins a conversation that ought to continue and ought to inform other aspects of the general Election Campaign as you move through the month of october and into the election period. I think there is something there that we have got to play with, which is its not just about the visuals and that 90 minutes that theyre together on stage, its about what flows out of that and how do we compare the positions and how do we make them more substantive and we have work to do on that. A great example of this is we had no discussion of Global Climate change this in these debates in 2012 and whats the big topic today in the president s address today . Global climate change. How do you get these to get people to think about their choices as a country. Thats the on going process and the work we have to do. Theres several questions that not surprisingly when you talk about the role of the media and i had the opportunity through the graciousness of the commission to attend a denver debate last year. One of the things that struck me was the difference between what happens in the debate hall and whats known as the room. Could you describe what that looks today and what it looked like 20 years ago. I was actually part of the original spin alley. It was the first debate between Ronald Reagan and Walter Mondale and took place in lieu louisvil louisville, kentucky. A group of us watched the debate. If you remember at the end of the debate president reagan was wandering off on highway 101 and not his strongest moment. The minute it was over, jim turned off the tv and looked at us and you could have heard a pin drop in that room. And jim baker looked at us and said, we won now go out and tell the media we won. We had to go out and spin the media. So we were kind of the first spinners. Now it is ridiculous. You were there. This is what we call spin alley. And its gotten so ridiculous that each side has maybe 20 spokespeople, governors, senators or members of the congress, and they have people Walking Around with them holding a sign up with their name on it. So that the media can see them in the crowd of people afterwards. It really has gotten to tpoint f being really redepartment of corrections will yo ridiculo. Mike is 100 right. What we did for a few years and we dont do it anymore, we used to have debate parties all over the United States. People would gather at pwaoeub libraries and private home and there would be a moderator and the minute the debate with you over it would turn off the sound so you wouldnt hear whether an it was Sam Donaldson in the old days or Chris Matthews or whoever the heck it might be and there there was a discussion about what they heard and the good points and the bad points and we found it to be fascinating and very different from people who hang on and see not only the people in spin alley but people who would say theyre experts. You see them on television i every night i turn the television on and they say, here is this republican expert and ive never seen that person before in my life. But the person is usually 15 years old. Ill tell you a great story about the spin afterwards. In 1988, i happened to be my assignment in the general election was to be the press secretary for senator lloyd benson. If you remember the debate between lloyd benson and dan quail produced one of the most famous moments, oepl pha, nebraska. It was interesting because those who were seated in the audience, including senator bensons wife who is a lovely woman, came out of it saying oh my gosh, we lost the debate because lloyd was so mean to dan quail. And their impression from having been in there and watched it on stage was that this was an angry he looked too angry and too hot. Of course i was sitting with all my friends in the press and they were looking at it and watching this. We then went back, if you recall the sequence of news. John f. Kennedy was a friend of mine and youre no john f. Kennedy. The camera was on dan quail getting his expression caught, frozen, deer in the head lights. I always thought if the camera had been reversed and on benson the out come of that moment might have been judged a bit differentli. The interesting thing was all the people said how are we going to deal with what they thought was a bad moment. And we said, i think we just won the debate with that moment. The spin room, it was a very complicated piece because a lot of people were asking, do you think the press was coming up to the benson folks saying, do you think senator benson was a little over the top with that and we said, we think that was clarified some of the distinctions between these two candidates. Frankly, its a demonstration Vice President ial debates are important and they produce moments, but ultimately they dont have a lot to do with the outcome of the general election because ate more about the cabb candidates at the top of the ticket. I think we did win that one. That business of trying to go out and create come motion and commentary after the debate is out of hand now. There is no way to control it, but its becoming i think you all are the ultimate ash bit tors because i think if you turn that off and tune it out and say, what matters to us as citizens that replaces the babble that you hereafter the debate itself. Weve got a number of questions about the moderators themselves, everything from more detail but how theyre selected to what i think of as a jim leer sympathy situation which is can you just cut off the candidates microphones to back checking the candidates. I think the commission and ive said this publicly, reelingly owes jim an apology and i apologize to him of the American People for so long have been used to a format where the question would be posed at a candidate. He would have two minutes to respond. The other candidate got one minute to respond to the cad tkap candidate and there was a 30 second response and move on to the other subject. That had been the format forever. We changed that in a series of debates that just concluded. What we did we divided the 90 minutes into six pods of 15 minutes. What we were looking for was to get more to have a debate to have the candidates go at each other and actually look at each other. A lot of debates they never look at each other and go at t and jims job was to get them started one of the subject matter. They knew. They knew what it was going to be, on health care and the plan was for 15 minutes. We wanted them to go at each other and they d they went back and forth. A lot of people afterwards, jim leer just let them go. He was supposed to let them go. He did exactly what we wanted to. Bob did the same thing in the other debates. They were cut into frames. Its streamly important. The bigger question is how we choose the modelingter raters moderators. We knew we changed the format ask going to these 15minute pods and its very important we have experienced people. You talk to anyone who has moderating, theyre shaking because there is 60 to 100 Million People watching. Therefore we put jim at the front and bob shaeufr at the back and we went with phartsdzer in the middle. Its hard to get diversity and you have to go a long way to find in any of the networks, with hispanics or blacks, men or women who really are good enough to do this job. This is a tough, tough job. Next time clearly we have to find a hispanic and next time we have to find some younger people to attract the younger audience that we have to communicate with. So its a tough job. The reality is what it takes to moderate a Live Television event at that level kind of takes out of play a lot of people who are great, brilliant print bright writers or people who would have other qualities and skills who could evoke some interesting positions. But theres so much that goes into the theatre of running a live broadcast like that that you of to go with prominent broadcast journalists. Who are used to working with that thing in their ear. Yeah. And that is hard. But with that said, as frank said, we need to see and elevate and have people who represent the diversity of this country in role as moderator. The important thing is its not about the moderator, stupid, its about the candidate. And the candidates have got to show up and they have do debate and prepare to engage each other and challenge each other because the quality of the debate will be if the stacandidates who are there contest with each other to flush out the opinions and substance that matters f you get one candidate but in one debate the candidate failed to show up. I think he had his honeymoon on miss mind or something. I think it was his anniversary. Yeah, yeah, his anniversary. He would have remembered his honeymoon. Part of the responsibility goes to the candidates to say, we are going to flush out some of the different positions. One question is about fact checking. This is a moderators role. Is it the partys role afterwards . Is it the medias role . Its the candidates role. If one of the candidates says something which is not consistent, which is wrong, its the other candidate. Its not for the moderator to interpose himself or herself because it appears thaeurb being partisan supporting one of the candidates and that did happen. Frank and i mildly disagree. Were allowed to mildly disagee from time to time and i think candy was trying to move the program on. I talked to her about t i think some people thought she unfairly interjected herself when basically corroborated something that president obama was saying. She had to move into the next subject and she was closing off what was a static situation and move it on. Its a great example of what we we want moderators to get the candidates to engage. We dont want the moderators to be the subject of the debate after the debate. Thats our goal. The good thing to look at that we looked at that we did not want to happen and didnt, we didnt want them to be like the primary debate which became circuses. The republican primary debates were atrocious. When you get 8 or 10 people on stage its hard to have a debate. Youre lucky if everyone gets to speak for three minutes. But the way the networks played it. They made a fortune. You had the object serd ity of it. Clear leer what the former republican National Party chairman said when he declared his debates atrocious, what he meant to say was good theyre also obnoxious by the way. But, you can see exactly the kinds of the dilemma that we have. You dont want these things. These are president ial debates and there is a dignity and an expectation that comes with that now that elevates that beyond some of the more stuff we saw in the primary debates. On the other hand, sometimes those primary debates were very entertaining and they fit their purpose which was to help republicans who to dominate. They clarified things there. When we move to the general election our commissioner only has a responsibility for the general election debates. There is an elevation and different context. A number of questions ask the timing and significance of the debate. I think there has been quite a bit of of Research Done on how voters get information. Could you talk about the significance of the debates and the actual Decision Making process. Does it harden peoples positions and influence their final decision. We know from polling by the time we get to the general election, remember, our debates started october 3rd and last one was october 22nd. The number of undecided voters at that point is smaller. Thats because theyve been exposed to it a long length of time, the National Party conventions and prime mare phase of the campaign and because were increasingly becoming very polarized in their politics and democrats know who theyre going to vote for and republicans do, but the Fastest Growing is independents. By the time you get to the october debates there are very few that are truly undecided. But there are probably quite a number of voters, and might range as high as 30 or so, that are either ambivalent or looking for something that says i think this is my decision and im looking for information that either confirms my decision or makes me think again. And i think thats the rule these debates play. Another thing they provide enormously important glimpses into the personality and abilities of the people were going to elect. Running for president of the United States is not like running for governor of california or u. S. Senator or congressman. Its a different experience because we wants as americans to be personally engaged with the personality of the president. Its not like any other office. And i think part of what these debates do, they solidify that relationship that the person that we eventually electing going to have with the American People. It gives us some context to understand them and know who they are. We dont have kings and queens. We have a president. The relationship that we have with the president is a different one than with most of the other elected offices in the country. Whmost the polls shows 65 , of the people that the debates are a factor in how they vote. Its not the only factor but its a factor. And minds can change. The numbers changed dramatically after denver. Not so much because i think the president wasnt at his best, but because suddenly they saw the governor standing there debating the issues and appeared president ial. Its always hard for a challenger. Harder for a challenger to take on an incumbant. He appeared president ial and knew the issues. It can change views of voters. It changed dramatically then and president had two more debates in which he can recover. Theyre extremely important i think in becoming more and more important. When we were running Ronald Reagan for president in 1980 and 84 we assumed when we were doing our sc campaign plans tha 40 would vote for the republican candidate and 40 would vote for the democratic candidate and only 20 of the voters in play in about twaoeu statements and thats where we concentrated. Those numbers have changed. Now more people are independents, say theyre independents than belong to either party. There is a changing dynamic out there. As mike said, its very important, particularly with independent voters. Ive got a number of people who would like to hear some personal stories to the degree you will tell them, either whether you quietly in the back room store the debates yourself even though you dont run out in the sin room or have times when you thought the candidates rather than famous times when the canned calls were themselves or said something that really shows who they might be as president or Vice President. Its really interesting. The first set of debates we did was michael ducockus and George Huber Walker Bush. Hes about 6foot 3 and michael is about 5foot 10, i think. What the great debate was back then was behind a podium. The argument from the ducockus campaign if the podiums were the same size there would be George Huber Walker Bush and the governor looking over. They reached an agreement the top of the podium had to hit the second button on their shirts. We actually built a Pitchers Mound under, behind michaels podium. So when michael came out he stepped on the Pitchers Mound and appeared to be the same size. If you ever have been at one of these debates very cold. We had one im not going to mention who it was, we had one candidate who was a sweater. He sweated all the time. He wanted to reduce the temperature to 58 degrees in the hall. We said, nah, were not going there. We had another candidate who was getting bald back here. We have seven cameras and one of them is behind because it shoots at the moderator who is normally in the middle and he wanted to make sure we wouldnt shoot him from behind. I mean, there are a million of these and some of them ill tell you one more. In 1992 we had three candidates. The only time because ross perot was involved. We do these on college campuss and normally what happens is they do a draw and one of the candidates ends up 0 oh we do them in gymnasiums usually. And one much them ends up in the mens locker room. Thats where they go before the debate and the other goes in the womans. In 1992, were at u the u in st. Louis. There were three candidates we had to drill a hole in the floor of the basketball arena where it was and build a set there because you had to have restrooms and so forth. In came governor clinton with this guy with books and went in holding room and in came president bush and he went in his hotted his room and we waited and waited and waited and ross perot didnt come. Until 15 minutes before we went on air. I hear ross perot who said, whats this rule who cant use charts and graphs. He never went in the holding room. So paul and i went in to use the facilities so we couldnt say it we did for naught. This is just little touches of things that went on. One last one that hurts me, but the first townhall meeting was at richmond. At that town hall meeting i was seated in a chair and paul kirk was with a woman with a woman by the name of pamela. She was on our commissioner and she had a delightful voice but we had in front of us a screen that showed what every television station was showing. When president bush looks at watch every single screen showed it. Pam ra leaned over to me and she said and said, frank, darling, its over. Its over. Turned out she was right. As a long Time Campaign operative i always would watch the debates in a holding room with other Campaign Staff and we could actually keep score. One of the consequences of being an elder statesman and cochair of the commission i have to sit with this guy in the audience. In the first debate in denver we were standing up frank and i go at the beginning to tell people to turn their cell phones off and behave like a good citizen. We always thank cspan. They air that portion of it so its fun to do. So im standing up there and looking at the seat that im supposed to sit in and i wont mention her name as she is the democratic congresswoman from denver she plopped herself down in my seat. Im like, where am i supposed to go sit down . I said youre on your own, buddy. I walked up in the back and sat with the network guys, which was more that was more fun to do anyhow because then you can watch how it looks on television. For someone like me its less what is going on in the hall and more what is going on for the eighty million plus americans who are watching this on television. But there are a lot of great moments that happen backstage. One of them, which i remember ive seen happen a lot, is one of the rare occasions where the two Campaign Staffs who are in mortal combat come together. Its always a refreshing opportunity because they get to meet their counterparts and theres a little of fraternizing going on because everyone has a High Energy Level and nervous. But it is the opportunity for you to see the other team in action. I wish there was more i wish we created more opportunities for some of them to have some conversation because the only other time that they usually see see eother is when theyre squawki squawki squawking each other on the television. One of the things is whether the dialogue has changed. We worry about civil dialogue today. The Lincoln Douglas debates were famous for their length. Do you think the last 25 years since the commission has been in place has seen a change in dialogue at the debates or who is the political dialogue beyond the debates changed to influence them in any way . I think the change in format has changed the dialogue. One of the reasons we got rid of the panels of reporters was that reporter number one has thought long and hard about the question he or she is going to ask to show how bright they are to the American People and their c constituents in the press pool. Maybe there needed to be a followup on that question. But reporter number two has spent a lot of time on his or her question and doesnt want to waste his or her moment in the sun to follow up on because they have their own question. So you didnt get the followups when you should and thats jud why i changed the format. The moderator has the ability to follow up to get them to go at each other. I think the system we came through as i said, two steps forward and one back, i like the model we have now. Not that might not change it, well spends a lot of time seeing what changes we should make. You can go to our website and be behind. More than happy to hear from you. I really think that in that period of time the quality of political discourse has degenerated. No question about that. People are angrier and use vocabulary is more mean spirit and question peoples motives and routinely call each other liars, which when i first started working in the 1970s it was forbidden to use that word in connection with a colleague in the senate. The refreshing thing about these debates when two candidates have to sit there face to face its hard for them to use that kind of language and that kind of tone and they you quickly get into it. They might be sharp in their exchanges and look for moments where they try to criticalize what the differences are, those sound bytes that are so important after the debate. But by in large they have to look like theyre having a conversation about the future of the country otherwise wed all be offended. This is part of what its like in these debates. They force the candidates in the highest office in the land to model in some kind of behavior that we would want in the sense of good scitizenship. There are about 230 republicans give or twae take. Its hard to keep track because people retire. Of those 230, 93 of them were elected from districts carried by governor romney. There were roughly 205 democrats in the house and 96 of them were elected from districts carried by president obama, which means if youre in the house and youre an incoumbent if you win the nomination youre home free and your challenge is really in the primary. If youre a republican, you normally get run at from the right and if youre a democrat you get run at from the left and pushes you in the positions. Whats happened there is no middle ground anymore in the house. There are no more blue dog democrats and moderate republicans who used to be from the northeastern core. Theyre gone. They dont know other other. If you dont know you cant trust someone. If you cant trust someone you cant sit down and be brave enough. So its tough. Its tough. We think weve taken in this terrible, terrible toxic atmosphere at least the president ial debates are out of there because of the very nature of how weve structured them and as again, as mike says, its up to the candidates but i think our record is, weve had people who have been involved in very serious and curious discourse. Just a brief pause for your radio listeners. Our guests are Michael Mccurry and frank. Were cussing those debates and political discourse in america. I want to pick up on what you just mentioned, frank, about the number of things that actually go right at this debate. I want to go back to the conversation about working with other nations. We hope, i think, often hope that there are some things we do well in our democracy that are worth emulating and then we worry that we overstep those bounds or become too sure of ourselves. It does appear that the peer t debates are one thing that were doing. Pa pass its interesting. Their concerns, you know, our format and how we have how our debates evolve are haoupb tphaoebg to our political culture. It would be a little bit too much to say we have this great model that and you should emulate that. Theyre struggling with fund meanting questions like how do we get National Broadcasting entities to air debates and how do we guarantee that the electorate will see them. How do we encourage leaders in power to participate and face their opponents face to face. As frank recounted the history in our system, thats not always been a given in our system either. So theyre looking and then the third thing is how do we create an independent structure like a commission, like our commission on president ial debates that will have the integrity to compel people to participate in these events. Theyre looking at the fundamental Building Blocks of what it takes to encourage did he bath at the National Level for National Leadership. They do so in conditions of extreme violence in some places where the tensions of elections will spill over in the streets and people will die. This has happened if you read the news you understand enough of the context there. Many of them, the most refreshing thing once said was, if we bring these debates in and let our people see our leadership arguing together about the future of the country, it will save lives in the streets because the violence in and around our elections wont spill out. Thats profound on the importance of these kinds of encounters and any democratic societies. I think we always need to be careful about assuming that the United States of america has the paradigm that everybody else should apply, but i think what theyre learning from seeing our experience is how do we develop uniquely in our own political cultures models that will work and things that will, you know, encourage people to say well we have to do this because this is what really civilized societies do. What i would start with, is look, dont try to emulate the United States. You have to come up with a system that fits your culture, your heritage. I, for the past three president ial races, have lectured at universities in china in beijing and shanghai. And to try to get to get those students to understand the Electoral College past. Ands why you use Colleges Universities as opposed to other sites. California, one of the more dynamic economies, not just in the country, but in the world. We have had a couple of president ial debates in california in the past. Does location matter . It isstarted out, and still our mantra, that we are involved in an educational function. We started out saying, we are going to do it on university campuses. If you are ever there, it is incredible what it does to the students. We have continued to do that. We try to get geographical balance. Site in the one west, one in the northeast, one in the south, and one in the midwest. It doesnt always work that way. Sometimes the proposals that come into not meet the standards. There are strict standards on hotel rooms within a certain distance. You have 10,000 reporters from all over the world. You have to have a facility not only to house where the debate is, but a facility to take care of the reporters who are there. Youve got to feed them. There are a lot of things that go into the process. There is also the final cut when we sit down, the secret service. Aboutmally get it down to 1012 places, and the secret service goes with us out. They have to know that they can lock it down. That there are easy escape routes. They can move the candidates. It is a very serious matter. Whether or not it matters to a state or how a state is going to vote, i do not think so. When i was chairman, it used to be, where are we going to hold the convention . If we hold it in florida, we will win florida. Neither party has that worked out. I do not think the location really impacts that much of the voting that goes on in that state. But we try to get that geographic balance. Campus, awe went to brandnew, multimillion dollar theater for the performing arts it was stateoftheart they still had to put in 500,000 worth of additional lighting and air conditioning because of the demands of the cameras and the lights when you are doing National Television. There are a lot of intricacies. The only thing i would add to the, we have students from junior statesmen program who are here in the audience the students, the young people are so excited and so idealistic. In fact, a lot of the universities and colleges that sponsored the debates with us develop curriculum so their students study the history of debates and they get into it, but it is that idealistic element that you are going to get some sense that this is about the future of our country, and here is the future. It makes the opportunity refreshing as well. The only thing left for me to do is to point out that i think it is usually attributed to fdr, but i think it is variously attributed the fact that there is no higher calling than Public Service we have been honored to have two Public Servants here this evening. I would like you to join me in thanking oath of them. Both of them. [applause] great job. Close, i instilled dr. Mary marcy, the president of the Dominican University of california. Still dr. Mary marcy, the president of the Dominican University of california. We are adjourned. [applause] you wrap that gavel with authority. Rap that gavel with authority. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2013] president obama will address the nation on the situation in syria on tuesday evening. You can watch for live coverage on the cspan networks. Next on cspan, a townhall on Public Service. Then americas first ladies and how they are portrayed in the media. Later, discussion about the decadelong search for osama bin laden. 15 years ago, book tv made its debut on cspan 2. Love, death, and money. These are the three main human concerns. We are all keen students of love. We are fascinated by every aspect of the matter in theory and in practice. Maybe not quite as much as ken starrs, but fascinated no less. Brought youn, weve the top nonfiction books and authors every weekend. More than 9000 authors have appeared on the tv, including on book tv. I wanted to give the reader a chance to understand the process through which i made decisions, the environment, the people i listen to as i made decisions, and this is not an attempt to rewrite history. It is not an attempt to fashion a legacy. It is an attempt to be a part of the historical narrative. Also, Supreme Court justices. Every single justice on the love has a passion and a for the constitution and our country that is equal to mine. Then you know that if you accept truth, youoperating understand that you can disagree. And nobel prize winners. Me, what is a for interesting is negotiation on moral decisions. Do no harm. Love somebody. Respect to yourself. Reduced to is simplified notions. The philosophers have spent their lifetimes trying to imagine what it is like to live a moral life, what morality is, what responsibility is. We visited book fairs and festivals around the country. At the annuallive l. A. Times festival of books on the campus of ucla in west los angeles. There is our signature programming, indepth. If you say to a child almost anywhere in the country, once upon a time, the child stops and pauses. Now, you better cash the check. You better have more to say after that. That phrase is still magical. Every week, afterwords. My father, his job had been to be press attache in belgrade. My mother wanted me to be born in prague where her mother was. I was born in prague. Then we moved back to belgrade. Then my father was recalled in 1938. Dowas in czechoslovakia when not seize marched in on march 15, 1939. Has shown998, book tv over 40,000 hours of programming, and it is the only National Television network devoted exclusively to nonfiction books. Throughout the fall, we are marking 15 years of book tv on cspan 2