A Meaningless Spectacle

 Presidential debates.  They tell us absolutely nothing, or at least nothing we need to know.

Consider what happens when Presidential candidates "debate" each other.  First of all, any person even vaguely politically informed can predict at least 90% of the questions that will be asked, and even, giving who is running the debate, the political slant of the wording.  Knowing this in advance, the candidates have their endless teams of soulless "advisors" and opinion manipulators craft responses based on extensive opinion testing of their target audiences.  The candidates then have nothing to do but repeat these canned responses, feigning anger and contempt at the appropriate places.  Job done!  You won the debate!

All of this has absolutely nothing to do with how a candidate would respond to crises or solve long standing problems, the actual job of the real President.  In fact, all it does is divert any consideration of the candidates' real qualifications.  And thus, we end up with a lying, rage filled ignoramus like Trump "winning" Presidential debates while clearly demonstrating that he belongs nowhere near the levers of government.

And which also clearly demonstrates that only fools, and a national press whose owners are determined to see Republicans win elections, have any interest in furthering this relic of a different age.