The hours of thought should have occurred before the debate. Its not like the debater has been chosen at random from the audience.
The New York Times has published many articles where they have a comment from one and state they could get no comment from the other. There is nothing new here and any change that was going to happen because the NYT was going to do this has already occurred.
ALL political debate and interview is presentation of ideas, not the place where ideas are born and develop in real time. Any candidate who is evolving his response in real time is unprepared, and if she is any good at all, will be prepared every time after that that she is asked about this same issue.
The New York Times has published many articles where they have a comment from one and state they could get no comment from the other.
The New York Times frequently mentions party position without quoting an on-the-record source by name. They generally try to provide both sides the story even when one side isn't willing to give a on-the-record answer.
Whenever you read in a New York Times article: "A senior democrat told us XY about policy Z", that democrat asked the journalist to treat his statement as off-the-record in the sense that he doesn't...
See this Newsroom clip.
Basically, their news network is trying to change the way political debates work by having the moderator force the candidates to answer the questions that are asked of them, not interrupt each other, justify arguments that are based on obvious falsehoods etc.
How big of a positive impact do you guys think that this would have on society?
My initial thoughts are that it would be huge. It would lead to better politicians, which would be a high level of action. The positive effects would trickle down into many aspects of our society.
The question then becomes, "can we make this happen?". I don't see a way right now, but the idea has enough upside to me that I keep it in the back of my mind in case I come up with a plausible way of implementing the change.
Thoughts?