In modern politics, televised debates are usually unenlightening, uninteresting and undermine democracy.
If they are even mildly entertaining, with one participant or the other landing a light punch, it is only rarely.
At worst, they are stultifying, with a couple of seasoned pros probing each other’s defences, dodging and weaving, and playing rope-a-dope without ever offering up a useful tidbit of data.
As a general rule, the more participants there are in a televised political debate, the more boring and predictable the proceedings, with all opposition candidates lining up to take shots at the frontrunner, who sensibly dodges and weaves and stays on the ropes.
This means Canadian political debates are likely to be even less enlightening and entertaining than their American counterparts, one of the strengths of our Westminster Parliamentary system not being that it makes good television.
The TV format, of course, naturally favours candidates who are glib gas-lighters and snarling bullies over those with a nuanced understanding of the facts and a desire to propose moderate policies that might actually work without doing too much harm.
Honesty usually means political death, because the single clip in which a candidate admits the reasonable truth – yeah, taxes are going to have to rise a little – will be pilloried repeatedly for such foolishness. No such good deed goes unpunished.
The art, such as it is, of TV debate has been well understood for half a century. Candidates who must undergo this ordeal are coached within an inch of their lives to evade any meaningful answer and, if their opponent slips up and tells the truth, to deliver a scripted riposte suitable for repeated replay.
The result is that, on top of everything else, these affairs tend to be boring, and the frontrunner wins as long as he or she or they manages to make no boo-boos.
Allowing dumb-ass journalist questions doesn’t usually help either!
On those exceedingly rare occasions when somebody lands a decent punch – Mulroney to Turner, 40 years ago, for example: “You had an option, sir!” – there’s no need to suffer through the entire stultifying “debate” because you’ll see the clip over and over on TV and, nowadays, on TikTok and Instagram.
Which is why, I guess, that Tuesday night’s U.S. presidential candidates’ debate was such a refreshing affair.
How long have we waited to see a candidate open a can of whoop-ass on her opponent like Kamala Harris did to Donald Trump?
If that beat-down had been a boxing match, the ref would have declared a TKO halfway through and sent Trump to his corner before he suffered any more brain damage.
Of course, some thanks is owed to Trump as well. Had he not been such a stunned palooka, the battle wouldn’t have been half as entertaining.
You don’t have to really approve of the sweet science to enjoy a good boxing match now and again, and you don’t have approve of televised candidates’ debates to have guiltlessly enjoyed the sweetly scientific pummelling the Democrat Harris laid on the Republican Trump Tuesday night.
I’m pretty sure even the former president’s supporters – at least the ones close enough to him to actually know the man – secretly enjoyed it too.
Now why couldn’t Rachel Notley have done that to Danielle Smith or, better yet, Jason Kenney?
No reason except good manners, I suspect.
Now, we’ve heard it said that the vice-president schooled the former president in Philadelphia Tuesday.
In truth, she schooled us all. It turns out televised debates don’t have to be boring and pointless.
What do you say we keep that in mind here in Alberta?
UCP will soon invite poop-cooky lady to rejoin caucus
As we asked in the wake of the May 29, 2023, Alberta election, how long would it take Premier Danielle Smith to welcome the poop-cookie lady, Lacombe-Ponoka MLA Jennifer Johnson, back into the bosom of the UCP Caucus?
“Probably longer than it would have taken had the seat count been tighter, but not that long just the same,” I wrote at the time.
Smith, in the heat of an election where decent people had a vote, kicked Johnson out of the party when it was too late to get her name off the ballot for comparing transgender school kids to poop in cookie dough. Johnson won anyway, which does tell you something about the voters of Lacombe-Ponoka.
Now that the premier is potentially facing the wrath of the MAGAfied members who make up the bulk of the activists left in her United Conservative Party, she is singing a different tune about Johnson, City News reports.
In a recent UCP members only meeting, City’s Sean Amato wrote, Smith “revealed she plans to reconsider after hearing what Johnson has to say in the fall when new legislation affecting trans youth is introduced.”
“I guess we’ll judge based on what she says in the Legislature when she has the opportunity to,” Smith said.
Count on it, Johnson will be welcomed back.
NDP’s Nenshi assigns new critic roles to MLAs
Meanwhile, in inside baseball, Alberta NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi has reshuffled the Opposition party’s critic assignments, including creating a “leader’s senior advisory team” for some well-known MLAs without critic roles.
The NDP now seems to have adopted the annoying Conservative habit of describing critics as “shadow ministers.” The doubled-up critic teams implemented by former leader Rachel Notley after the May 2023 election have now been abandoned.
Rakhi Pancholi remains as Nenshi’s deputy leader, and Christina Gray as the leader of the Opposition and House leader while the party leader remains outside the House. As for the rest of the assignments:
CRITICS
Nagwan Al-Guneid, Energy and Minerals
Brooks Arcand-Paul, Indigenous Relations
Diana Batten, Children and Family Services
Gurinder Brar, Service Alberta and Red Tape Reduction
Jodi Calahoo Stonehouse, Forestry and Parks
Joe Ceci, Arts and Culture
Amanda Chapman, Education
Lorne Dach, Transportation and Economic Corridors
Jasvir Deol, Infrastructure
David Eggen, Advanced Education
Court Ellingson, Finance
Sarah Elmeligi, Environment and Protected Areas
Janet Eremenko, Mental Health and Addictions
Nicole Goehring, Tourism and Sport, and Armed Forces and Veterans Affairs liaison
Sharif Haji, Affordability and Utilities
Julia Hayter, Status of Women
Sarah Hoffman, Health
Rhiannon Hoyle, Jobs, Economy and Trade
Nathan Ip, Technology and Innovation
Janis Irwin, Housing
Kyle Kasawski, Municipal Affairs
Marie Renaud, Community and Social Services
Irfan Sabir, Justice
David Shepherd, Public Safety and Emergency Services
Lori Sigurdson, Seniors, Continuing Care, and Homecare
Heather Sweet, Agriculture and Irrigation
Lizette Tejada, Immigration and Multiculturalism
Peggy Wright, Labour
HOUSE ROLES
Irfan Sabir, Deputy House Leader
David Shepherd, Deputy House Leader
Kathleen Ganley, Whip
Janis Irwin, Deputy Whip
Amanda Chapman, Assistant Deputy Whip
David Eggen, Caucus Chair
Peggy Wright, Caucus Vice-Chair
LEADER’S SENIOR ADVISORY TEAM
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