There are few names that really stick to the Republican Party like the Party of Stupid. The GOP really should trademark that name. Tuesday night’s Vice Presidential debate removed any doubt as to why the Republican Party owns that name.
When CBS journalist and Tim Kaine debate partner Elaine Quijano opened the debate, there was little doubt she was going to live down to conservative expectations. She gave Democrat Vice Presidential nominee Tim Kaine one tough question but threw eight tough questions at Republican Indiana Gov. Mike Pence. While Kaine constantly interrupted Governor Pence, she said nothing. But when Gov. Pence started to make points to rebut the interruptions, Quijano sprang into action.
The difference between Democrats and Republicans is that Republicans are long used to the biased media and an experienced candidate like Mike Pence knows how to handle those questions. Republicans are used to being out-numbered in these debates, where they have to fight the Democrat candidate and the Democrat “moderator.”
The real question is why this keeps happening.
The debates are controlled by the Commission on Presidential Debates, which is an organization created by the Democrats and the Republicans. The Commission has a Democrat and a Republican co-chair. There are also allegedly Republican members of the commission, which, among other things, picks the moderators for the Presidential and Vice Presidential debates.
And they keep picking moderators who do their best to help the Democrats. That is understandable from the Democrats’ point of view. But why do Republicans keep doing this?
In 2012, ABC News reporter Martha Radditz hosted the Vice Presidential Debate between Joe Biden and Paul Ryan. Conservative media outlets pointed out that Barack Obama had been a guest at her wedding to FCC Commissioner Julius Genachowski. That did not matter. The debate went forward and as the Media Research Center noted at the time, “Reviewing the questions posed at Thursday night’s vice presidential debate, ABC correspondent Martha Raddatz clearly favored Team Obama.”
No one can forget the famous life line that then CNN “Journalist” Candy Crowley threw to Barack Obama, when GOP nominee Mitt Romney had him on the ropes. As Romney pointed out that it took Barack Obama two weeks to call the September 11, 2012 attack on the American Consulate in Benghazi a terrorist attack, Crowley jumped in and wrongly fact checked Romney. That intervention shut Romney down for rest of the debate and may well have cost him the election in 2012.
When NBC News anchor Lester Holt hosted the first Presidential Debate this year, he could find time to talk about Donald Trump’s taxes and the birther issue that no one cares about, but amazingly enough, not a single question about emails or Hillary Clinton’s health.
And now Elaine Quijano joins the media bias hall of shame.
Why do the Republicans continue to tolerate this election after election? The leaders of the Republican Party stagger around like newly castrated cattle, trying to figure out what is important, while their nominees go up to be beaten up by debate moderators who are clearly cheering for the other side.
If Donald Trump had not done so badly in the first debate, he would have leverage to complain about the second debate. If he did not need this second debate so badly, he could threaten not to attend unless changes were made. In 1980, the strategy worked for then President Jimmy Carter. Three debates were scheduled. Carter boycotted the first two, causing them to be cancelled. Only when Ronald Regan relented on his call that third party candidate John Anderson be included, did Carter finally agree to a debate.
The GOP and Team Trump are walking into the buzz saw for the next debate.
Guess who the moderator of the next debate is? It is Martha Radditz, along with Anderson Cooper of CNN.
The Republican Party and the Trump campaign should step up and demand that one of those moderators be replaced with a moderator of the Republican Party or Trump campaign’s choice.
Will that happen?
No, of course not.
The Republican Party will never stand up for itself. The GOP and the Trump campaign will get the debate they deserve.
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