John McCain and Barack Obama are set to debate tonight

Bily House, Media General News Service
WASHINGTON BUREAU
Published: September 26, 2008

Follow along with the Herd on the Trail BLOG from our Washington Bureau.

The McCain campaign is resuming all activities and the Senator will travel to the debate this afternoon.

WASHINGTON - After a prelude of fits and starts over the last 48 hours, John McCain and Barack Obama are set to meet tonight at the University of Mississippi in their first of three 90-minute debates.

The McCain campaign says the Arizona Republican has decided to show-up, after all, because there has been “significant progress” in Congress toward a deal on a rescue plan for the nation’s economy.

“The McCain campaign is resuming all activities and the Senator will travel to the debate this afternoon,“ the campaign said.

“The race is so close and this debate is a dramatic-enough event, without having had to add more drama,” said Alan Schroeder, author of Presidential Debates: 50 Years of High-Risk TV , who predicts viewers could top 70 million, despite the debate’s Friday night scheduling.

History provides no hard-and-fast rules to gauge the importance of presidential debates.

But the delivery during a debate of a memorable line, or expectations not met, or gaffes committed can and have set the tone for the stretch runs of some past campaigns, say analysts.

Even before tonight’s face-off, it seems destined to be remembered. McCain’s sudden announcement Wednesday that he was suspending his campaigning to rush back to Washington to help craft a fix to the nation’s financial crisis threw the debate into an 11th-hour limbo.

He had said he would not participate in the debate unless sufficient progress had been made on aa Wall Street bailout plan, and both he and Democrat Obama on Thursday attended a hyped-up emergency meeting with President Bush and congressional leaders.

But Obama challenged him to go through with the debate, regardless, saying people needed to hear the presidential candidates volley on issues. McCain agreed, finally, even though no lawmakers say no agreement on the Wall Street bailout has been reached.

But McCain’s campaign’s statement said he has spent the morning “talking to members of the Administration, members of the Senate, and members of the House.“

“He is optimistic that there has been significant progress toward a bipartisan agreement now that there is a framework for all parties to be represented in negotiations,“ the statement explained. “Following the debate, he will return to Washington to ensure that all voices and interests are represented in the final agreement, especially those of taxpayers and homeowners.“

AllanÖ Louden, a campaign rhetoric and political communications expert at Wake Forest University in Winston Salem, N.C., said framing the events of the past two days – which he says have “shaken up this race again”—will now be among the challenges facing both McCain and Obama tonight.

The official focus of the first debate is foreign affairs and national security. But Louden said the economy is what’s on the nation’s mind right now. The candidate who can rhetorically and authoritatively best explain or define how to shore-up the economy and protect American taxpayers may come out ahead, Louden said.

Barack Obama says he is set for a presidential debate tonight (Friday) at the University of Mississippi, the first of three scheduled 90-minute debates he is scheduled to have with John McCain.

Problem is, he may be alone on the stage.

History provides no hard-and-fast rules to gauge the importance of presidential debates.

History provides even less hint on what to expect if one of the two major-party presidential candidates - in this case, Republican John McCain - simply doesn’t show up.

“I hope he does (show up),“ said Obama, telling CNN Thursday night that he thinks it’s important for the nation to hear both of them talk about how they plan to lead the country, including securing its “economic strength.“

But the debate was thrown into an 11th-hour limbo with McCain’s sudden announcement Wednesday that he was suspending his campaigning to rush back to Washington to help craft a fix to the nation’s financial crisis.

Despite Obama’s urging that they go through with the debate, McCain as of late Thursday still had not said what he will do. Earlier in the day, both he and Obama attended an emergency meeting with President Bush and congressional leaders, but lawmakers said they were still trying to reach a bipartisan agreement on a plan to rescue Wall Street.

Obama said he’s planning to keep closely monitoring the negotiations on the bailout plan, and that he - and McCain—would be able to do that by telephone from Oxford, Miss., where the debate is scheduled.

Analysts said Thursday that they don’t see McCain as gaining any advantage if he stays away from the debate and in Washington until a bailout bill is agreed upon - and may even be helping Obama’s standing.

“The race is so close and this debate is a dramatic-enough event, without having had to add more drama,“ said Alan Schroeder, author of Presidential Debates: 50 Years of High-Risk TV, who predicts viewers could top 70 million.

“It’s an odd, peculiar thing for him (McCain) to have done - and Obama has come out forceful by standing his ground,“ said Schroeder. He predicts McCain will ultimately show up for the debate, and that his campaign will come up with some explanation “to make it seem less like a cave-in.“

Allan Louden, a campaign rhetoric and political communications expert at Wake Forest University in Winston Salem, N.C., said framing the events of the past two days - which he says have “shaken up this race again” - would be among the top challenges to face both McCain and Obama tonight.

The official focus of the first debate is foreign affairs and national security. But Louden said the economy is what’s on the nation’s mind right now. If they debate, the candidate who can rhetorically and authoritatively best explain or define how to shore-up the economy and protect American taxpayers may come out ahead, Louden said.

The audience for the first George Bush-John Kerry debate in 2004 was 62.4 million viewers. Schroeder, a Northeastern University professor, predicts that the influence of the Internet and real-time live streaming will lead to Friday’s debate being watched more widely, while also allowing millions of Americans to add their own voices to the post-debate analysis and spin.

“Obviously, every debate has its own idiosyncracies; but you never know what you’re going to get and what bombshells might occur,“ said David Lanoue, a University of Alabama political science professor.

The most memorable - and even devastating - lines or miscues in presidential debate history have run a gamut. Many are easily re-lived today through YouTube and other Internet video sites.

There was the first 1960 debate between Richard Nixon and JFK, which kicked-off the age of TV presidential debates. Nixon’s “5 o’clock shadow” and his relative unease contrasted sharply for many viewers to Kennedy’s tan, confident and well-rested demeanor. Those who listened to the debate on radio thought Nixon won it.

In 1976, President Ford claimed wrongly in a debate “there is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe,“ a mistake that reinforced his image as a less-than-brainy chief executive.

Four years later, Carter found himself the target of two memorable debate lines after he asserted that Ronald Reagan would cut Medicare. Reagan responded, “There you go again,“ and then asked Americans during his closing remarks, “Are you better off than you were four years ago?“

In 1988, Democrat Michael Dukakis’s dispassionate, unemotional response to whether his opposition to capital punishment would stand if his wife, Kitty, were raped and murdered seemed to rub many viewers the wrong way.

And in 2000, the shrugs and sighs of vice president Al Gore - in contrast to a folksy, likeable persona projected by George W. Bush—became fodder for satire, including a memorable Saturday Night Live skit.

More recently, Kerry was able to turn what was a fairly persistent Bush lead in the polls in 2004 into a dead heat by shifting the focus of their debates on whether Bush had mishandled the war on terrorism.

This year, the debates will be the first ever in which neither candidate is a sitting president or vice president.

Recent national polls indicate exactly what may be at stake starting with Friday’s debate to be moderated by PBS’ Jim Lehrer.

A Quinnipiac University poll released Tuesday in four key battleground states - Colorado, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin - showed that 22 to 26 percent of likely voters say that they are either likely, or somewhat likely, to change their minds because of the presidential debates.

The two other presidential showdowns are scheduled for Oct. 7 at Belmont University in Nashville (a town hall format with no specific topic) and Oct. 15 at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y. on domestic issues.

Almost as anticipated is a debate set for Oct. 2 at Washington University in St. Louis between vice presidential candidates Joe Biden and Sarah Palin.

The extent to which tonight’s (Friday night’s) opening debate at Ole Miss in Oxford, Miss., would venture into economic issues is uncertain, but McCain has acknowledged that is not his strong suit. The official topic of this debate going in—foreign affairs and national security—is viewed by many as more familiar ground for McCain, and shakier ground for Obama.

McCain, a former fighter pilot, is seen as someone who has been around the foreign policy block and has more experience on national security issues. But that means expectations will be high for the 72-year-old McCain to shine, showing more of a mastery to a war-weary public of the issues regarding the war and other topics. Anything short of that could be a disappointment, said Lanoue.

McCain also has a track record of prickly zingers against opponents and other memorable sound bites. But, Lanoue said, “he’s a bit of a wooden performer; a bit awkward out there.“ For example, he cited McCain’s line during a Republican primary debate that he would follow Osama bin Laden “to the Gates of Hell,“ only to afterward flash a smile that seemed out of place.

The more youthful Obama, by comparison, will not only have to validate that has a sufficient grasp on foreign policy, he’ll have to meet the expectations of many that he is a superior orator, said Lanoue.

However, Obama, during the Democratic presidential debates actually “displayed a tendency “to pontificate too much and qualify his answers too much” said Wake Forest’s Louden. There seemed little desire to nail down his comments to crisper sound bites - and that has made him a less effective debater—agreed Schroeder.

While a debate performance may not greatly alter a candidate’s standing in the polls, Lanoue said it can mean the difference of between 3 and 5 percentage points - a swing that could help decide races as close as this year’s.

That’s one reason why presidential candidates have taken to scheduling their debates at least 20 days before Election Day to correct errors or regroup from bad performances, the political equivalent of a lifetime.

Reporter Billy House can be reached at or (202) 662-7673.