Under harsh television lights, May the most natural, relaxed and elegant debater

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 06/08/2015 (3745 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In the days leading up to a national, televised election debate — like the Maclean’s magazine debate that took place Thursday night — there is always a strenuous effort by journalists and other observers to build it into something it is not.

We use a lot of boxing and professional sports terminology. We hype and promote our coverage and in the process, suggest that there will be a knockout moment. Horse racing analogies are not unusual.

We do all that even though debates, unlike sporting events, almost never produce a clear winner or loser. In fact, most debates look a lot less like a title fight or a championship game, and more like pointless family arguments at a holiday dinner table.

Given all that, is there any real value in political debates? Once you accept there are no real winners and losers, debates are still useful in exposing some of the more subtle qualities and foibles of each individual leader.

The harsh glare of television lights can reveal deeper problems with insincerity, insecurity and disingenuous intellect.

What, then, did we learn about the four leaders from the Maclean’s debate?

First, that Prime Minister Stephen Harper is one cool cat. And given that he came into the debate having to defend his cynical decision to launch the country into a 78-day campaign in the midst of a serious economic slow down threatening to push his budget back into deficit, Harper’s pure calm and unshakeable composure was pretty remarkable.

Much of what Harper said about the election, the economy, the budget and the environment was empirically or intellectually flawed. But you’d never know that just by looking at him. Even when he was spinning a whopper, Harper appeared calm and serene. After watching this debate, it’s obvious why he is such a formidable opponent.

We also learned that both NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair, the presumptive front-runner coming into this debate, and Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, have a ways to go before they can seriously challenge Harper in this kind of forum.

Mulcair looked awkward and stiff. When he wasn’t smiling artificially into the camera, Mulcair’s elocution was bogged down in a glacial pace. So slow, at points, that it seemed his mouth might just stall out.

Mulcair had his good moments when it appeared he forgot all the bad advice he got from his debate handlers and took on the tone and posture of a prosecuting attorney that served him so well in question period. But a stumble during his closing comments — where he lost his place in the script and actually said “sorry” before finding the end of the rope — may have undone those good moments.

As for Trudeau, given the performance he put in, there will be hand-wringing in the Liberal universe on Friday morning.

Trudeau looked calm and collected at the outset but as the debate unfolded, he became more agitated and muddled. By the end of the debate, Trudeau was talking lots but communicating very little. His sentences were awkward, and he seemed lost when it came time to nail down a clear message.

Elements in the Liberal party were concerned that Trudeau, in contrast to the older and more polished competition, might end up looking like a high school student up past his bedtime. Trudeau’s harried delivery and constant stutters did not do much to dispel that concern.

And then there was the Green party’s Elizabeth May. As many voters know, this is the only debate slated to involve May; other planned debates have so far elected to exclude her.

The Green party has always presented a challenge to debate organizers and hosts. The Greens only have two MPs, even though they are in all other measures a national party running a national campaign. That makes it easy to ignore May and the Greens out of hand.

However, the Maclean’s debate clearly demonstrated why the other parties are often so willing to exclude May from these proceedings.

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May was the most relaxed, the most natural, the most knowledgeable and the best overall debater. Perhaps it was because she spent less time talking about Green party policies, and more time elegantly debating the issues. Or perhaps because she is better under pressure than either Mulcair or Trudeau.

One can only hope that other debate hosts who have not offered May a place at the table will reconsider their positions and ensure the Green party leader is involved. The debate on this future of the nation will be better if they do.

What does it all add up to? No winner, no loser and no seismic moment in this, the longest federal election campaign in 140 years.

The leaders will regroup and head back on the campaign trail until the next debate. And then, we’ll all dust off our boxing jargon and wait for the knockout that never comes.

dan.lett@freepress.mb.ca

Dan Lett
Columnist

Dan Lett is a columnist for the Free Press, providing opinion and commentary on politics in Winnipeg and beyond. Born and raised in Toronto, Dan joined the Free Press in 1986.  Read more about Dan.

Dan’s columns are built on facts and reactions, but offer his personal views through arguments and analysis. The Free Press’ editing team reviews Dan’s columns before they are posted online or published in print — part of the our tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.