The media doesn't think they have a role in keeping candidates honest unless their name is Clinton
Today on Michael Smerconish's show "Smerconish" he spent the first 5 minutes of the show dissecting the statement below (see statement at bottom of page) that the Trump campaign put out Thursday evening and using the campaign's own words to detail why it was dishonest, vicious and conniving, and ugly and that Trump should be accountable for his lies and deception. After thoroughly debunking the statement he then introduced Mike McCurry, the Co-Chair of Plans Debate Committee. McCurry was also the former Press Secretary in Bill Clinton's administration.
The two of them then began a discussion of their respective debate philosophies and were surprised to see that they both seemed to be 100% in agreement that it was the job of the candidates to fact check one another, not the moderators. Smerconish then told a story about how someone had once told him a story about telling a debate moderator to go into the bathroom, take a look at yourself in the mirror and tell the person looking back, "this is not about you".
The issue of fact checking your opponent wouldn't be such a big deal if you didn't have an opponent like Trump who lies about everything. He can tell 10 lies in a couple of sentences as Smerconish pointed out in his opening monologue on the campaign statement below. He's also a bully and a name caller. So how is a serious candidate, who is serious about debating, supposed to deal with someone who is bombastic, a compulsive liar, and who evades answering the question asked without impunity? How does Hillary deal with a opponent who is being graded on a curve, while she's held to a higher standard?
McCurry stated that the debate committee chose to divide the debate up into 15 minutes segments rather than allotting each of the candidates two minute and one minute response times. So their idea is to just give the candidates 15 minutes and let them go at it. Laughingly, they think this format will produce a more substantive debate. Right, and I have some ocean front property in Nevada I'd like to sell you.
I read on DU earlier today, that 538 expects Hillary to have the better debate performance , but Trump will be declared the winner.
It's like the old joke that says Ginger Rodgers had to do everything Fred Astaire did, but backwards and in high heels. Unfortunately that standard still holds true for a woman presidential candidate in 2016. She still has to be twice as good to be considered half as good.
- September 15, 2016 -
Trump Campaign Statement
"Hillary Clinton’s campaign first raised this issue to smear then-candidate Barack Obama in her very nasty, failed 2008 campaign for President. This type of vicious and conniving behavior is straight from the Clinton Playbook. As usual, however, Hillary Clinton was too weak to get an answer. Even the MSNBC show Morning Joe admits that it was Clinton’s henchmen who first raised this issue, not Donald J. Trump.
In 2011, Mr. Trump was finally able to bring this ugly incident to its conclusion by successfully compelling President Obama to release his birth certificate. Mr. Trump did a great service to the President and the country by bringing closure to the issue that Hillary Clinton and her team first raised. Inarguably, Donald J. Trump is a closer. Having successfully obtained President Obama’s birth certificate when others could not, Mr. Trump believes that President Obama was born in the United States.
Mr. Trump is now totally focused on bringing jobs back to America, defeating radical Islamic terrorism, taking care of our veterans, introducing school choice opportunities and rebuilding and making our inner cities safe again." – Jason Miller, Senior Communications Advisor
