Bruce Apar’s Blog

What appears to be the first bona fide debate between the two declared candidates for New York’s 99th Assembly District has been scheduled for Wednesday, August 27, at Yorktown Stage, starting at 7:00 p.m. That’s when incumbent Assemblyman Greg Ball and challenger John Degnan will square off in an event hosted by a non-partisan third-party, North County News, which has absolutely no stake in who is elected.

The moderator will be independently selected by North County News, which will ask if the person identified meets with each camp’s approval. The moderator will pose questions derived from the newspaper’s archives of stories covering both candidates and issues of the day. The questions will betray no bias toward one candidate or the other and reveal no prejudicial leaning on hot-button issues. Audience members will be invited to pose questions of their own.

If all the above seems painfully obvious to any reasonable, well-informed person, the need to exercise ethical, fair and thoroughly impartial procedures to justify using the word “debate” is not obvious to everyone, even including those who are holding what they inaccurately call a “debate.”

A local group that has its heart in the right place, but is misinformed about the proper way to stage a debate, is holding a totally partisan event this Friday at Yorktown Town Hall that more accurately should be called a press conference.

It’s quite a feat to announce a debate for two elected offices and work it so that only one candidate for each office shows up. Here’s a preview of how that is accomplished, borrowed from an imaginary primer that might be titled, “How to Turn a Debate into a Duh-Bait.”

Why “duh-bait”? Because people who put on a debate that is set up to explicitly favor one candidate are insulting the intelligence of the candidate on the other side; as if the prey don’t know (duh!) that they are being baited instead of debated.

1) Have the duh-bait hosted by an organization that actively engages in partisan politics and has made known which candidates it favors, ensuring their opponents have valid reasons for staying away. It takes two to debate. It takes one to duh-bait.

2) Schedule and announce the duh-bait date without first consulting all the candidates to confirm they are available.

3) Select a moderator who has campaigned for one of the candidates and collected signatures on a petition required to get the candidate’s name on the ballot.

4) Select a panel of questioners that includes only those who agree with one of the candidate’s agendas and take a hard line against the views of his opponent.