There They Go Again
By Mike Murphy
Though it sounds secretive and glamorous, debate prep is magnificently unpleasant for everybody involved. The candidates have gripped and grinned their way through a savage jungle of fund raisers, powerful local idiots, soggy state-fair corn dogs and rabid, preening reporters just to get to the debates, a dangerous pinnacle where one slipup could cost the election. The campaign staffs are equally exhausted and by now more than a little frustrated with the candidate they have come to both love and hate. Put them all in a room together in what are often poorly planned prep sessions, and you have the perfect recipe for disaster: the staffers discover great catharsis in firing increasingly nasty "prep" questions at the candidates, who in turn become more and more itchy under fire until finally exploding with a gusher of recriminations at their staffs for failing to prepare them for so many impossible questions.
Good debate prep is designed to build up, not tear down, the candidate's confidence. The first trick is to practice with a stand-in who has memorized the opposing candidate's likely answers. This is far easier than it sounds. One of the best-kept secrets of politics is that there are only about 20 "typical" questions. Odds are that one's esteemed opponent has publicly answered every imaginable policy question by the time the debate finally occurs. It is vital that your candidate not hear your opponent's answers for the first time onstage, since that will often lead to panic if a candidate feels the opponent's answer is far better than his or her own. Hmmm. Great answer. I've got nothing like that. I'm a loser. I'm going to lose this debate. In high school, Belinda would have wanted to go to the prom with him, not me. Anger. MUST ... ATTACK ... NOW!!! At that point something very bad usually happens.
A lot of debate prep is given over to mastering another basic rule: never make the rookie's mistake of actually trying to answer the question you are asked. Candidates are told instead to quickly "pivot" into their central campaign message whenever possible.
Question: "Governor, why is your hair on fire?"
Answer: "Nobody understands fire better than America's brave firefighters, which is why I'm so proud to say that the heroes who make up the National Firefighters Association took one look at my 11-point plan for comprehensive national health-care reform and strongly endorsed me as the only candidate in this race who is standing up for working, middle-class families who need health care now." Also, always keep talking until the moderator is forced to stop you with a foghorn blast or by reaching for an elephant gun under the desk. Airtime is gold.
Consultants have spent the equivalent of entire geologic ages trying to come up with the one item every candidate deeply pines for: the devastating one-liner. To be really devastating, the line must appear to be true, clever and, especially, spontaneous. So teams of moonlighting Hollywood comedy writers have been churning out ideas for weeks. The classic of the genre is Ronald Reagan's retort to Jimmy Carter in 1980: "There you go again." But nothing is worse than an overlabored gotcha line that falls horribly flat, so spin doctors must first do no harm. Part of this is to gently persuade the candidates to be totally relaxed and natural while simultaneously being very careful not to really be themselves. When Joe Biden squares off against Sarah Palin on Oct. 2, Biden must be cautioned to avoid his powerful urge to bring a laminated copy of his sat scorecard to the podium or to toss any well-meaning compliments at his opponent that include the word gams. It's probably a good idea to strip him of his beloved 4-lb. cuff links before he launches into any working-class-hero stuff as well. Palin should leave the overcooked hockey metaphors in the penalty box, lest we hear some clunker about the "puck" of reform smashing through the good-ol'-boy goalies of D.C.'s terrible status quo. And both will need to avoid the unintended subtext blunder (see "pig, lipstick on").
Finally, the savvy viewer should remember that any moment that looks too perfect to be true probably isn't. I once worked on a campaign in which we made a big show of opening our secret debate-prep session to reporters. The highlight was the part when the candidate dramatically rejected the lame, scripted debate answers we staffers had offered up, vowing instead to just tell it like it was.
We were very proud of our candidate; that was precisely the bit we had carefully rehearsed.
Murphy is a GOP political consultant, and was senior strategist for Senator John McCain's 2000 presidential race
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