Barack Obama didn't need debates to catch fire. He did so long before the first one.
A Hillary Clinton rival
whines:
One Democratic 2016 campaign adviser who spoke to Business Insider said they believe the Democratic National Committee's debate schedule was "worked out" to benefit Hillary Clinton and hurt her opponents.
The adviser, who requested anonymity in order to speak frankly about the party's campaign arm, suggested the DNC is hosting a small number of debates in an attempt to give Clinton's more low profile rivals "less screen time." They also suggested the relatively late schedule of the debates will make it harder for Clinton's lesser known rivals to introduce themselves to voters.
First of all, is there any reason this "adviser" got anonymity for this attack? We're supposed to take Clinton's rivals seriously when they're too afraid to attack her on the record?
Given what we've been hearing from other reports, this adviser almost certainly works for former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley. Perhaps he doesn't want to overly damage his vice-presidential chances?
Furthermore, six sanctioned debates is more than enough. It's funny watching this dinosaur of an "adviser" whine about "screen time" at a time when candidates have myriad avenues to deliver their message across infinite screens. Poorly watched debates aren't the answer for a candidate looking to catch fire. Howard Dean and Wesley Clark caught fire in 2003 before a single debate took place. Barack Obama likewise did the same in 2007. The debates actually hurt Dean, and by the time they took place in 2007, Obama was already off to the races.
Debates may have had an outsized level of influence in campaigns from the '60s to the late '90s, but we live in a different world now. Stop whining about the old rules, and learn to play by the new ones. Six debates is more than enough for candidates to differentiate themselves, particularly after they've used new media tools to introduce themselves to primary voters.
That said, the DNC is wrong on one major aspect: the rules allow it to bar any candidate from attending its sanctioned events if they participate in any other debates. That blatantly undemocratic clause needs to be ignored by all candidates. If you don't want to call it a "debate," then fine, but if candidates want to participate in joint forums, hangouts, gatherings, symposiums, roundtables, or whatever, that's their right as Americans and fuck the DNC for trying to squash it. Hillary can show up to those additional events if she wants to. Or not. No one is forcing anything on anyone.
If the insurgent candidates want to generate some attention, they should openly flaunt that rule then demand to be included in the sanctioned debates. And if the DNC holds its ground, all of Clinton's opponents should boycott until Clinton is forced to either stand alone on stage like an idiot (thus the story becomes a farcical event), or she asks the DNC to bend the stupid rule.