As Election ’24 gets closer to the Day of Reckoning, looking back at other elections, other campaigns and other times offer a glimpse at how Democracy was working throughout the decades.
Today it’s the only vice-Presidential debate of Election 1992. A three way debate between incumbent Dan Quayle, Senator Al Gore and retired Admiral James Stockman. With all the focus on either Democrats or Republicans, we tend to lose sight of the other parties involved in the sweepstakes. The campaign of Ross Perot and James Stockdale was a hit-or-miss affair and even during the debate, Admiral Stockdale was questioning why he was there.
The vice presidential nominees argued, interrupted, and contradicted in the first wide-open, head-on clash since televised presidential campaign debating began, a format the Republicans had opposed. Quayle took advantage of the open forum questions from a moderator and time for argument to focus on trust as an issue, picking up a Bush theme in sharper words than the president employed himself. When he wasn’t talking trust he was talking taxes. And when he got the last word, he said Gore hadn’t rebutted him. “Do you really believe that Bill Clinton will tell the truth?” he asked at the end.
“And do you trust Bill Clinton to be your president?” Gore bore down just as hard on the issue the Democrats want center stage, the economy, needling Quayle along the way. Stockdale was literally the man in the middle, at the lectern between the major party nominees, and said he felt like an observer at a pingpong game. He fumbled with his pen, missed hearing one question, introduced himself as an amateur and acted like it. “I’m not a politician, everybody knows that,” he said. When the 90-minute debate was over, the Republicans said Quayle had accomplished his debate mission; the Democrats said Gore had won and that the vice president had been too strident Both sides agreed the Stockdale showing would likely be a problem for Perot. There were no major fumbles by the major-party nominees, and each had grounds for his claim to success. Quayle certainly showed himself a changed man by comparison with his faltering debate.
That could be a preview of presidential debates to come. The next one, set for October 15th in Richmond, Va., was to feature questions from a selected audience, and the final debate, on Monday in East Lansing, will include 45 minutes with the same direct debate format used in Atlanta. It had Quayle and Gore arguing directly, and prompted Stockdale to observe: “I think America is seeing right now the reason this nation is in gridlock.” That was one of his better moments during a difficult evening. “Who am I? Why am I here?” the retired admiral, Vietnam war prisoner and hero, asked as he introduced himself at the outset.
For a reminder of debates from elections past and a refresher course on civility under brickbat, here is that debate as it was presented by National Public Radio on October 13, 1992.
