Kesher Talk has a brief account of the Hitchens-Galloway Debate with some links.
PJ Media appreciates your comments that abide by the following guidelines:
1. Avoid profanities or foul language unless it is contained in a necessary quote or is relevant to the comment.
2. Stay on topic.
3. Disagree, but avoid ad hominem attacks.
4. Threats are treated seriously and reported to law enforcement.
5. Spam and advertising are not permitted in the comments area.
These guidelines are very general and cannot cover every possible situation. Please don't assume that PJ Media management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment. We reserve the right to filter or delete comments or to deny posting privileges entirely at our discretion. Please note that comments are reviewed by the editorial staff and may not be posted immediately. If you feel your comment was filtered inappropriately, please email us at story@pjmedia.com.
Hardly a debate, indeed. Galloway’s mincemeat for any decent debater, let alone the splendiferous Hitch. Which makes one wonder how Coleman and Levin could have allowed Galloway to make mincemenat of them last spring.
A clue to the answer, I think, can be found in the recent Roberts hearings gasfest. Our Senators not only don’t know how to make cogennt, concise arguments, especially on their feet; our Senate rules and procedures positively encourage them to be pompous and foolish gasbags.
Compare the Senate’s m.o. with the UK Parliament’s Question Time and other debate forums. In Parliament, anyone can interrupt the speaker, and speakers are judged not on the quality of their prepared remarks but on their ability to cut and thrust, to respond to impromptu questions with wit, logic and rhetorical force. Prime Ministers are not spared. Everyone’s a fair target, and anyone who cannot defend himself on his feet is despised as a lightweight, regardless of his political credentials.
OTOH Senate rules prohibit interruption of a Senator when he launches into his long-winded prepared statement. In fact, Senate custom not only allows but encourages pomposity: even when the hearings are expressly designed for eliciting lengthy and detailed statements from a witness, as with a SCOTUS nominee, the Senators unite in making the proceedings all about their own fumbling, longwinded, illogical, hamhanded prepared remarks!
Is this really the best that America can do?
No wonder that American politics is increasingly dominated by nepotism: the Bushes and Clintons and Gores and Bayhs and Romneys; the Daleys in Chicago, the Landrieux in Louisiana, and dozens of other sons and daughters of former mayors and governors across the country.
Time to introduce the oxygen known as real debate into the 100 Windbags Club. And if the British-style cut-and-thrust school of rising through the political ranks prevailed here, it’s highly doubtful we would have so many second-rate relatives of Daddy holding high office across the nation.
I had a ticket, but couldn’t get to NYC because I got stuck in traffic and missed the train. However, I watched on the internet.
C-Span will televise the video on Saturday, September 17 at 9:00 pm and Sunday, September 18 at 12:00 pm and Monday, September 19 at 5:30 am
Thibaud, you make a good point about our Senate rules and the pomposity they foster.
Regarding the Bush family, though, the son is first-rate. It’s the father who was second-rate.
***
There’s another factor at work, though: the MSM’s devotion to knocking down Republicans and disinterest in foibles of Democrats. I’m personally convinced that this has weeded out a lot of inferior Republican politicians, while permitting a lot of VERY inferior Democratic politicans to survive.
Bostonian,
the MSM’s devotion to knocking down Republicans and disinterest in foibles of Democrats. I’m personally convinced that this has weeded out a lot of inferior Republican politicians, while permitting a lot of VERY inferior Democratic politicans to survive
You’re probably right, though there are plenty of Republican pinheads in that party’s own gerrymandered districts. I agree totally that Republicans graduate from a much tougher ecole des coups durs than do the likes of Biden and Boxer and Kerry, which is someone like Bush 43 is able to outwit and wrongfoot his opponents again and again.