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Required debates

Current poltical debates do not serve the national interest:

  • Those debates try to cover too many topics at once meaning they can't go into depth on any one issue.
  • The questions are always weak (whether asked by moderators or audience members).
  • They don't reflect the reality of governance (all politicians have a team of advisors and that team isn't on stage with them at debates).
  • The agendas of the questioners is a major issue both in what they ask and more importantly in what they won't ask.
  • The organizations sponsoring the debates have been known to interfere in the process, such as by selecting weak questions over strong questions that they disagree with.

Current political debates are mostly just entertainment, consisting of one or more politicians trading stock speeches and prepared barbs. We aren't choosing the best policy makers and that has a very widespread impact.

This political platform will resolve that in the following ways:

  • A government elections website (hereinafter called "the Hub") will be created that devotes a page to all candidates for national and state-wide office from all parties. The Hub will have a section for national elections, and subdomains for each state each of which has that state' sstate-wide candidate information. The Hub will only have current elections; data for elections that have already been held will be transferred to an archive site. Candidates and states are welcome to have their own websites elsewhere, but the Hub as its name suggests will form a hub for voters to learn about upcoming elections. The Hub will also have pages for state-level referendums and the like.

  • All presidential candidates will be required to take part in several Policy Debates. A panel of experts from all ideologies - even those considered outside the "mainstream" - will be able to ask a candidate and their experts specific questions about their policies. These Policy Debates will be live-streamed on the Hub and will be broadcast on CSPAN, PBS, or - if absolutely necessary - time will be purchased on commercial TV. A transcript will be posted immediately to the Hub. Each Policy Debate will be about one topic and will not consist of the candidate giving canned speeches or recounting their positions for the umpteenth time. Instead, the panel will ask questions about policy ideas the candidates have already stated. If there are a large number of presidential candidates and several topics, this would result in a large number of debates. However, experts can be paid for their attendance, a few debates can be held each day, and other methods can be used to make conducting large numbers of debates more feasible.

  • In addition to those debates, all candidates for national office will have to answer the top 20 toughest questions submitted by voters for each of several different topics. Candidates can answer in text or prerecorded video format. Voters will submit those questions to the Hub, and the toughest questions for each of the topics will be selected using the OpenQuestions module. Using that module will ensure that the questions are the toughest, and not just the most popular. The process to choose the Experts who judge the questions will be transparent and include a free and easy appeals process for those whose applications were rejected.

  • State- and local-level candidates will be encouraged to participate in the same debates and will have the same access to the Hub's resources as national candidates.