Is debate in America dead? Was last night's spectacle? The end of debate in America, the end of a great tradition, Lincoln, Douglas, Kennedy, Nixon, Obama, you know, we had great debates

in this country.

When Obama debated Romney, did we last night see the death of debate?

Is it over?

Was last night something new?

Or was it the culmination of years and years

in which we have seen debate being wounded and hurt and last night we saw the end result

The death of debate you'll hear more about this on the Dershove.

I love a good debate.

I was brought up on debate.

I was the president of the debate society in high school

captain of the debating team in college.

I've lived my life debating.

I've debated in front of the United States Supreme Court. I've

debated on television. I used to debate Bill Buckley regularly on PBS.

Debate is at the center of American democracy and in the first presidential debate we may

have seen the death, the death of debate. Everybody acknowledges the debate was a disaster. People

pointing fingers, mostly at President Trump, some at the moderator, some at Biden, some at the rules themselves.

We'll get to that in a minute.

The point is everybody agrees that the debate was a disaster. There are

those calling for the end of presidential debates. Certainly many calling for

no second debate between Trump and Biden.

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