10-candidate debate: Circus, cattle call or hot mess?

Although most of the talk about the opening Republican presidential debate, exactly one month away on Aug. 6, has focused on the 10-candidate limit and who'll make the cut, there's a more basic question: What's gained from what veterans of past mass gabfests variously describe as a circus, a cattle call or a hot mess?

In big debates, sound bites shrink to nibbles, and most contestants don't even get those. "Smaller is better,'' says Bill Richardson, the former New Mexico governor and United Nations ambassador who competed with Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and others during the Democratic primaries eight years ago.

But even skeptics agree that, given the unprecedented number of candidates, a large, multi-candidate forum is like democracy itself — the worst alternative save all the others, including no debate at all.

Fox News hosts the first of a potential 12 GOP debates, which will be held in Cleveland. (The Democrats will have six debates, with the first coming sometime in the fall.) The network plans to limit it to the 10 leading candidates (though that could increase, considering any ties) in opinion polls; CNN, sponsor of the second debate, has a similar plan, plus a debate for the second tier.

Such a large panel is not unprecedented in primary debates — 10 Democrats debated in the 2004 race and 10 Republicans during the 2008 campaign — but experience suggests there are limits to what should be expected on such a crowded stage.

A big field does give voters a rough impression of candidates, including the previously obscure, and allows side-by-side comparisons. Sen. Lamar Alexander, a GOP candidate in 1996 and 2000, told a forum earlier this year that the format reduces pandering; debaters know someone else on the panel will call them out.

A big field does not allow in-depth discussion of issues — "these are debates for the age of Twitter,'' said Princeton political historian Julian Zelizer — and encourages grandstanding and showboating by candidates desperate for attention.

Which is why they're fun to watch. "My favorite part of the campaign,'' said Patrick Millsaps, Newt Gingrich's presidential campaign chief in 2012. "It's not great for democracy,'' said Zelizer, "but it's good TV.''

WHAT'S THE POINT?

Although big, multiple-candidate primaries have produced few of the more memorable moments in presidential debates, there are notable exceptions.

In 1980, candidate Ronald Reagan wanted to include five other candidates on a New Hampshire stage with himself and principal rival George H.W. Bush. When Bush balked, and the moderator ordered Reagan's sound muted, the old actor famously intoned, "I am paying for this microphone!''

Possibly the most striking thing about a multi-candidate debate is how it makes the normally powerful — governors, senators, tycoons — feel powerless, reduced to complaining about the questions they got or the moderator's bias.

It's hard to even get a word in edgewise. Richardson recalls his "tongue hanging out'' as questions on topics in his wheelhouse, such as foreign conflicts, went to other candidates, and he was saddled with ones on less relevant issues, like hurricane preparedness.

In a June 2007 debate, Richardson, who arguably had the most impressive résumé of the field, was not asked a question until 18 minutes in. "If you're not in the top tier of candidates,'' he said, "you're chopped liver.''

Steve Forbes, the wealthy magazine editor who sought the GOP nomination in 1996 and 2000, hasn't forgotten that awful feeling: "On certain nights, I was like a pitcher who just didn't have it.''

To complain that debates are too large is to miss their point: They exist precisely to cull the candidates' ranks of the weak, the lame and the halt. This year, with no clear GOP front-runner and 16 announced or probable candidates, that's more important than ever.

And debates with so many contestants and so little time invite gaffes, oversteps and other political disasters by contestants desperate to get their message across.

Possibly the most famous such blunder occurred in 2011, when then-Texas governor Rick Perry — one of eight GOP candidates on stage — forgot the third of three federal agencies he said he'd close if elected, and uttered what could be the epitaph for any number of debaters: "Oops.''

SOME FRIENDLY ADVICE

How do candidates survive such free-for-alls, and how can voters make sense of them? Veterans of multi-candidate debates interviewed by USA TODAY had some recommendations.

Candidates must assess their place in a pecking order that, for Millsaps, evokes "seventh-grade cafeteria politics.'' There are the front-runners (candidates 1-3), the challengers (4-6) and the also-rans (7-10) — the cool kids, the wannabes and the geeks.

The first three try to look presidential and say as little as possible; the second three attack the first three; the rest try to get noticed by doing something different, like not attacking the front-runner.

The goal is not so much to "win'' the debate, but to not make a big mistake while also saying or doing something to make the debate post-mortems over the next 24 hours.

If you can't make that cut, don't show up. Forbes said some of his worst debates were the result not of what he said, but what he didn't say: "I just didn't break through.''

So candidates must choose their tactics:

Attack the front-runner — whoever that is: The theory, shared by hyenas everywhere, is whatever the front-runner loses, the challengers gain. "But who's the king of the mountain?'' Millsaps asked. "With 10 people, it's hard to tell.''

Attack the moderator: In 2012, Newt Gingrich sparked his candidacy in the South Carolina primary by sparring with debate moderator John King of CNN. When King asked the former House speaker about his ex-wife's claim that he requested an "open marriage,'' Gingrich replied: "I think the destructive, vicious, negative nature of much of the news media makes it … harder to attract decent people to run for public office. I'm appalled you would begin a presidential debate on a topic like that." The crowd cheered.

Former Massachusetts governor Michael Dukakis, one of "Seven Dwarfs'' who went on to win the 1988 Democratic nomination, still relishes a primary debate where he managed to get into an argument about Nicaragua with the host — conservative Republican hero and Democratic bete noir William F. Buckley.

"That's what I wanted,'' he recalls. "I tried to keep it positive with the other Democrats.''

Tell the truth: That's what former Alaska senator Mike Gravel, who ran for the 2008 Democratic nomination, says helped him steal the show at the first debate. When someone said pulling out of Iraq would mean soldiers had died in vain, he replied: "You know what's worse than a soldier dying in vain? It's more soldiers dying in vain."

Bend — or break — the rules: Forbes says that if the moderator or the questions favor the front-runner, "you just have to break in, but not in a way that you look like the bad guy.'' Millsaps agrees: "After 10 minutes, the rules go out the window. If there's cross talk or sparks fly, the moderator lets it go.''

Deliver a pithy line: George Bush was being pounded by Forbes in a 2000 debate about his record as Texas governor. "So many half-stories,'' Bush replied. "So little time.''

In 2012, Mitt Romney said he didn't run for re-election as governor of Massachusetts because "for me, politics is not a career." Gingrich told him to cut the "pious baloney" and admit he wanted to run for president instead.

Bring a prop: Long-shot candidate Ned Coll produced a rubber rat at a 1972 Democratic primary debate in New Hampshire to dramatize the plight of the urban poor. In 2007, Democrat Dennis Kucinich pulled a copy of the Constitution from his pocket to buttress his point that Vice President Cheney should be impeached.

Repeat a catchy slogan: Four years ago, GOP candidate Herman Cain relentlessly and memorably flogged his " 9-9-9" plan to replace current taxes. You remember — 9% transaction tax, 9% income tax and 9% sales tax.

Leave 'em laughing: In a debate in Iowa in 2007, Richardson got a chuckle from the crowd when he said that while Clinton offered experience and Obama offered change, "with me, you get both.'' Another time, when Clinton and Obama were bickering, Richardson jumped in to say he had mediated armed conflicts more civil than this.

Such is success in a problematic format. Millsaps is resigned: "The Lincoln-Douglas debates they are not.''

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