The Democratic nominees for constitutional office this year are apparently not keen on debating their MassGOP opponents. The political press appears unwilling to let them get away with this crime against democracy. I think somebody needs to seriously consider the possibility that running under the banner of a political party that has thoroughly abandoned essential democratic norms and values disqualifies MassGOP nominees from the privileges of candidates who have not done so.
Journalists covering this “Democratic debate ducking debate” seem to me to be missing the forest for the trees. I think this pro-debate instinct is understandable, even a laudable defense of core democratic principles, under ordinary circumstances. I think, however, that we are not presently experiencing ordinary circumstances and condemning Democrats for refusing to debate Trumpublicans ignores the indisputable fact that the GOP is no longer willing to respect the democratic values, norms, or rules that make liberal democracy possible. This year’s Democratic candidates (with the possible exception of Diana DeZoglio whose opponent has distanced himself from pro-Trump Republicans and who apparently doesn’t even enjoy the support of the MassGOP) should very publicly and aggressively reject the legitimacy of their opponents’ candidacies because to dignify them would be to condone the GOP’s attacks on American democracy.
I am not advocating debate “ducking,” however. I am advocating debate rejection, animated by clear and unambiguous explanations about why voters should stand with Democratic candidates against the Republican Party assault on democratic norms and standards of civility and integrity.
The unwillingness or inability of journalists to surrender their partisan neutrality and to look objectively at the American political landscape has left the average American voter in the dark about the very asymmetric partisanship of contemporary American politics. Neutrality is, of course, much easier to pull off than objectivity and in our present hyper-competitive media marketplace, reliance on it is very understandable, but it is also unintentionally helpful to the right wing authoritarians who have taken over of the GOP and are using it to undermine the rule of law and the integrity of our electoral system.
Under normal circumstances, calling out politicians for putting their campaign X’s and O’s ahead of voter education and norms of fair play and open debate is exactly what journalists are supposed to do. Under present circumstances, however, doing so may amount to a calculation on the part of journalists that suffers from the same defect as that which they believe they are calling out. Journalists who do call out the fact that the GOP has devolved into a dangerous foe of democracy, and who describe day-to-day politics without side stepping or obscuring that overriding reality, risk professional scorn because (unfortunately) they now too must bow to the low information news consumer the way professional politicians often must bow to the low information voter. In other words, competition makes doing the right thing tough all over.
The good news here is that statewide Democratic candidates do not have serious competition, so we should be compelling them to expend their excess political capital to do the right thing for American democracy, which is to not allow Republican Party candidates to duck responsibility for condoning their party’s existential threat to American democracy, and to deny them the legitimacy of a debate platform.
Democratic candidates in Massachusetts who lack serious competition could use their rejection of calls to debate their MassGOP opponents to push back against the phony balance, moral equivalence, and bothsidesism that pervades conventional campaign media narratives. Candidates who will almost certainly defeat their Trump-endorsed, MassGOP opponents without breaking a sweat, no matter how much criticism they get for ducking debates, should be compelled to break a sweat by using their rejection of debates to alert Bay State voters to the very real threat to state and nation posed by the Republican Party. If they did this then the virtually automatic “debate ducking” media narrative would be short-circuited and journalists would be able to cover a much more real and important debate, namely, whether MassGOP candidates have disqualified themselves from the serious consideration of voters by their membership in Donald Trump’s Republican Party.
In short, Massachusetts Democrats have an opportunity to live up to their state’s claims of political exceptionalism, and to show the rest of the country how attacks on the very foundations of American democracy, on civility, integrity, and common decency, need not be ignored, appeased, or surrendered to.
Trump-endorsed, MassGOP gubernatorial nominee Jeff Diehl has a long and clear public record of ignorance, incivility, and dishonesty that should obligate Maura Healey to aggressively reject calls for her to debate him. Her agreement to debate Diehl once is, frankly, disappointing and a sign that Healey cares more about the X’s and O’s of campaign strategy than about the opportunity a firm rejection of debate demands would give her to publicly discredit the uncivilized and dishonest brand of politics that Diehl represents.