I think candidate debates hosted by the media stink. When hosted by television news anchors the focus is on creating a headline, not enlightening the voters. One only has to look at the egregious actions of the Fox News buffoons playing “let’s you and him fight”

…Could you please address Governor Bush across the stage here…

…[mc_name name=’Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX)’ chamber=’senate’ mcid=’C001098′ ], your colleague, [mc_name name=’Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)’ chamber=’senate’ mcid=’P000603′ ], right there next to you, said a few months ago…

…Governor Kasich, I know you don’t like to talk about Donald Trump….

…Do you really believe you can assign blame to [mc_name name=’Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)’ chamber=’senate’ mcid=’P000603′ ] just for opposing…

…[mc_name name=’Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL)’ chamber=’senate’ mcid=’R000595′ ], why is Governor Bush wrong on Common Core?…

…Governor Christie, I want to engage you and Governor Huckabee in a subject…

…Governor Huckabee, what do you think about what [mc_name name=’Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)’ chamber=’senate’ mcid=’P000603′ ] just said?…

…Governor Bush,… an anonymous GOP donor who said you called Mr. Trump a clown, a buffoon, something else that cannot be repeated on television….

The CNN debate was no different. Jake Tapper ignored the American electorate in a valiant attempt to provoke headline-generating controversy:

…Would you feel comfortable with Donald Trump’s finger on the nuclear codes?…

…You didn’t answer my question. Would you feel comfortable with Donald Trump’s finger on the nuclear codes?…

…Tell Governor Bush why you are a serious candidate and what your qualifications are to be commander-in-chief….

…Governor Bush, would you feel comfortable with Donald Trump’s finger on the nuclear codes?…

…Governor Christie, I want to ask you about something that Dr. Carson said the other day….

…Respond to Governor Kasich, please….

…Why is that not, as Governor Kasich says, playing to the crowd and an example of you being inexperienced?…

…Did [mc_name name=’Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX)’ chamber=’senate’ mcid=’C001098′ ] just play to the crowd?…

…Is Scott Walker’s approach the right one, canceling the state dinner?…

…Is Governor Bush on the wrong side of the criminalization of Christianity?…

I quit not quite one-quarter of the way through the transcript.

One would expect that CNN having conducted the GOP debate in a cage-match fashion that they would do the same for the Democrats. One, however, would be very wrong. The same network that allowed its moderator – the wildly inappropriately named Candy Crowley – to tag-team Mitt Romney and save Obama has decided that it wants a kinder, gentler Democrat debate.

CNN’s Anderson Cooper will moderate the first Democratic presidential debate this week, and unlike the previous Republican debate hosted by CNN, Cooper said he won’t be encouraging confrontations between the candidates.

“I’m always uncomfortable with that notion of setting people up in order to kind of promote some sort of a face off,” Cooper said Sunday on CNN’s “Reliable Sources.” “Look, these are all serious people. This is a serious debate. They want to talk about the issues and I want to give them an opportunity to do that.”

The real reason is to save Hillary’s ample, cellulite infused ass. She is incapable of debate. Bernie Sanders and Martin O’Malley are both much smarter than she is. In addition, her positions on homosexual marriage, gun rights, illegal immigration, and the Iraq War in 2016 are all 180-degrees from where they were in 2008. The second reason is to try to contrast the GOP debates, which have become heated at points, with a Democrat debate that is very polite. As Brian Beutler writes in The Adults Take the Stage in the Democratic Debate:

It isn’t wrong or biased to say that Democrats make comparatively boring television. But that isn’t a strike against Democrats, either. It’s a reflection of the fact that the Republican Party, unlike the Democratic Party, is dominated by reactionary voters, which makes its candidates prone to saying or doing outrageous things out of a sense of necessity.

…

The best way to cement impressions, then, might not be to home in on revelatory incidents, assuming they’ll come to define the parties and their candidates, but to juxtapose them in the broadest terms. The contrast couldn’t be more striking.

Maybe one day someone at the RNC will learn that the media are not their friends and that debates structured to generate headlines by gratuitously setting candidates against each other inevitably result in our candidates being hurt while the Democrats are allowed to debate over the fringes of how much free stuff they will be able to give away.