Questions That Won't Be Asked Tonight

Looking forward to tonight's debate, I thought about what questions I would ask if I were Bob Schieffer, the moderator. Here are a few that popped into my head, in no particular order:

• Please explain why you believe you are prepared and qualified to be president of the United States.

• Please name the three highest priorities you'd bring into office.

• What can we expect to see in the first 100 days of your presidency? What policy objectives would you target, and how?

• What will be your approach to appointing Supreme Court justices should you have the opportunity to do so as president?

• How did our financial system wind up in such dire straits, and what can we learn from this experience that will help us prevent it from reoccurring?

• Given the opportunity, what would you change about the way we go about electing a president?

• What can private citizens do to help solve the vast array of serious problems our nation faces?

• What do you think the role of the vice president should be?

• Seven years after 9/11, how big of a threat is posed to the US by terrorists, and how would you act to counteract that threat?

• What's your view regarding whether, when and how to use military force to achieve US objectives?

Most of these questions probably won't be asked tonight. I think Schieffer will do a reasonably good job, but he's likely to stick to the same script that most moderators use: asking for each candidate's position on an exhaustive list of issues while throwing in a few questions aimed at addressing flash points in the campaign, such as whether Obama is qualified enough, McCain's guilt-by-association attacks or whether the troop surge in Iraq was a success. This approach is flawed, but probably necessary because of the ridiculously short time alloted for candidate answers. 

A far better way to structure debates would be for the moderator to ask a small number of open-ended, prepared questions, like the ones listed above. Instead of asking candidates to articulate their positions on Iraq or Afghanistan, ask them their views on using military force or how they'd address the threat of terrorism. That would give candidates significantly more options about how to answer, and what they choose to talk about — and not talk about — would tell us a lot more about what kind of leaders they are and how they'd govern. Follow-up questions could ask candidates to be more specific about any vague responses, as well as drill down further into anything new or interesting a candidate may say in his initial answer. 

These types of questions might actually require that the candidates think — and tell us what they think — instead of listening for key words in the question ("health care," "Iraq," "taxes") and summoning their endlessly rehearsed talking points on that issue. 

Anyway, I hope everyone watches tonight, and that Schieffer proves me wrong.