Skip to footer

Presidential debate: 7 defining moments in history (+video)

President Obama and Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney are preparing for their upcoming debates, memorizing facts and figures as well as strategizing on tone and body language. Since the first televised debate between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon in 1960, presidential debates have been as much "show business," according to President George H.W. Bush, as they are civic exchanges of political ideas. 

From Ronald Reagan’s one-liner, “There you go again,” to Al Gore’s heavy sighs and eye rolls, zingers and mannerisms can define a presidential debate even more than the candidates’ positions on critical issues. Here is a look back at seven defining debate moments.

AP/File
Republican Vice President Richard M. Nixon, left, debates Sen. John F. Kennedy, the Democratic presidential nominee, during a live broadcast from a New York television studio on Oct. 21, 1960.

1960: John F. Kennedy vs. Richard Nixon

Vice President Nixon (R) was favored to win the 1960 presidential election, but the first-ever televised presidential debates gave an unexpected edge to his rival, Senator Kennedy (D). 

The first debate on Sept. 26, 1960, pitted a fit and tan Kennedy against a sweaty and pale Nixon. Nixon refused to wear makeup, and his light-colored suit blended with the studio backdrop.

Appearance matters, especially on TV. The four Nixon-Kennedy “great debates” aren’t remembered for the substance of the issues – they spent an inordinate amount of time discussing China’s plan for two tiny Pacific islands – but they gave the lesser-known Kennedy a chance to reach some 70 million voters, who tuned in for the first debate.

That, at least, was Kennedy's view, according to Newton Minow, the man he appointed to chair the Federal Communications Commission. The debates "stoked the public appetite for and the modern campaign's emphasis on the image and the sound byte," Mr. Minton wrote in his book, "Inside the Presidential Debates."

1 of 7
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.