Vice presidential candidates JD Vance and Tim Walz are set to debate this Tuesday. Ahead of the Oct. 1 event, the broadcaster announced that moderators Norah O’Donnell and Margaret Brennan will not fact-check either candidate — Walz and Vance will be responsible for fact-checking one another. The news prompted political scientist Norman Ornstein to lament that though CBS was once “the gold standard for television news,” both “those days and their standards are long gone.”
Ornstein isn’t the only voice objecting to CBS’ announcement, with the condemnation of their choice widespread on social media after CNN previously declined to fact-check candidates during the debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump earlier this year, followed by ABC opting to include brief fact-checks from moderators in the presidential debate between Trump and Kamala Harris.
According to CBS News’ editorial standards, the moderators are there to facilitate the conversation/debate between the candidates, as well as enforce the debate’s rules. However, they leave the responsibility to the candidates when it comes to fact-checking as part of the broadcast. CBS does plan to offer its own form of live fact-checking — but it will be online, rather than directly from the moderators, via its CBS News Confirmed Unit journalists in an online blog.
We’re gonna have a proven liar on our network. We’re not going to do anything to point that out.
Cowards. Why hold a debate at all if you’re gonna be pussies about it?
I think this is how it should be. Moderators fact checking inevitably leads to accusations of being biased to one party, since anything and everything can be fact checked. Unless you keep tally and do an exact number of fact checks for both sides, it’s futile to fact check. Let the opponent do that. They should have prepared for all the lies they know their opponents would peddle.
Debates don’t have unlimited time. That would simply allow them to lie every time a person has the last say on a topic. Making the other person have to use their time to speak on the next topic about a precious topics bologna, making minimal time to actually reply and a constant distraction from answering the questions which were hopefully designed to allow voters to better understand the positions of the candidates.
Tally’s don’t really work well either because lies aren’t always black and white. Say for instance someone says x number of people or $x were spent on something or were effected by something. If they say 400,000 but it was really 389,000… You would have to mark that as a lie equivalent to a lie saying John Snow wasn’t a character in game of thrones.
This is the real answer.
CBS not fact checking gives the liar a strong advantage.
The moderators not fact checking is fine for things like debate competitions because the judges are experts.
But in a public debate, an opponent even responding to a lie legitimizes the lie. “Of course he’d say that.”
When a candidate lies and the facts are readily available to the moderators, it is imperative for the public good that they fact check.
I’ll try and assume that you’re not just a Maga type who hates facts, for just a second.
You can’t prepare for the lies that the opponent will peddle, because Vance uses the tactic where he just throws an avalanche of bullshit, with a tiny bit of truth in there. Its literally what he’s been doing so far. No normal human being will be able to fact check all that in real time and give any rebuttal, waltz would look like he doesn’t know what he’s talking about even though in reality Vance would just be lying his ass off.
This is why you have moderators who do fact checking. If it seems to you that the fact checking is rather one sided, then you’re very close to underi the issue, you just need that one last extra step where you understand that trump & co are full of bullshit
Try not to use “Slammed” in Article title challenge (Impossible)
Lambasted
vance cant fact check anyone being the admitted liar he is. just like his orange bff he cannot be trusted to be honest
Fuck CBS
I will say this debate is inherently riskier than the last one simply because JD Vance is already at his floor. He’s the most unpopular VP or VP candidate in history. Worse than Sarah Palin, worse than Spiro Agnew, worse than Aaron Burr.
He loses, nothing changes, he cannot go lower barring Mark Robinson tier revelations and even then I have doubts. He wins, Walz slips a point or two, Harris by extension maybe 1/4th of a point.Really anything that can stop the bleed for the Republicans is a win for them, October is critical. Harris rode a 6 week high after getting in at the end of July, spent the first two weeks undoing the pit Biden had dug, then got boosts from the VP pick and convention that lasted until early September. Trump finally had trends on his side and the debate utterly wrecked that. That’s finally fading again so they really are seeking a win, a screw up here could be too late to wait out and Vance getting some good press could bury stuff like the Uncle Robinson(no relation) disaster.
The other problem is that he’s young, really young, Teddy young. JD Vance is young enough he can fake it for a little bit in a way Trump is just too old to do these days. He’s baitable, but not to the level of Trump or even Biden in this environment. Young Narcissists can put on a face for a while in a controlled space like this, 80s Trump did it all the time and I’d argue Vance might be sharper than him.
I don’t think it’s a bad matchup, Walz is very wholesome and more experienced(and the reverse would be very unideal for the Democrats. Vance would be better at avoiding the massive tangents Harris baited Trump into, meanwhile Walz isn’t as high energy or effective on the pursuit against Trump as Harris is) , but he definitely ‘looks’ and ‘sounds’ older than he is, especially compared to Harris. So Walz is walking in with that already there.
A vanishingly small number of US voters are even going to watch this. There is wildcard baseball and a bunch of other crap happening at the exact same time.
Theres no point in watching it without fact checking and moderation, without those its just gonna be republican propaganda with occasional interjections by easily ignored sanity.
Whatever happened to "criticize?’
Too boring! We need drama, baby! Endless, exhausting drama brings those sweet, sweet clicks! That’s why we love Trump!
That’s been turned against the critic. Some people view “criticizism” the same as nitpicking and complaining.
So sick of the over-use of “slam”. Where it does work? “Car door slams finger.” Elsewhere? No. Never.
And wrestling news.
And in porn news.
Domestic violence news
All good answers! I love you Internet people!
What about after the words “Everybody get up, it’s time to” or “come on and”?
Easy blah blah obliterates/annihilates their opponent in alleged debate.
We might as well go for the most obscene words at this point.
Mysticpickle drops bombshell on journalists. Entire industry collapses!
I refuse to upvote any post woth the word “slammed” in the title
“Article title slammed by Feathercrown”
That really ripped me.
Vance will be fact checked way more.
So they’re just going to let Vance fearmonger the country into a race war.
Cool. Cool cool cool.
CBS does plan to offer its own form of live fact-checking — but it will be online, rather than directly from the moderators, via its CBS News Confirmed Unit journalists in an online blog.
So the attention of the viewer is divided or they don’t even know that there is an online live fact check.
Sounds more than fishy
I vote for big true/false gauge behind them both. The needle swings as the speaker speaks. Maybe a flashing red light for insane lies and green for absolute truth.
But they would need real fact checkers voting on the truthfulness in real time to make it work.
Maybe their mic should get quieter each time they lie lol
This is actually a great compromise if they don’t wanna fact check em on air. Have the meter and the link on screen if anyone wants to go online to read the fact check.
I’d prefer it actually visible to the candidates.
They need to know that we know.
Lul would be amazing. I would love to see their reaction as the meter in front of them goes ham.
“Uh, well, I, uh … the question is-is vague. You don’t say what kind of couch, whether anyone is watching or, uh… At any rate, I certainly wouldn’t fuck the couch!”
The best thing about this joke is how protesting will make him sound so much more guilty of it.
good.
You misspelled “bad”.
