Although the Democratic presidential debates addressed a wide range of critical topics — including healthcare, the economy, immigration, climate change, gun control, race relations and inequality, Russian interference in American elections, and of course, how to defeat Donald Trump — the debates themselves drew much criticism. Norman Ornstein of The Atlantic (November 20, 2019) called the debates a “fantasy world” that did not reflect the actual work of governing while Akintunde Ahmad, Lauren Harris, and Savannah Jacobson of the Columbia Journalism Review (November 19, 2019) criticized the debate moderators, claiming they “struck a particularly simplistic and uninformative tone, asking questions seemingly designed to elicit a predetermined answer.” Many critics, including Caroline Framke of Variety (January 14, 2020) lamented that the debates once again failed candidates and the electorate, in that they were “meant to inspire antagonistic moments that give cable news channels like CNN some juicier meat to chew in between debates.” Focusing on corporate control of the media, Julie Hollar of Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (February 29, 2020) argued that in the debates, what “we continue to see is the corporate media’s use of its outsized power to dictate the limits of the conversation — and therefore also limit the ambitions of our politics.” At Citizens for Global Solutions, what stood out to us about the debates was the lack of moderator questions and candidate discussion on what needs to be done at the global level to solve our most pressing problems, and as president, how each would accomplish this. As a result, at a meeting of our think tank, the World Federalist Institute, we drafted a number of questions which our Action Network sent to the candidates and debate organizations to address in their debates and town hall meetings, as well as sending the candidates two copies of Planethood by Benjamin B. Ferencz and Ken Keyes, Jr. (1991), presenting the argument for a World Federation. Those questions are listed below. We encourage you to raise them with the candidates and your political representatives.
- Do you think that US foreign policy should aim to protect the human rights of all in the human community and not just the rights of US citizens?
- How would you bring an end to the US’s ongoing wars and reduce excessive spending on a military preparing for the next war?
- What do you think the US government should do to halt the reviving nuclear arms race and to get international arms control and disarmament back on track?
- How do you believe the United Nations should be made more effective to foster international security, protect our global environment, and solve other pressing global problems?
- Would you veto a congressional override of military plans or preemptive actions under the War Powers act?
- Are you in favor of the US ratifying the treaty for the International Criminal Court that could prosecute individuals involved in genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime of international aggression if national courts fail to do so? If yes, why, and if no, why not?
- How would you guard against the dominance of the Military-Industrial Complex that President Eisenhower warned us about in 1961?
- We often hear that the rule of law is the answer to our national and global problems. Would you be in favor of strengthening the body of international law by having the US ratify treaties such as the Paris Agreement, the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women, and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child?
References
The Democratic Debates Are a Fantasy World (Norm Ornstein, The Atlantic, November 20 2019)
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/11/democratic-debate-questions-candidates-need-answer/602296/
The State of Debate Questions (Akintunde Ahmad, Lauren Harris, and Savannah Jacobson, Columbia Journalism Review, November 19 2019)
https://www.cjr.org/politics/debate-questions-2016-2020-democrat-republican.php
Democratic Debate Questions Once Again Fail Candidates and Electorate (Caroline Framke, Variety, January 14 2020)
https://variety.com/2020/tv/columns/democratic-debate-cnn-des-moines-register-sanders-warren-moderators-1203467552/
Democratic Debate Moderators Frame Questions to Define Acceptable Politics (Julie Hollar, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, February 29 2020)
https://www.commondreams.org/views/2020/02/29/democratic-debate-moderators-frame-questions-define-acceptable-politics
Planethood (Benjamin B. Ferencz and Ken Keyes, Jr, 1991)