Opinion > Columnists > Randy Scholfield

  Randy Scholfield  

Have voters had their fill of 'gotcha'?

Please let this be the last presidential primary debate. Not for the candidates' sakes, but for mine. I can't take it anymore.

I'm getting bitter -- so are many Americans -- at the "gotcha" flaps that pass for debate in this Democratic primary silly season.

I've watched most of the debates. Some were better than others, but most moderators have tried to highlight issues of substance.

They didn't even try in the ABC News debate this week.

Are Americans really as dumb and superficial as debate hosts Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos treated them?

Gibson started pointlessly enough, badgering each candidate to pledge to accept the other as his or her running mate.

Charlie. Please. Haven't we already covered this ground?

It went downhill from there.

Never mind that the nation faces problems of historic proportions -- climate change, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, a tanking economy, a dysfunctional health care system and a mortgage crisis.

Most of the first hour was spent talking about the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, "Bittergate" and whether Obama was sufficiently patriotic.

Obama got the worst of this relentless inquisition and was visibly frustrated.

Gibson tried to justify a dumb question about why Obama doesn't wear a flag lapel pin by observing that "it's all over the Internet."

By all means, then, push it to the top of the nation's agenda!

Maybe I'm an elitist, but I really don't think flag pins are a burning issue to most voters.

Does anyone other than Internet conspiracy nuts really believe that Obama hates his country, despite his repeated avowals and stated reasons for his patriotism?

That's the stupidity of this style of campaign coverage.

In the 24/7 media mosh pit, these snippets and rumors become endlessly looped and take on a viral quality. No matter how many times they're reasonably addressed, they never go away.

Next up for endless spin appears to be Obama's "relationship" with Bill Ayers, a former member of the Weather Underground who has been active in Chicago politics for years. Obama has met him and even once served on a foundation board with him. So what?

Of course, candidates should be accountable for misstatements and lies. Obama's "bitter" comment was poorly phrased and offensive, even if his larger meaning was clear enough.

But after his repeated explanations and apologies, it's time to move on. Time for the media to get out of the way and let voters decide how important it is.

According to polls, few voters in Pennsylvania or nationwide were bitter about "bitter."

Speaking about such "manufactured issues" as flag pins, Obama said he had confidence that "the American people are smarter than that."

It's telling that the crowd audibly booed at the end of the debate, with Gibson smiling uneasily and joking, "The crowd is turning on me." Later, ABC's Web site was flooded with negative e-mails.

Clinton was booed, too, at a recent Pennsylvania campaign stop when she tried to get more mileage out of Obama's "bitter" statement. Maybe voters are finally getting tired of these distractions and insults to their intelligence.

"What's troubling is the gap between the magnitude of our challenges and the smallness of our politics -- the ease with which we are distracted by the petty and trivial," Obama wrote in his second book, "The Audacity of Hope."

That smallness was on full display Wednesday night.

But so was many voters' disgust. Maybe Americans have reached a turning point -- a recognition that the enormity of the problems we face aren't served by the media's obsession with the trivial and sensational.

We can hope.

Randy Scholfield is an Eagle editorial writer. His column appears on Fridays. Reach him at 316-268-6545 or rscholfield@wichitaeagle.com.