In the short time between the constructive round and the rebuttal round–yes, “rebuttal” as a hard job of any respectable debater– , nothing can be “scripted” except in the sense that the speaker-nominee “a” has generally practiced his or her stump speech so much that you might say, in a way it is “scripted”; it is extemporized from a long campaign of practice. Same for the speaker-nominee “b”. We have just had the exhibition season.Now it’s on to the finals.
What will be good for us is that we will have a direct clash between opposing parties for the first time, focusing on a subject matter restricted to just a few crucial issues in each debate.

No more “my friends” conversation. This is high level discussion and debate at the highest level, two specialized terms in the nomenclature of the debate specialists. Not for amateurs or the “minor” league.

The audience participation you desire should be done with demographically selected, as pollsters do the job, focus-groups after the debates at a remove from the debate hall, same building or across the continent in the regions blue or red. These debates should be a media event, primarily. Actually it should be the people who bring themselves into the process in discussion groups in libraries or some such meeting hall throughout the nation. Or, what’s better, livingrooms filled with neighbors or friends or relatives gathered to watch and discuss each event. What a “hotbed” of democracy that would be!

However, the debate protocol defends a binary proposition: defend option A or B, true or false, yes or no. Of course, we need to be able to distinguish between the candidates and their positions. Rather than push each towards extreme positions, I’d prefer a format that permits the expression of broader, more centrist, overlapping positions, but where the detail and subtleties of implementation for example may differentiate them. I’m less interested in rebuttal, as it is too often scripted and done poorly with misinformation and distortion. I’d rather see clear expressions of commitments and understanding of the policy landscape by the candidates. Leave it to the viewers to judge the merits of the proposals and the competence of the candidates. Finally, and most importantly, the debate format you promote still doesn’t bring people into the process, which I think is what is really required. The questions addressed by candidates should be the result of a deliberative process that harvests them from a microcosm of the population. And the process needs to be able to surprise the candidates–after all, we are looking to see how they react unscripted on their feet under the glare of the camera.