A few days ago, we had the Republican debates on TV, and I came to the conclusion that having ten people on the stage at once was an unmanageable mess. At thirty seconds per answer, candidates were limited to faux anger and soundbites, while the cheers and applause gave it a gameshow feel. (Well, okay, so it was better than the debate on MSNBC, where you had questions like "What do you hate most about America?")
What I'd like to see is one-on-one, round-robin debates. Now, we could pair up the candidates randomly, but where is the fun in that? What I thought might be interesting is to have each candidate pick the order he wanted to debate every other candidate, and choose the order that best matches the aggregate preference. Unfortunately, I am not certain the fairest way to piece together incomplete debate orders (each candidate would have nine debates, but the total field would have a total of 45 debates). Anyone know the best way to do something like this? It would be similar to scheduling a baseball season or other sporting event, so it would seem to have a use beyond just debates. Thanks! Michael Rouse ---- election-methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
