Thursday night is pivotal for U.S.

by Chris Bacon, Editor, Cody Enterprise

It’s gonna be a big show.

Thursday night’s presidential debate will likely be a pivotal moment for our nation. CNN will host the event between two men who have both been president.

To understand how unusual this is in U.S. history, remember that only one president, Grover Cleveland, ever served non-consecutive terms. He was first elected 10 years before the famous flight of the Wright brothers. The last president to even try to be reelected after losing an election was Theodore Roosevelt in 1912.

Recall also that the last campaign was conducted in a climate of Covid fear. Masks were everywhere, businesses were shut down, and CNN ran a continuous death-toll scroll on the right side of the screen for many months. We did not have a normal election cycle in that climate.

Now we can examine our candidates much more closely, without pandemic concerns.

While certain political entities always play up the significance of the coming election as “historic” or “pivotal” in order to motivate their base, this election seems to us to truly be a big one. Never in our lives have the candidates openly had such divergent goals.

A divided America has different visions of our future. We have calls to “defund the police” on one side and to build a wall along our southern border on the other. Each of the last two elections has been marred by controversy and questions of fairness.

We need some normalcy.

Enter this debate. Now President Biden said in May that he would not cooperate with the Commission on Presidential Debates, which had sponsored general-election debates since 1987, said Michael Grynbaum of the New York Times. So instead of the commission, CNN will run the show.

Expected to be widely watched, it should settle some issues. American voters will get to see the candidates onstage, unfiltered, facing each other. The Easter Bunny will not be present to come between a president and the press. Mean statements made cannot be deleted in the minds of voters who have watched the live debate. Voters can exercise their judgment on the age and fitness of the candidates, one 78 and the other 81, and both the oldest presumptive nominees in the history of their respective parties. Spokesmen or women will have a hard time walking back statements plainly made live before millions of viewers.

This is a good thing.

Here’s predicting a record viewership, as undecided voters tune in to learn and partisans tune in hoping to verify what they believe.

Thomas Jefferson, who penned a large part of our Constitution, wrote, “Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government.” Let’s pop some popcorn, grab a cold beverage and watch the show. We have a government to choose.

The debate will air at 7 p.m. Mountain Daylight Time on CNN and CNN.com and be simulcast on ABC and ABC News Live.