Lori Falce: Presidential debate or cafeteria food fight?

If you are a politics nerd like me, you probably spent Wednesday night watching the first Republican presidential primary debate of the 2024 election season.

For some, this might be comparable to the other periodic ritual trial-by-combat going on right now — NFL preseason football.

There definitely are parallels to be made. Previous superstars get pushed out of their comfort zones in hopes of finding previously undiscovered talents in a new role. Maybe this linebacker would be a good longsnapper. Maybe that third-stringer has what it takes to start. In this case, the third string would be six current or former governors, a senator and a tech entrepreneur.

But, after watching the debate, I found it to be less like an audition for someone ready to take on the White House and more like a brood of squabbling children in need of a good teacher. Perhaps the debate process is a little less preseason football and a little more sending your kids back to school.

You know what it’s like. They’ve had a whole summer of later bedtimes and more screen time. They have run wild in the neighborhood. Their world has become all swimming and video games. The idea of bus stops and math homework can turn them feral.

Then they get the teacher who guides them back to schedules and makes them realize who really is in charge of the classroom. There are rules, and they matter. There is work that needs to get done, and that doesn’t happen if everything is chaos.

But wait — does that analogy work? These people are running to be the president. If that’s not the person in charge, who is?

The teacher in this scenario is the American people.

It’s past time for the electorate to remind the candidates what the important virtues and objectives of the nation — and, in this case, the party — are. It’s also important for Democrats to realize this isn’t just a finger wagging at Republicans. The Democrats need to do the same, especially in Pennsylvania.

Although, even the teachers let things go over the summer. They take that vacation, too, and need to come back to the classroom ready to get down to business.

What that means is every American has a responsibility to remember what the job of the president is. It isn’t to be a figure for memes and jokes. It’s not to be our entertainer-in-chief.

The majority of Americans don’t want a replay of the 2020 election with the same players on the ticket, but we rapidly are heading toward exactly that. President Joe Biden doesn’t have a serious polling challenger on the Democratic side, despite Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Marianne Williamson announcing bids. One could say the same about the GOP; the debate didn’t feature the leading candidate, Donald Trump, who declined to participate.

It’s on all of us to drag the candidates we have back to reality and stop rewarding bad behavior. We need to encourage the candidates who can do their homework and have real, rational, reasonable debates on ideas and principles rather than devolving into a cafeteria food fight.