Will Hillary Flunk the Nixon Debate Test?

The first debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton — Monday, Sept. 26 — is also the 56th anniversary of the legendary Nixon-Kennedy debate, the first televised debate in U.S. history.

It is fitting that the highly anticipated Trump-Clinton matchup will occur on that anniversary, as there are some striking parallels between the two contests.

“The closest precedent that exists would probably be the first televised debate [between Nixon and Kennedy].”

That Nixon-Kennedy debate proved the power of the camera in crafting a politician’s image.

“The closest precedent that exists [to the Trump-Clinton debate] would probably be the first televised debate,” Eddie Zipperer, political science professor at Georgia College, told LifeZette.

“People listening on the radio thought Nixon won, but people watching on TV thought Kennedy won,” he said. “Nixon was sweaty and uncomfortable looking whereas Kennedy was handsome and composed,” Zipperer added. “If [Clinton] doesn’t look 100 percent healthy, it will probably hurt her just based on the fact that it will be on people’s minds.”

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Like Clinton, Nixon was suffering from health problems. In August, Nixon was hospitalized for two weeks with an infection that he developed after a knee injury. Many thought being under peak health was in large part why Nixon looked so terrible on screen compared to Kennedy.

Of course, Hillary’s condition appears more permanent than Nixon’s, and while Nixon disappeared quietly to the hospital for two weeks in an age before 24-hour TV coverage, Clinton collapsed in front of the entire nation.

Clinton can be sure there will be a large audience watching for any indication of further health problems. “In 1960, 36 percent of the population watched the first Kennedy-Nixon debate,” wrote James Fallows, chair in U.S. Media at the United States Studies Centre and former speechwriter for Jimmy Carter, in the The Atlantic.

“The same percentage now would mean nearly 120 million viewers in the United States, plus countless more worldwide,” he wrote. “These debates would be must-watch TV because they would be the most extreme contrast of personal, intellectual, and political styles in America’s democratic history,” Fallows continued.

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In addition to the health issues, Nixon, again much like Clinton, also entered his debate against Kennedy on the heels of embarrassing media incidents. A number of weeks before the debate, a reporter asked President Eisenhower to name some of Nixon’s contributions to the administration toward the end of a long press conference.

“If you give me a week, I might think of one — I don’t remember,” replied a tired Eisenhower. Of course, Clinton’s media gaffes are of her own making. She referred to half of Trump’s supporters as “deplorable” for disagreeing with liberal, globalist policy.

Then of course there is the never-ending scandal and embarrassment emanating from the FBI investigation into her use of private servers while at the State Department, and the release of a trove of leaked emails once contained on them.

Clinton also suffered further embarrassment by the leak of a series of damaging emails authored by Colin Powell. One email including a passage particularly relevant to Monday night’s matchup. “On HD TV she doesn’t look good. She is working herself to death,” Powell wrote.

That those listening to Nixon-Kennedy debate on radio believed Nixon to have beaten Kennedy is likely the inevitable result of Nixon’s greater experience, both in debate, government and policy — an advantage Clinton shares.

Nixon had spent the better part of eight years as vice-president and, like Clinton, had extensive foreign policy experience. Prior to being Eisenhower’s second-in-command, Nixon had served in Congress, spending three years in the House and three in the Senate.

Kennedy, on the other hand, was by comparison a relatively inexperienced senator. Like Trump, however, he understood the media, was great on television, and exuded a youthful energy that Trump also displays despite his age. Nixon’s wonkishness was no match for such a combination.

“If Trump can seem easily rather than angrily in command … or if she is beset by some new controversy for which she gives a hyper-legalistic rationalization,” wrote Fallows, “then the debates could be a turning point for Trump.”

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Ironically, while Clinton shares many similarities with the Nixon of the 1960 debates, the Nixon of the 1968 debates shares many similarities with Trump.

Nixon’s campaign was centered on the promise to restore law and order to America’s cities, which — much like American cities today — were suffering from violent race riots and rising crime. Following his victory he would coin a term for his supporters familiar to anyone following Trump’s campaign — the “silent majority.”

In a 1969 speech he appealed those who were horrified by the radical unrest sweeping the nation and the political direction in which it was heading. “And so tonight — to you, the great silent majority of my fellow Americans — I ask for your support,” he said.

Donald Trump will be asking the same Monday night.