OPINION:
Conventional wisdom once held that a front-runner shouldn’t debate his challengers because meeting them on the same stage gives them stature. So why do a favor for a challenger? That’s why Ronald Reagan wouldn’t debate George H.W. Bush in 1980. He sat on his lead, lost to Mr. Bush on caucus night and breathed new life into a challenger who began the race as a footnote in most early polls.
That might still be wisdom, but it’s no longer conventional. Presidential candidates are expected now to debate, debate and debate again, and these are “debates” that neither Lincoln nor Douglas would recognize. They’re only occasions for throwing sound bites. Four years ago the Republican candidates threw so many sound bites at each other so often they reduced themselves to barkers in a traveling carnival rather than serious contenders for the nation’s highest office. The candidates have to be prepared to accept every opportunity to “debate,” relying not on their own judgment but on the intervention of the Republican National Committee to reduce the festival of cliches and blather.
Donald Trump wants to return to conventional wisdom. He apparently doesn’t see any advantage in giving his challengers a break. He blames his withdrawal from the Thursday night Des Moines debate on Megyn Kelly, Fox News and even their boss, Roger Ailes. But he continues to appear on Fox’s other programs to lob grenades at the network, making himself the center of attention by taking a walk. His challengers and Fox News fear a much diminished television audience will watch. This further makes him look afraid of Miss Kelly. He risks looking not so manly after all, but it’s a risk he’s willing to take.
Nevertheless, his competitors once more are dancing to his tune, and maybe playing into his hands. Ted Cruz says he would like to actually debate the Donald one-on-one, in the manner of Lincoln-Douglas, and his manager says several of the other candidates have suggested skipping the network debates altogether.
In his book, “The Art of the Deal,” Mr. Trump says the key to being a winning dealmaker or negotiator, and he considers himself to be the best, is to know when to walk away. If he has read his counterparts correctly, the network will chase him down the hall before he gets to the snowbanks and he’ll make the deal he wants and on his terms. The deal he’s trying to make in Iowa is not with Megyn Kelly, Fox News and the Republican National Committee, but with the Iowa Republicans who will trudge through snow up to their knees on Feb. 1 to give the winner an important fragile but early lead. They’ll get the last word.
Iowans are notoriously late deciders, and 60 percent of his core Iowa supporters in a Twitter poll — Twitter polls are often little more than Twitter twaddle — want him to show up in his fighting clothes, ready for the debate. But the Donald is his own man, like it or not. It’s his decision, and the suspense should expand the audience.
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