ENN Comes Home From Chili's And Grades The Presidential Debate

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"ENN Comes Home From Chili's And Grades The Presidential Debate"

As a follow-up to our debate liveblog, some concluding thoughts are below. I drafted this article with support from Deputy ENN Editor Sopo, who provided contributions and signoff on the commentary and scores.

But, don't take our word for it! Please read the full debate in #p-and-vp-debates on our Discord server. If you don't agree, please argue in the comments to this post to gin up activity and advertising revenue for ENN. And remember to read all the platforms and VOTE.

UPC:

UPC must have entered this debate with the goal of never, absolutely never, being pushed onto the back foot. The dominant figure throughout the debate, and never afraid to get aggressive with his fellow candidates, UPC pushed and prodded his way through nearly two hours of spirted dialogue.

No question, he had to deal with a lot in the debate. Based on recent polling, there's no question that they are the frontrunner, and both Ellenburg and Vor focused their energies on him. It was a lot of incoming, but when given the choice to suavely parry an attack or charge full-forward, UPC was charging ahead. A particularly odd moment occurred during the question on war objectives, where UPC slammed Vor based on details from a private FA groupchat — invoking FA expert Kazaman in the process. Attacks like these occasionally felt gratuitous, and overshooting the rim of what was probably politically optimal. While UPC concluded the debate with kind words for his opponents, the energy I felt permeating throughout was almost a bemusement for having to entertain challengers at all.

That being said, in many replies, UPC gave extremely thorough and engaging answers. You can't help but feel, at certain stages, that UPC has forgotten more on a topic than many of us have ever known. He remained in command of the facts and details throughout the debate, and unlike other candidates, didn't really have any missed opportunities. He ended the debate with a pretty powerful attack on the recruitment records of his opponents, leaving onlookers with hard stats that demonstrate the commitment they and GK have made for our region.

Because I am a cringe millennial, I can't help but think about Jed Bartlet's debate in The West Wing, where President Bartlet's performance knocked his opponent to his back. An exchange between two characters discussing this debate comes to mind:

Will Bailey: I thought he was going to have to fall all over himself trying to be genial.

Sam Seaborn: So did we, but then we were convinced by polling that he was going to be seen as arrogant no matter what performance he gave in the debate, and then that morning at 3:10 my phone rings and it's Toby Ziegler. And he says 'Don't you get it? It's a gift that they're irreversibly convinced that he's arrogant, because now he can be.' If your guy is seen that way you might as well knock some bodies down with it.

Ultimately, it's up to the voters to judge President UPC and this debate. But any President needs to be confident, strong, knowledgable, and an effective communicator. Based on this debate, it would be hard to argue that President UPC isn't all of those things, and if you were looking for a reason to vote against him, you probably didn't find it. Both opponents are trying to defeat a successful, smart, incumbent. It's not going to be easy, and UPC probably did what he needed to with this debate — knocking over some bodies along the way.

Overall Score: B+

Ellenburg:

Ultimately, to me, this debate presents as a missed opportunity for Ellenburg.

Ellenburg kept his cool through a heated debate and looked for creative ways to prod his fellow candidates, but he always seemed a little on the backfoot, relying on vague answers or references to his platform to carry him through the debate. Sometimes he would try to inject himself in into deep policy exchanges between UPC and Vor with broader points or new topics and almost... get relegated to being an afterthought, openly saying "noted!" in response to UPC correcting him in between shooting verbal barbs back and forth with Vor. Multiple shoehorned references to work in other regions, while not a *bad* thing, seem like time that could've been better spent on different examples

One of Ellenburg's key platform tenants is the idea that the war against various Raider Unity regions is not being prosecuted to the greatest extent. But arguably, Ellenburg phoned in his weakest performance in the war and foreign policy questions. When pressed by UPC on what "going on the offensive" meant with regards to the war, Ellenburg even admitted that he might not have the answer currently and might need to work with allies to determine it once elected. This is a big miss, and might require a campaign course correction like rolling out some new policy ideas or giving an addendum speech of some kind.

Ellenburg did have some strong moments later on in the debate, particularly in the culture section and the later section on shepherding the next generation of leaders. In the later, having a concrete example of mentoring and getting someone integrated in a Ministry came off as strong, especially when juxtaposition with Vor's attacks on UPC for taking so long to develop new leaders. In fact, UPC's attack on Ellenburg in this section comes across as an overshoot — you would not put the same level of development expectations on a citizen or Minister as you would the President.

But...it all comes back to the lead sentence. This debate was an opportunity to demonstrate policy depth + ability to be quick on the feet in an increasingly fast-paced NS world. While Ellenburg presented as a thoughtful, competent leader who could certainly handle the Presidential logistics if elected ... I am not sure, based on this debate, he cleared that higher bar.

Overall Score: C-

Vor:

Vor delivered a compelling debate performance that was only slightly less consistent than UPC's — but perhaps offered with a slightly softer touch.

He started off a little slow, saying that his unique offering to the region was "fresh leadership" — three terms of UPC down, pretty much any member with a heartbeat could offer that. His next answer on the question of "why change" also presented as a lot waffle, and I described it in the debate liveblog as ChatGPT-esque.

But Vor was just warming up, and consistently was able to press the case with UPC in creative ways. He did not necessarily come up on top of every exchange (UPC had me convinced over Vor in the Raider Unity war question fwiw) but was consistently present and engaged. Vor also had an incredibly effective moment using humor to disarm UPC's odd groupchat//DM attack.

Vor effectively cornered UPC on why he has been unsuccessful in developing more leaders in the region until now (this is probably one question that UPC definitively lost in my view), and held his own on the foreign policy questions. When it came to culture, Vor openly conceded that UPC has been doing a great job and declined to press an offensive there, contrasting with much of UPC's take-no-prisoners debate approach.

Overall, I am not sure that Vor outperformed UPC in the debate simply based on brass tacks. But I do think that Vor passed a clear threshold and demonstrated his communication and policy chops. For voters who aren't sure about another term of UPC, Vor has proven himself to be an interesting and viable alternative.

Overall Score: B
 
Last edited:
Just noticed that in my post-baked potato soup and martini coma I previously chronically misspelled "Ellenburg" throughout the article. That has been fixed.
 
please argue in the comments to this post to gin up activity and advertising revenue for ENN.
Happily, as long as I get a cut.

I think that UPC outperformed everyone else in this debate, even if I found his approach a tad aggressive at times, but Vor "won" if that makes sense. I agreed more with UPC throughout the debate, but reading the Grand Hall and sneaking peaks at early poll results, Vor earned more respect and support from the broader public. This makes sense to me--as the popular incumbent, UPC had less to gain and more to lose, while Vor is one of two challengers offering a change in leadership and had much more to gain. In this way, Ellenburg's disappointing performance benefitted Vor as it established him as the chief challenger to UPC's office. Vor also succeeded in pointing out shortcomings of the administration and planting them in the minds of voters, giving him an angle to campaign off of that's congruent with his platform. Vor is better positioned after this debate than he was before, and might be in the best position of any candidate at this point.

As I said earlier, though, UPC gave the best performance, at least from my perspective. His experience as President showed, especially when delivering the hard, "electorally unpopular" truths. It actually reminded me of the JayDee/Elio/McEntire debate, except I don't think UPC came off as patronizing as JayDee (that might be bias though :p ) and it made Vor and Ellen look a little more naive to me. Between my own growth in FA experience and UPC's recent and consistent success, I agreed with him and found his opponents' foreign affairs positions riskier, perhaps unnecessarily so. The part that won me over in particular was:
upc said:
They know where we stand, believe it or not. Badgering them about it is not going to lead to the productive result that you think it will.
I'm not sure if this was a proper depiction of Vor's policy, but his inability to clarify suggested that either it was, or Vor wouldn't actually be doing anything all that different from UPC. Either way, it's advantage UPC. Ultimately, the foreign affairs questions only further proved to me that UPC knows what he is doing, and confirmed my concerns that Vor's route might be riskier or ill-advised.

Vor effectively cornered UPC on why he has been unsuccessful in developing more leaders in the region until now (this is probably one question that UPC definitively lost in my view)
I agree with this. I don't think UPC defended himself effectively at all on this question, though he said many thought-provoking things that made me think about how we view leadership development in this region. I've always felt that there's something... off about it. Like when UPC said this:
upc said:
we are confident now that we have that support structure in place -- we can do big things and enable newcomers to do big things, without letting them get devastated by shitty polling results
I thought about my first term in Cabinet. It sucked. In part because of a lack of help, but also because of my own lack of experience. A lot of discussions about developing leadership include wanting to throw less experienced members into the fire, but this turns out poorly more often than not. In fact, it's why I haven't run for president lately (and ended up not GOTVing in my only run)--I don't think I'm ready. It confuses me how allowing people to accrue more experience in lower risk setting so as to be better prepped for the next step is seen as "stifling" the next generation. Again, I definitely I don't think UPC won this question, but I kind of convinced myself to side with him on it.

Also, I just think there are innate flaws with Vor's angle of "filling in the gaps" that UPC/GK "let fester". I agree with a lot of what was said, and there are some things that could have been done in the previous terms that weren't. But many of these things actually do show up in UPC's platform, and he brought them up in the debate. One such example is encouraging our allies to up their sleeper numbers (it's partially my fault that this hasn't already been done, actually!), which Vor brought up in the last section but is part of UPC's plans anyways. If we concern ourselves with what will be done, I don't think Vor established himself as that different from the popular, proven incumbent. Using what hasn't been done as an argument is an angle that is difficult to maintain against an administration that is flexible and receptive of feedback. I think back to UPC's second run, where criticisms over visibility brought about the popular and effective Arrakeen Dispatch/Half-Blood Herald, which I now see as a defining aspect of his presidency. Also, a lot of these criticisms have been absent up until this election, which makes them feel a little more hollow! This was a problem with my own arguments during my bid alongside Elio against JayDee. So while Vor did a good job of paving this avenue of attack in this debate, UPC is equally set up to make it collapse.

TLDR: Vor gained the most from this debate but UPC did the best from my perspective.
 
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I think that UPC outperformed everyone else in this debate, even if I found his approach a tad aggressive at times, but Vor "won" if that makes sense.

This was my feeling too - UPC definitely did not lose an opportunity to attack, and, especially later in the debate, some of the attacks (against Ellenburg especially) felt gratuitous. Vor, I think, missed some opportunities to attack (but not many), and felt more moderate and agreeable by contrast. That's why I wanted to grade them evenly (but HEM said no), as I think UPC's alternatingly aggressive and defensive demeanor offset his better overall responses. You could argue either of them is the real winner - but Vor's approach, in my opinion, came across better.

I do wonder if UPC had played the role of frontrunner and not gone on the attack, would he have come across better, or would he have looked weak? Hard to say - but he probably had least to win and the most to lose heading into today, and I appreciate that he was willing to stand up for himself and his record, even if he may have gone a bit over at times.

Plus, as HEM mentioned in the liveblog, I feel like I learned some things during this debate!
 
As I said earlier, though, UPC gave the best performance, at least from my perspective. His experience as President showed, especially when delivering the hard, "electorally unpopular" truths. It actually reminded me of the JayDee/Elio/McEntire debate, except I don't think UPC came off as patronizing as JayDee (that might be bias though :p ) and it made Vor and Ellen look a little more naive to me. Between my own growth in FA experience and UPC's recent and consistent success, I agreed with him and found his opponents' foreign affairs positions riskier, perhaps unnecessarily so. The part that won me over in particular was:
I think both Vor and UPC said things on foreign affairs that I felt were very interesting and I was "learning" about the current dynamic in real time. That being said, UPC's contributions were even deeper and more thoughtful. It almost felt like there isn't an alley UPC's mind hasn't explored in terms of FA scenarios, and the willingness to get into the weeds (even if it came with some snark) says a lot about his abilities. I also appreciated the call for realism and understanding that there are just some things that we cannot move overnight.
I do wonder if UPC had played the role of frontrunner and not gone on the attack, would he have come across better, or would he have looked weak? Hard to say - but he probably had least to win and the most to lose heading into today, and I appreciate that he was willing to stand up for himself and his record, even if he may have gone a bit over at times.
The recent counterfactual here is the Kazaman/JayDee/McEntire/Gem debate where Kazaman played it super, safe. The big takeaway was that Kazaman wasn't offering any depth or detail, and that debate was when JayDee started to pull away (in my mind). Regardless of how you weigh his performance, UPC absolutely did not phone it in.
 
I can't help but feel this is a somewhat kind interpration of upc's performance that doesn't line up with what I saw. GK said that they didn't want Vor to define the debate, yet the fact that they seemed to plan their debate against Vor rather than for themselves implies to me that that's exactly what they did.

upc's strategy in this debate seemed to be "volume of fire," or to basically take as many shots as he could find and see how many land. I found myself agreeing with upc on a lot of his attacks, particularly how he intends to prosecute the war against LWU. However, some of his other attacks just came off as odd or unwarranted and even gave his opponents a chance to shine where they otherwise wouldn't have. upc is incredibly gifted in FA; Vor is no pushover but upc's depth of knowledge in that area is nearly unmatched in this region. For that reason, I expected upc to sweep the FA portion of the debate rather handily, and while I'd personally say he won that portion however I think he nerfed himself a bit with his tactics.

I'm not inside the mind of the upc/GK ticket, but their performance reminded me a lot of my own against Elio and McEntire where I very much felt that I was the underdog going into a 2v1 match-up so I came out swinging a bit harder than I did during the Kazaman and McEntire debate and put a lot more pressure on Elio - my primary competitor - than I did against Kazaman.

As for Vor, I would agree with what others were saying during the debate the Vor and upc seemed to practically switch roles. Something that seemed to be intentional on upc's part. There's something to be said about moderating one's own performance, Vor was much more picky about where he chose to go on the offensive and for that reason I find his jabs to be far more memorable and effective. However, I think Vor also left some points on the board that he could have grabbed and he got cornered by upc on a few key points. upc was on the offensive a lot but I didn't really get the feeling that Vor was on the defensive except for a few portions.

Ellenburg just wasn't present at all, I'm concerned he wasn't even really paying attention to the debate. He seems to have gotten busier so it's possible a last second conflict came up, but it felt like he simply wasn't 100% there. upc took a rather odd jab at Ellenburg that he barely even seemed to acknowledge. I haven't seen much from Ellenburg to sway me towards him and the debate did not help.

Stepping back to look at platforms, upc's decision to put the war back on his platform was a strategically brilliant move. upc has made clear and evident headway in the prosecution of this war and his tenure speaks strongly to the benefit of longer terms for building FA policies and executing them. This has forced other tickets to put the war on their platform as well and made it a centerpoint of the debate which upc definitely won. upc does a good job of highlighting his strengths - more of the same but also some improvements where it's needed.

I think upc really set the tone for the platforms and the campaign, but Vor set the tone for the debate. I've still yet to see who sets the tone for the post-debate dash, but I think whoever controls the narrative post debate will win this Election.
 
I can't help but feel this is a somewhat kind interpration of upc's performance that doesn't line up with what I saw. GK said that they didn't want Vor to define the debate, yet the fact that they seemed to plan their debate against Vor rather than for themselves implies to me that that's exactly what they did.
Do you think it was the overall grade that was generous? Because I had some pretty scathing commentary for UPC in the article, which I stand by fully.

I think what I struggle to negotiate, is that the abrasiveness UPC displayed, to an extent, is a sign of strength and leadership. I want a strong President who isn't afraid to be pushy sometimes. Using facts and experience as a sword to cut down your enemies is a good thing.

So, my overall feeling was that UPC overshot the rim, yes. But not that he behaved in a way that was fundamentally unpresidential or even necessarily bad. It's ultimately up to everyone else to decide how they feel about it and whether it impacts their vote.

As it is, on the merits, this was a VERY strong debate for UPC. Had he struck a better balance between assertiveness and abrasiveness, I think it would've been an A/A+. So in that sense, I did penalize him nearly a full letter grade.
I'm not inside the mind of the upc/GK ticket, but their performance reminded me a lot of my own against Elio and McEntire where I very much felt that I was the underdog going into a 2v1 match-up so I came out swinging a bit harder than I did during the Kazaman and McEntire debate and put a lot more pressure on Elio - my primary competitor - than I did against Kazaman.
I think the key risk UPC had here, however, was Kazaman's debate. Kazaman played it super safe with short answers, didn't engage heavily in the back-and-forth, and paid a very steep price for it. If theoretically, UPC's goal going into the debate was optimizing for avoiding Kazaman's specific fate, he definitely did that. I doubt he was thinking specifically about Kazaman, but it's a delicate balancing act.
 
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