The first televised presidential debate in history proved the small screen’s power in shaping the course of American politics — and led to a spectacular series of campaign-killing flubs.
Vice President Richard Nixon was already hobbled by a lingering knee infection and a bout of the flu when he made the fateful decision to turn down a professional make-up job for his historic TV meeting with Massachusetts US Sen. John F. Kennedy on Sept. 26, 1960.
Nixon slapped on some Lazy Shave powder to try to hide his 5-o’clock shadow — and wound up looking sickly and pale next to his tanned and relaxed rival.
Even worse, “Tricky Dick” started sweating under the heat of the Chicago studio lights, forcing him to pull out a handkerchief to wipe his face.
The indelible image led television viewers to declare Kennedy the winner, even as radio listeners give Nixon the edge.
That debacle led candidates to avoid TV debates again until 1976, when President Gerald Ford — badly bruised by former California Gov. Ronald Reagan’s primary bid — agreed to face off against ex-Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter.
Ford, mocked for a purported lack of intellect, stumbled badly during an Oct. 6 showdown in San Francisco, confusingly declaring in response to a question about the Cold War that “there is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe and there never will be under a Ford administration.”
Carter later undid himself in disastrous debate with Reagan on Oct. 28, 1980, in Cleveland.
In a discussion about the nuclear arms race, Carter said he wanted to “put into perspective what we’re talking about” — by citing a conversation with his then-13-year-old daughter, Amy.
Reagan, meanwhile, used his closing statement to deploy a devastating line to the record audience of 80.6 million people watching at home: “Are you better off than you were four years ago?”
Eight years later, on Oct. 13, 1988, in Los Angeles, the second debate between Vice President George Bush and Michael Dukakis saw the Massachusetts governor — an avowed death-penalty opponent — get asked whether his position would change if his wife was raped and murdered.
Dukakis responded without any emotion, questioning the deterrent value of capital punishment and opening the door for Bush to attack him over the “question of values.”
Bush trounced Dukakis in November but torpedoed himself in a 1992 Town Hall-style event with Bill Clinton and Ross Perot.
He was caught on camera checking his watch as a woman in the audience asked about the effect of the national debt on the candidates’ “personal lives.”
Bush repeatedly tried to dodge the question, then buried himself by saying: “I’m not sure I get — help me with the question and I’ll try to answer it.”