The Forums

When I hear the word "debate," I get anxious. I do not enjoy confrontation, and I never seek an argument. I'm sure part of it is insecurity, worrying that I won't know the right words to say and I'll just end up looking and feeling stupid. Thankfully, my husband doesn't have this problem. If he did, he'd have a hard time running for office. But so far in the campaign, he hasn't participated in a debate--there haven't been any. Instead, he's been invited to "candidate forums." I would describe a candidate forum as a kinder, gentler debate. Forums come in different formats, but the main idea is always for the candidates to introduce and differentiate themselves and make the case for why the audience should vote for them. Forums include introductory and sometimes closing speeches, as well as a questions from a moderator or the crowd.

A few weeks ago, I attended the first such forum with him. It was the weekly meeting of a conservative political action group, and they had invited all the Republican candidates to speak and have the opportunity to win the group's endorsement. Only three of the six candidates showed up that day. Harvey is the only one out of all six who has never held public office, so most of the members of this group had never heard of him; this would be his first impression. I sat nervously with Tabitha while Harvey took his seat up front with the other candidates and they drew numbers to see who would speak first. Harvey drew third, so we waited.

Each candidate had five minutes. The other two did fine, as I would expect, and then came Harvey. He stood up and delivered his speech just as he would a sermon, calmly and confidently. It's one of his gifts. Then came the time for questions. I braced myself. Who knew what these politically engaged and opinionated men and women would come up with? For each question, each candidate had a minute or two to answer, and they rotated the order in which they answered. It began: questions about Boehner, the Patriot Act, cutting federal agencies, the Constitution, immigration. Harvey showed a command of the issues and even got applause once or twice. I could not have been more proud.

(I thought of myself up there trying to answer those questions, and it made me giggle inside. I am not completely ignorant of these issues, but I wondered how the audience would react if I responded to a question with, "What exactly is that?" or "Let me google that and I'll get back to you." No such thing with Harvey. If he were clueless on an issue, you'd never know it.)

In the end, the group voted to endorse one of the other candidates, a state senator who has spoken to the group and attended its meetings in the past and whom the group had previously voted legislator of the year. In other words, he already had a connection with them. But Harvey had the second-most votes, and the group's leader praised him in front of the group and later in an e-mail newsletter for his knowledge of the issues, his strong positions, and his ease of communication. After the meeting there were others who approached him and gave him similar encouragement and support. Ultimately that meeting was a chance for Harvey to introduce himself and his positions and practice his speech and answering questions--an awesome experience for him to get under his belt.

Chatting with the moderator after Harvey's first forum

Since that first forum, Harvey has attended four or five others. A couple have been dinners or lunches with twenty or thirty people. One of them had a "speed-dating" format, where the candidates made the rounds to small groups at tables and had ten minutes with each group.

With the host of a forum for a Republican women's group

The largest forum was at a church; between four and five hundred were in attendance (see photo at the top of this post), and it was broadcast on the radio. Five of the six candidates were there. Although this gave Harvey the widest audience, the format was challenging. No candidate ever had more than one or two minutes at a time to speak, so it was all really just sound bites. Since all of the candidates are conservative Republicans, they all fall more or less in the same line on the issues, so most of their answers were similar. Harvey was excellent, giving thoughtful responses, each with bit of a different take from the other candidates' answers, but he didn't have the time to really explain who he is, why he's different, and why he's running. However, he did the best he could have done with the time he had, and we had a great response at our table post-forum.

So while I would be a nervous wreck were I the one speaking and answering questions about political issues in front of a crowd, when I get to go to a forum with Harvey and hear him speak and answer those questions, I'm filled not with anxiety but with excitement, because I know he's a gifted orator and he's always ready with a thoughtful and wise response. More important, I also know there's one with him who is guiding him and giving him the words to speak and that Harvey is seeking him and relying on him through this entire process. The most common response I've heard from people when they speak with Harvey or hear him speak is "I'm impressed." Now just maybe if he impresses enough people, we'll have a shot at this thing. Keep the forums coming.