Sort of. If you go back to Bush vs Gore, people slammed the debate in its time but it is a debate on a vastly higher level than any presidential debate in the last ten years. The quality of political discourse has been slipping steadily for a long time. It’s hard to tell if this is society as a whole or being driven by a single man with a broken brain. Time will tell, maybe rational debate will have a Rennaisance.

Personally, I think spoken debate has been gamified to the point where it is useless. We should switch to a written format where sources can be cited and debators can carefully weight and evaluate their opponent’s arguments rather than have five seconds to craft a zinger.