Viewed in hindsight, the first general election debate of any given presidential cycle can be hilariously off-topic, even directly misleading about how the candidates would govern on issues of national import.
In 1988, 14 months before the decadeslong menace of international communism suddenly collapsed, moderator Jim Lehrer kicked off the George H.W. Bush–Michael Dukakis contest with what he described as the "number one domestic issue to a majority of voters"—illegal narcotics. "What is there about these times," the PBS legend needed to know, "that drives or draws so many Americans to use drugs?" (The elder Bush then treated 65 million viewers to a disquisition on the comparative demerits of Crocodile Dundee.)
