8 Candidates Gather For 1st Tussle On TV; A Chance To Distinguish Themselves

For presidential hopefuls, it's called the Expectations Game.

Here's how it's played: Before a debate, rival campaigns build up the skills of their opponents while downgrading their own candidate's verbal abilities. That way, any bright moments make a performance seem like a home run.

For the Democratic hopefuls, the first major round of the Expectations Game came ahead of Thursday night's debate at South Carolina State University in Orangeburg, S.C.
The 90-minute event — the earliest presidential debate ever — offers eight candidates their initial chance to distinguish themselves on the long road to the nomination next year.

"I've just got to make sure I don't trip walking on the stage," joked Delaware Sen. Joe Biden, who complained that the candidates get no opening or closing statements and that responses to questions are limited to 60 seconds.

Illinois Sen. Barack Obama cracked, "It takes me 60 seconds to clear my throat."

Such self-deprecating comments before a debate are common in the Expectations Game. So is anonymous praise.

One of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's rivals tried to set high stakes for her performance by sharing with a reporter a 1990 editorial in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Clinton, as first lady of Arkansas, once turned a news conference staged by her husband's Republican challenger into an impromptu debate. "The tougher Clinton" went on to "mop the marble floor with her husband's opponent," the newspaper contended.

In a similar bit of gamesmanship, an Obama opponent tried to raise the bar for the Illinois senator by pointing out to a reporter that he had been editor of the Harvard Law Review and rose to prominence on the strength of his rhetorical skills. The campaign cited a letter to the editor in The Seattle Times last February that claimed Abraham Lincoln would have lost his election if he had to debate Obama instead of Stephen Douglas.

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