The Last Debate by Jim Lehrer Page B

to be a full-scale rehearsal in a ballroom down on the basement level of the hotel. I knew access would be restricted and limited, but I also knew it would be a great place to begin my story, a great place to start looking for what was happening behind the faces and the postures. A reminder, please, that my prede-bate focus was solely on the candidates.
    Turpin not only said no, he said it forcefully, profanely, leaving little doubt that the decision was final. He also reminded me of the trouble the columnist George Will got into by participating in one of Ronald Reagan’s debate rehearsals. I told him I did not want to play a part, I only wanted to watch. No, he said again.
    But, as a reporter, I did not often take no for the final answer on a matter this important. I saw bearing witness to that rehearsal as a monumentally important thing to do for my story. So I arranged through other means to have access to what happened at that rehearsal. What other means? I will not say. I cannot say. The person or persons who assisted me did so only on the condition that I never reveal their involvement. I gave them my word. My word is good. Did money change hands? Yes, it did. How much? Barely four figures. Again, I was reimbursed by the
Taller.
(No frequent-flyer miles were awarded on this one.) So the post-debate charge in
The Washington Morning News
that I “paid sources for information and for access into chambers and sanctums” is technically correct. And I would do it again tomorrow if confronted with the same option: pay and get in—don’t pay and stay out. The public has a right to know what happened in that hotel ballroom. If the public’s right to know is the overriding energy behind journalism, what difference does it make whether the sources of the information come free or for a fee? In my opinion, it is a question from an argument that I believe is no longer relevant to the practice of journalism in this country.
    What happened that evening during the rehearsal was critically revealing, particularly in light of what happened barely twenty-four hours later at the real thing.
    Rusty Washburn, the former New York congressman and housing secretary, played the rehearsal part of the opponent. He had done so inthe rehearsals for debates during the primaries, and although everyone, including Turpin, had thought he got a bit carried away, good luck required that he do it again for the one and only debate of the general-election campaign.
    It was a mistake. He got carried away even more this time.
    Washburn, well known as a man who saw himself as president more clearly than he did Meredith, played Greene as a candidate a lot better than Greene did.
    “You asked me about the federal budget deficit,” he said to one of four campaign aides playing the panelists. “That is important and I will address it, but I must first say that the most important issue the American people should be focusing on tonight is one of bigotry and division. The real question of this election is whether this nation can afford the divide-and-conquer politics of fear that my talk-show-meister opponent is dishing out. Fear of fellow Americans and immigrants who look different than us Euro-Caucasian whites. I say no. That is my answer to that question. And on Election Day, I believe that will be the answer of an overwhelming majority of the American people.”
    He stood behind a podium on a stage against a far wall of the room, the Rainbow Ballroom. Meredith stood at another podium some forty feet away, and the four fake reporters were behind a table facing them. It was a good mock-up replica of what the stage would be like Sunday night in the Williamsburg Lodge auditorium. The main difference was the color scheme. The Rainbow Ballroom was mostly beige, orange, and gold. Beige carpet, orange walls, and gold light fixtures.
    “Mr. Washburn,” Jack Turpin said, walking up to a spot between the mock-panelists and Washburn, “we appreciate your desire to