The topics in the “All American Debate” were new, but the responses were so predictable. 

Howard University’s campus hosted the presidential debate with style.  The Blackburn Center auditorium was filled with 500 guests representing a broad range of stars from the African-American community.  Like most political events in Washington, D.C., getting a ticket wasn’t an easy task.   One insider told me that each candidate was given 50 tickets, and the remaining 100 seats were to be divided between PBS, the host Tavis Smiley and Howard University. 

Watching the debate from the “spin room” was an education all its own.  Few of my White counterparts recognized the faces being flashed across the jumbo screen during the debate. 

“Who’s that?”  One reporter asked me, “Victoria Rowell,” I responded.  Another reporter saw me jotting down names feverishly, and looked at me curiously. I mouthed “Vernon Jordan.”  

The audience was filled with faces spanning several generations.  Howard gave tickets to some college students; Smiley invited some youth folks from Florida.  But other faces inplace were quite familiar: activist/actors Harry Belafonte and Ruby Dee; author Terri McMillan; and activists Dr. Michael Eric Dyson, the Rev. Al Shapton, Dorothy Height President of National Council of Negro Women, and Ted Shaw of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. 

After the debate, the room filled with spin doctors, making sure we knew who were the frontrunners.  Surrogates for senators Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.), Barack Obama (D-Ill.), Chris Dodd and Joe Biden (D-Del.) and former Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) were stressing their candidates’ strengths. 

Rep. Dennis Kuchnich (D-Ohio), New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson (D) and former Sen. Mike Gravel (D-Ak.) met with reporters face to face.

The crowd pleaser and most popular African-American celebrity was Professor Cornel West. His crowd, and his stream of reporters and photographers, grew larger and larger at the Obama stakeout.

Host Tavis Smiley stopped by too; he said he was pleased that a debate had finally moved beyond Iraq to issues more pertinent to Black America. “We haven’t had enough of these questions asked,” he said.  

The room started to thin about 30 minutes after the spin began.  I overheard folks from each camp claiming some level of victory.

I heard a few reporters say that they weren’t sure what the shining moment was tonight. 

For me, the shining moment was seeing all of these Black folks gathered at Howard University for a presidential debate.

 – Pamela Gentry, BET News