With the August 28th runoff election less than a week away, Mick Cornett and Kevin Stitt met for one final televised debate on Wednesday night to convince voters who's the worst choice for governor.
At the beginning, the debate was a lot like the snoozefest from Channel 9 – the candidates were asked standard questions and provided canned responses filled with random resume bullet points or anecdotal tales about meeting people on the campaign trail.
But unlike the boring debate on News 9, this one actually got interesting in the second half when the candidates were asked about their negative campaign ads. At that point, the debate turned into a live couples therapy session, where the candidates aired petty grievances and accused the other of going dirty first.
You can watch the entire debate over at Channel 5. Here are five things we learned.
1. Abigail Ogle is now a political expert.
We've been warning people for years that Abigail Ogle is going to the rule the world someday. Maybe it's time everyone starts paying attention?
In just six fast years, the next generation Ogle has moved from reporting on a public access TV station to working as the evening anchor on KOCO Channel 5. Now KOCO is putting her on a panel of "political experts" for the debate. Congrats to Abigail! I wonder how long until we get Abigail's Minute – a nightly opinion piece about local politics and current affairs.
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2. Mick Cornett is salty
Things got kind of awkward when the two candidates were asked about the negative campaign ads. Stitt didn't seem to care too much, but you could tell it rattled Mick like an uncentered baseball card. I haven't seen him that worked up since he coached Casey's basketball team.
At one point in the debate, while defending his staunch opposition to sanctuary cities, it looked like Mick was about to go full Mike Gundy and delve into a long rant, yelling random things like "That Ain't True," "It makes me want to puke," and, of course, "I'm a man. I'm 60!" Fortunately, he was able to control himself and delve back into resume bullet points and campaign anecdotes.
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3. Kevin Stitt kind of looks like the drunk guy at a wedding.
More specifically, that one tall older guy who's dating your sister's friend that had one too many vodka tonics and miniature quiches and is now about to give an awkward toast at any moment. Those guys are easier to spot than a shady mortgage lender.
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4. #BullStitt
Six months ago, who would have thought that "Bull Stitt" would be the most memorable phrase from the 2018 GOP race for governor, or better yet, that Mick Cornett would be the guy who coined it? That would be like finding out Emily Sutton is the person in charge of inventing new curse words.
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5. The Election Needs To Hurry Up And Get Here
I don't know how much more of these guys the voters – or even the candidates – can take. The negative ads have provided some entertainment, but this has been a boring campaign between two guys with more similarities than differences. Hell, I can barely come up with five bullet points for this point.
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Anyway, who's it going to be, Republican voters? The successful conservative businessman or the successful conservative politician? I guess we'll find out soon enough.
