The Mast-Head: My Bad Debate

My own best debate story came to mind on Monday as I watched Lester Holt try to wrangle Donald Trump into answering a question about a previous statement regarding Hillary Clinton’s looks. Mr. Trump would not answer, and I wondered what was going through Mr. Holt’s mind at that awkward moment.

I had been a guest moderator for the League of Women Voters of the Hamptons at a Westhampton Beach discussion two years ago between Tim Bishop and Lee Zeldin. Joe Shaw, the editor of The Press Newsgroup in Southampton, was the other moderator, and we decided to meet for an early dinner at Starr Boggs. 

Not that I like to write about my health, but for the sake of this story, it is important to explain that I have a severe allergy to red meat. This diagnosis, increasingly made here on the East End, is of an allergic condition thought to be triggered in some people by the bite of a Lone Star tick. My first attack came in about 1991, making me, as far as I know, Patient Zero, at least in this part of the country.

Generally, I order carefully in restaurants, but on that night, I just asked for the fish and did not explain to the server that I could not have anything with meat in it.

Dinner was fine. The conversation was good. But about halfway through my entree I noticed that my lips were beginning to tingle just a bit.

I made it through the debate, though by the last 15 minutes, the back of my neck had begun to itch, another sign of what was to come. As Mr. Bishop and Mr. Zeldin made their final pitches, I was running through the options. I had left my Epi-Pen kit and allergy pills at home. I did not know the area. I was definitely about to turn visibly red and start having trouble breathing.

Then, the debate was over. I whispered to Joe Shaw that I had to run and headed to the door. A Southampton Town cop keeping an eye on things was at the back of the auditorium; I asked him if there was a 24-hour pharmacy nearby. There was, but at the very moment I turned to race to my car, Mr. Bishop appeared in my path eager to reiterate a point.

What else can you do when a member of Congress has something to say? I listened. Thinking about it now makes my scalp start to itch all over again. Eventually, Mr. Bishop was through, and I headed to Rite Aid, bought some Benadryl, and started the long drive home. Just how the debate had gone that night I had no idea.