Editor’s Note: This column was written before Saturday’s assassination attempt of President Trump.

I watched it. It was a matter of civic duty. And professional responsibility, given I still write this column.

It was awful, a national embarrassment.

Donald Trump lied from start to finish in his June 27 debate with President Joe Biden. He lied about the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol that sought to block the peaceful transition of power to Biden, who had won the election. A “small number of people … many ushered in by the police,” Trump lied.

“He wants to raise your taxes by four times,” said Trump of Biden. No, he does not.

Trump accused Democrats who support access to abortion of backing infanticide. “They will take the life of a child … even after birth.” That was a complete fabrication.

How do you know Trump is lying? His lips are moving.

Biden did little to counter the lies. He did little to present his record as president, somehow never mentioning infrastructure, though the bipartisan infrastructure bill was among his administration’s greatest achievements.

Biden fumbled and mumbled. He was most effective in convincing many viewers that, at 81, he is too old, and his cognitive abilities have slipped too far for him to serve another four years.

Consider this Biden response: “We have a thousand trillionaires in America — I mean, billionaires in America. And what’s happening? They’re in a situation where they, in fact, pay 8.2% in taxes. If they just paid 24% or 25%, either one of those numbers, they’d raised $500 million — billion dollars, I should say, in a 10-year period. We’d be able to right — wipe out his debt. We’d be able to help make sure that — all those things we need to do, childcare, elder care, making sure that we continue to strengthen our healthcare system, making sure that we’re able to make every single solitary person eligible for what I’ve been able to do with the COVID — excuse me, with dealing with everything we have to do with. Look, if — we finally beat Medicare.”

In the wake of this debacle of a debate many in one party, the Democrats, called for a change at the top of the ticket. Both parties should have been doing so, but most Republicans have long come to accept Trump’s lying, bullying, whining and his willingness to stomp on the Constitution to try to retain power.

A friend and I, a Republican, shared lament over how low our political discourse has sunk.

“If we were to watch the Nixon-Kennedy debates now it would make one cry to compare the intellectual discourse,” he said.

So, I looked back.

Easy to find on YouTube, I watched that first-ever televised presidential debate in 1960 between Democrat John F. Kennedy, the handsome U.S. senator and World War II hero, and Republican Richard Nixon, the vice president hoping to succeed President Dwight Eisenhower. Their youth was striking, compared to what the nation now witnesses. Kennedy was 43, Nixon 47.

That debate began the tradition of televised presidential debates. What the black-and-white telecast lacked in production value — the candidates sat awkwardly on a barren stage and walked to spindly podiums to speak — the participants more than made up for in their substantive responses.

The debate took place on Sept. 26. It was my fourth birthday. Perhaps this explains my lifelong fascination with politics.

That debate opened with eight-minute opening statements. Eight minutes! No teleprompters and no notes.

The debate topic was domestic policy, but Kennedy brilliantly opened with the subject foremost on the minds of many Americans — the spread of Soviet Union-style communism across the globe. The U.S. must be strong domestically, Kennedy argued, if it was to confront that challenge and push the cause of freedom globally.

Nixon, going second in opening comments, went off script to respond to Kennedy. He said he agreed that domestic success is a vital component to confronting the communist model. They disagreed, said Nixon, on how to achieve domestic success.

Throughout the debate, Kennedy argued for a more aggressive role for the federal government in confronting poverty, spurring industrial expansion and improving education.

“I don’t believe in big government, but I believe in effective governmental action. And I think that’s the only way that the United States is going to maintain its freedom. It’s the only way that we’re going to move ahead,” said the Democratic candidate.

Nixon concedes that federal programs play an important role but warns that moving too much power to Washington — and away from the free market and the states — is the wrong approach.

“I do believe that our programs will stimulate the creative energies of 180 million free Americans,” states Nixon. “I believe the programs that Senator Kennedy advocates will have a tendency to stifle those creative energies. I believe, in other words, that his program would lead to the stagnation of the motive power that we need in this country to get progress.”

The tone of mutual respect starkly contrasts with today’s bitter politics. History tells us these men did not like each other, but they took the high road when addressing the nation.

“I know Senator Kennedy feels as deeply about these problems as I do, but our disagreement is not about the goals for America but only about the means to reach those goals,” states Nixon.

“I think Mr. Nixon is an effective leader of his party. I hope he would grant me the same. The question before us is: which point of view and which party do we want to lead the United States?” asks Kennedy.

It would have been unimaginable to viewers at the time to hear one candidate say to the other, “He doesn’t care. He doesn’t like the military at all. And he doesn’t care about our veterans,” as did Trump. Or, for that matter, Biden’s comment, “You’re the sucker. You’re the loser.”

And neither Nixon nor Kennedy argued about who had the better golf game.

Having eloquently laid out their visions for the country, Nixon and Kennedy then responded to the panelists’ questions with detailed statements about policy and legislation. The quality of the discussion was far, far above that seen in recent presidential debates. The Obama-Romney debates were probably the last to feature a similar level of discourse.

Back in 1960, Americans expected more. And, I would contend, they were better informed. They read newspapers and watched national TV news programs that offered a spectrum of views and presented information objectively.

Today many seek out websites and TV programming that only amplify their beliefs, often by villainizing those with differing views.

In a nation of 179 million people, 66.4 million watched the first 1960 debate, 37% of the populace.

On June 27, 51 million people watched the Biden-Trump debate, 15% of the populace.

Kennedy and Nixon had three more debates that year, and viewership remained remarkably steady, ranging from 60.4 million to 63.7 million in the three subsequent debates. Kennedy would win a close election, becoming the youngest person ever elected to the presidency. Nixon would attain his goal of the presidency in 1968, before resigning during a second term in 1974 in the wake of the Watergate scandal.

In his closing statement in that first debate, Kennedy promised nothing but instead called on Americans to share in the “great task” that lay ahead.

“I don’t want historians, 10 years from now, to say, these were the years when the tide ran out for the United States. I want them to say these were the years when the tide came in; these were the years when the United States started to move again,” said Kennedy. “That’s the question before the American people, and only you can decide what you want…what you want to do with the future. I think we’re ready to move. And it is to that great task, if we’re successful, that we will address ourselves.”

It was inspirational. Can anyone inspire us again?

Paul Choiniere is the former editorial page editor of The Day, now retired. He can be reached at p.choiniere@yahoo.com.

Editor’s Note: This column has been updated to correct the date of the attack on the U.S. Capitol.