Scully was also an intern for Joe Biden in DC during his Senate career. The cabal of journalists and commentators who were former aides, cabinet members and interns is growing too prominent to ignore. Members of the televised media who have worked for Democratic presidents or members of Congress include Chuck Todd, George George Stephanopoulos, Jim Sciutto and Jake Tapper. Anderson Cooper briefly served on an executive panel of the Clinton Foundation. On the Republican side, there’s Fox’s Dana Perino. None of this is to say that these people wouldn’t be capable of handling a debate — but wouldn’t it be easier to avoid accusations of bias by simply not considering these people, or other print and web journalists with political ties, as debate hosts?

Bias isn’t the only problem here however. Older members of the traditional media are losing their audiences to tech platforms such as YouTube and Facebook. On top of that, as in Scully’s case, these old hacks are clueless about how these platforms operate and who their audience is. Significant conversations don’t take place on CNN panels anymore. They happen on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and Instagram. Any future commission should be considering moderators with audiences and followings on these platforms. Joe Rogan has been repeatedly floated as someone with more of a grasp of the problems facing the average Americans today than any suit sitting behind a corporate news desk in New York or DC.