I was part of a live debate in Chicago this past Thursday, facing off against Steve Everley of American Solutions at an event sponsored by Lexus and Patron and moderated by Mark McGrath, who you may remember as the frost-tipped lead singer of the band Sugar Ray, beloved to millions for their 1997 hit “Fly.” Yes, that’s all as weird as it sounds.

There’s been some hue and cry over these debates but in my experience it was harmless. McGrath turns out to be a genuinely nice, down-to-earth guy. His questions — at least the questions he was given — were fairly sharp and if anything biased a bit in my favor. Everley’s a nice guy too, and wasn’t interested in arguing over climate science. The focus was mostly on clean energy, though Snooki and pot legalization came up too. We each got 60 seconds per question to make ourselves heard over the hum of beautiful people buzzed on tequila, chatting each other up by the bar. Let’s just say that the informational content fell somewhat short of academic.

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It was fun, though! I’ll put up video when it’s available.

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UPDATE: There’s video of the debate available here.