At one point, Sanford turned the table on one of the moderators to implicitly underscore his plea for forgiveness and belief in second chances, a point he has previously made.
On Sunday, if one of the moderators, or one of the undecided voters in the crowd, fires a tough climate question at Clinton, Lertzman has some advice.
After Mrs. Merkel praised their common work on the financial crisis, one of the moderators made the comment, so widely cited in Germany on Monday it seemed all but certain to go down as the unofficial name of the debate, saying, "But Mrs. Merkel, that sounds now more like a duet and less like a duel".
But the April 19th event next week is special for another reason: Humble Moi will be one of the moderators, on the session featuring "The Power of Poetry". Well, not entirely special, actually.
On Thursday, when Rachel Maddow, one of the moderators, mentioned that many voters were concerned about the fees, Clinton switched from talking about the unknowability of Goldman's motives to the knowability of her own.
At one point during the gleefully principle-free Republican debate in Las Vegas, on Tuesday night, Hugh Hewitt, one of the moderators, tried to find out if Ben Carson had what it took to be President.
"The following is an extract from one of the moderators on the official Manchester United website - it wasn't responding to me but it sums up the attitude of too many 'supporters': 'You obviously don't understand the meaning of the word 'support'support
Perhaps they were imagining what the ladies and gentlemen of the pundit panels might have said afterward if it had been one of them, the candidates, rather than one of them, the moderators, who committed this particular "misspeak": Well, Chris, Hillary is trying to humanize herself again.
On Wednesday night, one of the debate moderators asked Carson whether his experience with Mannatech called into question his "vetting process or judgment in any way".
At one point, rather than simply challenging them on their past statements, Megyn Kelly, one of the three moderators from Fox News, showed each of the two men some footage in which he was captured saying very different things from what he is saying now, then challenged him on the inconsistencies.
"Marco, when you signed up for this, this was a six-year term, and you should be showing up to work," Bush said, busting in on an interchange between Rubio and Carl Quintanilla, one of the CNBC moderators, about an editorial in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel that accused Rubio of ripping off the voters who elected him in 2010.
