You can’t move for Lloyd Bentsen these days (there’s eight words that I never thought I’d write). The former US vice-presidential candidate’s put-down of Senator Dan Quayle in the 1988 VP debate has been played and re-played on radio and TV in the UK this week as Britain gears up for the first live, television debates between the men who would be prime minister (and Nick Clegg).

The expectation behind the repeat use of the Bentsen clip is that the three debates, on home affairs, international affairs, and domestic policy, will be game-changers. However, I think people will be disappointed.

Barring a major gaffe, the ‘debates’ are likely to be staid events – one-minute responses to pre-approved questions; leaders trotting our their manifesto lines; every one of them playing it safe. The three-way debate will reduce the cut-and-thrust that might have been present had it been a Brown-Cameron tussle.

I hope I’m proved wrong – otherwise it’s going to be a dull 90 minutes. Perhaps by the third debate (on the BBC, and therefore likely to be most watched), poll numbers will persuade leaders to be more daring – especially on the main dividing line issue of the economy (Brown’s ‘we’re in this together’ versus Cameron’s Thatcher-lite ‘you’re on your own’).

However, I just can’t see the thrill of the US debates translating over to the UK. We have a different political system and culture (despite the presence of American debate-preppers and US-style downplaying of your own man’s abilities).

Local issues and ‘kitchen-table’ economic considerations also play a big factor in an election whose result rests ultimately on the number of MPs in the House, not solely on the personality of the leader, important as it may be to some.

So I’ll watch with interest rather than expectation tonight… there’s a long way to go in this election – and it’s as likely to be won as much on the doorstep, by word of mouth and on the web as in the TV studio.