WASHINGTON — Here’s the thing about presidential debates: They pay too little attention to the things voters really care about.

Oh, sure, tens of millions tune into the spectacle of seeing the two most disliked candidates in American history exchange taunts and insults. The ancient Romans enthusiastically trooped in to see gladiators fight each other to the death, too.

And in this election in particular, voters may be deciding solely on the basis of character — or “temperament,” if you will — and policy differences may be less important.

But these character issues can be “litigated” in other forums — to use the latest buzzword in news-speak (for those who remember George Orwell’s “1984,” pun intended). Because, like it or not, there are important policy issues at stake in this election. Even though many consider him categorically unqualified to be president, Donald Trump has tapped into issues of jobs and immigration that millions of voters think have been ignored by the reigning political elite.

“ There is a hunger among voters for actual substantive debate about policy. ”

Yet these issues get short shrift in debates where network anchors, conditioned by the drive for ratings even in commercial-free programming, go for the lowest common denominator. Leaving aside the question of bias, it is unquestionably true that Trump’s campaign most often offers that lowest common denominator, and baiting Trump is easy sport not only for his political opponent, Hillary Clinton, but for the moderators as well.

And yet, there is a hunger among voters for actual substantive debate about policy. Even those who have ruled out voting for Trump are looking for some reassurance that Clinton, who has largely been happy to campaign as the not-Trump, truly is a safe pair of hands.

Read:10 reasons Donald Trump could still win in November

Look at the response to the question in Sunday’s debate from Ken Bone about how to balance the competing needs of energy, jobs and the environment.

“Judging by comments on social media, many of those who tuned in found Mr. Bone to be the most diverting thing about the debate,” the New York Times reported as social media memes of a new hero went viral.

Ultimately, Bone, who was one of several undecided participants selected by Gallup for the town hall style debate, found that Clinton, with her nuanced answers to his question and some others, “really impressed” him.

This participant, however, was dismayed by the amount of time in the debate given over to personal attacks. “I would have liked to see less of that and more on the issues,” he told the Times.

Amen to that.

Many of the questions were on the personal controversies obsessing the media — Trump’s hot-mike recording on groping women, Trump’s taxes, Trump’s “ban” on Muslims, Trump’s lack of discipline, and, oh, yes, Clinton’s two-faced comments about Wall Street that emerged from the leak of her speeches to Goldman Sachs.

Read:Donald Trump threatens to jail Hillary Clinton if he wins White House

Although it was ostensibly a town-hall format with questions from the studio audience and the public online, a lot of these questions were posed by the moderators. They, of course, were also the gatekeepers for deciding which questions from the public were actually heard and could set the topics for the debate in that manner.

Poll after poll shows that the biggest concern among voters is the economy and jobs, and the first debate moderated by NBC’s Lester Holt did cover this topic in the initial segment — the one everybody thought went well before it degenerated into personal attacks and interruptions. Despite being a central concern, however, it was largely ignored in the second debate.

Republicans torn Over Trump: What's next?

Terrorism ranks second in the Pew Research survey of voter concerns for the 2016 election, though this has yet to be directly addressed in the debates (a question by Holt on “homegrown” terrorism was quickly sidetracked by the candidates).

Instead, in a format which gives absolute discretion to news moderators chosen in a totally opaque fashion — an invitation to the funereal pomposity that characterizes these debates — we are more often treated to their particular hobbyhorses.

ABC moderator Martha Raddatz, for instance, covers military affairs and considers herself something of an expert in her own right, so she introduced the topic of Syria into the debate this week and stayed with it for several minutes, even jumping in with her own observations.

The tragedy in Syria and what the U.S. should do about it is undoubtedly an important issue, but Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson is surely not the only person in the country who doesn’t know what Aleppo is and there are many much more pressing concerns for voters that were totally neglected.

Foreign policy in general is a top voter concern, but China certainly has a much more direct impact on the lives of Americans than Syria, yet it was mentioned only in passing.

Two top issues — health care and the Supreme Court — got questions in the second debate, but other burning issues like gun policy, immigration, Social Security, education, trade policy, abortion, Wall Street all got short shrift in the media obsession with atmospherics.

To the extent leaked tapes, leaked emails, deleted emails, email hacking, Miss Universe, personal income taxes, Benghazi, the Khan family, Bill Clinton, Loretta Lynch, the FBI, Wikileaks, stop-and-frisk, or the birther conspiracy might influence voters, there a numerous other forums for these “issues” — the Sunday morning talk shows, the nonstop talking heads on cable, the network news broadcasts, Saturday Night Live and the full panoply of political comedy, not to mention endless column inches in the newspapers few people read any more.

Read:Glenn Beck: Hillary Clinton is the ‘moral, ethical’ choice for president

Believe it or not, American voters actually care most about the issues that actually affect their lives. They deserve the opportunity in those few hours devoted to one-on-one debate between the candidates to hear what these aspirants to the White House have to say about them.

The final debate this campaign is Oct. 19 and is the last chance to address many of these real issues one-on-one. Maybe third time’s the charm.