I agree that the moderation was an absolute travesty. The Mods would interrupt Trump (or somebody) after a few seconds, attacking what he was saying. There were relatively long periods of cacophony, candidate refusing to shut up when Mod was trying to drown him out. It's normal to let a candidate finish a sentence or two when time has expired, but some candidates were allowed to add several paragraphs, while others were cut off, insulted etc. Part of the problem may have been using "moderators" like Jim Cramer, probably not even a competent interviewer let alone moderator.
CNBC's performance was an utter joke. I hope they're duly embarrassed. Although, the Fox moderators in the first debate did more of the "Hey, he said this about you. What about that?" type of question than either CNN or CNBC.
Still one has to blame the GOP candidates themselves for these travesties. Bullshit ideas and blatant lying now seem to be the norm. When Trump said "I'm going to build a wall and have Mexico pay for it" - Is this not a serious policy prescription?. doesn't it warrant a question like, "How do you expect to accomplish this?" In conjunction with some of the other things Trump has said, warrant a question like, "Why should we continue to take you seriously when you propose such complete nonsense?"
If you take positions that have gone beyond realistic and into crazy land, highlight that fact for the folks at home. ETA: If some of the GOP candidates don't want to end up a cartoon in a cartoon graveyard, maybe they ought to try re-establishing their connection with reality. What I'm interested in is debates which actually fulfill their purpose of helping voters make up their minds about candidates.
I think the crux of the question is really what role should moderators have when candidates' positions are actively contradicted by basic reality. Until voters demonstrate they care that candidates are lying to them, candidates will continue to lie. Journalists should still point this out when this is happening. Also, when you don't like the question or don't have a good answer - the fallback is to attack the question and the person asking it (media). This has been going on forever.
Another problem is that there are to many fucking candidates. Some of the batshits, Cruz, Huckabee etc., who have no chance of winning, should drop out so some of the saner ones such as Rubio and Kasich can get their idea's out to the public without the batshit drowning them out.