Although at one point I had hopes of actually attending last night's presidential debate in person, those plans fell apart and it turned out to be a struggle to even hear it on the radio. I'm on vacation in Maine with my kids and our house has no television. Plus, for reasons I still don't quite understand, FairPoint is apparently incapable of getting our DSL working. My last resort was to sit in our rented car in the middle of the dark woods and listen to the debate on the XM satellite radio rebroadcast of the CNN audio feed.
Hearing, rather than seeing the debate, while sitting with my college-age daughter and with her younger sister in the backseat playing video games, may have given me a somewhat different perspective on the outcome and the effectiveness of the candidates who were in attendance. My experience may have been akin to those who heard the Kennedy-Nixon debate on radio rather than watching it on TV. I was safely isolated from the "pretty" factor which some of the candidates have going for them, and had to focus on what they actually said.
The first and most obvious thing about the debate for me was the absence of former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson. Despite meeting the qualifications which CNN had laid out for inclusion in the debate, Johnson was not invited for reasons which remain obscure. CNN chose to selectively interpret their own criteria in order to exclude him and stuck by their position in the face of a massive call-in and email campaign, substantial negative coverage in other media as well as protestors on the scene.
Even CNN knows they aren't fooling anyone about their deliberate exclusion of Johnson and they may still be trying to explain it by the time the next debate rolls around. The upside for Johnson supporters is that this gross example of media bias seems to have really lit a fire under Johnson and his rhetoric is taking on a harder edge and he seems to be setting aside his laid-back style for a much more aggressive campaign style. It's going to get harder for them to continue to ignore him.
Article comments
1 - Glenn Contrarian
Dave -
When it comes to Johnson, you merely echo the complaints that many on the far left and the far right have raised for many years - that the candidate that they like the most wasn't included in the debate. Many of us on the left (not including me) wanted to see Dennis Kucinich included in debates during the last presidential election...but he was left out of most (and I think all) the major Democratic debates.
And why? Is it really because the Fourth Estate wants to play kingmaker? I doubt it. I think it's more of a matter of where does one draw the line when it comes to how many to invite to a debate...and what level of name recognition must one have before they can be considered a serious-enough candidate to participate in a major debate.
With the possible exception of Herman Cain, I don't think Johnson has anywhere near the name recognition that would qualify him in the eyes of the MSM. If he wants to be a truly viable candidate, then IMO he needs to take the next four years building up a national campaign framework using truly grassroots organizations, and frame himself as a true outsider as-yet uncorrupted by DC politics.
To an extent, that's what our current president did.
Please note I didn't make any judgments about the current crop of Republican candidates, but tried to address Johnson's situation as objectively as possible.
2 - Dave Nalle
Johnson certainly has as much name recognition as Pawlenty who no one had heard of prior to this election and Santorum is only ahead of him because of negative recognition, which shouldn't really count for him.
And it has to be about more than name recognition. Johnson has an actual following. He has people willing to protest in his behalf by the thousands. Santorum and Pawlenty certainly can't claim that.
Qualifications also matter. Governors are more electable. People like Bachmann get a lot of name recognition, but that doesn't give them executive experience. Johnson was arguably one of the most successful governors of the last few decades.
The problem with CNN making the decisions is that their priorities - like name recognition - are not the priorities of the voters or of the Republican party. So from the very start, having them in a decision making position skews the results.
Dave
3 - zingzing
i'd heard of pawlenty plenty. aww, that was neat. i'd never heard of johnson (although his common last name might have helped with that). and yeah... santorum... heard of him quite a bit. no one puts asshole and dick together quite like he does.
"The problem with CNN making the decisions is that their priorities - like name recognition - are not the priorities of the voters or of the Republican party."
then the republican party needs to schedule its debates with another entity. but roger ailes seems to be showing some reluctance to do that for some reason or another.
4 - Baronius
So far, I've heard that CNN threw the event for Romney, Cain, and Pawlenty. I think that people are seeing what they want to see.
5 - Baronius
Wait, what? Zing doesn't support Santorum?!
6 - Steve
I liked the fire of Bachmann, her background, and what she had to say. This was my first exposure to her. Not sure why everyone wants Palin to run when Bachmann is already running and is a more professional candidate with a real chance to get votes.
7 - zingzing
"Bachmann is already running and is a more professional candidate with a real chance to get votes."
yish. here's your second exposure.
8 - handyguy
I think Romney is from Michigan, not Minnesota.
Here is Ezra Klein's Twitter summary of the debate. Reading it is probably as instructive as watching the damn thing, and much more entertaining:
Romney won. Bachmann surged. Cain disappointed. Pawlenty whiffed. Gingrich slept. Santorum fretted. Paul scolded.
9 - handyguy
Michele B apparently kept her inner space alien in check last night and managed to fool everyone into thinking she might possibly be reasonable. But face it -- when she's not hilariously inappropriate and uninformed [that is to say, 99% of the time], she's nothin'.
I note that her 'states' rights' position on gay marriage still allows her to support a constitutional amendment outlawing gay marriage.
I also loved [the day before the debate] CNN's recently out reporter Don Lemon asking Rick Santorum if he has gay friends, and looking half impressed, half dubious at Santorum's answer: "I not only have a gay friend, I was with him just the other night."
10 - handyguy
Hey, you can watch watch Gary Johnson debate after all: debate an Obama impersonator, that is, on John Stossel’s Fox News show. This was sooo clever the first time, with Ron Paul, that Stossel just had to do it again.
11 - handyguy
Here’s a better place to watch the silly fake Johnson-Obama debate stunt. The other page had only the Ron Paul version.
12 - Leroy
At last we know which candidates want thick and which thin pizza crust. This and other core issues were noted in the foreign press.
13 - Arch Conservative
I don't see how any of the people on stage could be worse than the train wreck we have in office.
It's a shame Ms. Obama didn't give abortion more thought at the time.
14 - zingzing
archie, i'm a bit confused. conservatives thought that obama would have destroyed america, enslaved it and turned it into a muslim fascist communist dictatorship (although you tell me what the order of all that is). i should think you'd be quite happy with the current reality given what you feared would happen. i mean, it looks like he's going to ALLOW ELECTIONS (again). that's a plus, right?
15 - Arch Conservative
Yeah you're right zing. He didn't do any of those things so I guess I should be grateful for the 25% increase in unemployment on his watch, the government takeover of the healthcare system and the additional 4 trillion of debt.
16 - zingzing
"Yeah you're right zing. He didn't do any of those things..."
i know. i doubt anyone really thought he would, but political rhetoric makes idiots out of lots of people every day. (really, how could he have afforded that many jackboots? logistics, people!)
"I guess I should be grateful for the 25% increase in unemployment on his watch, the government takeover of the healthcare system and the additional 4 trillion of debt."
well, i hardly think you can take the spiraling unemployment of bush's last term as obama's fault. unemployment leveled off within 6 months (within one minor spike thereafter). that it hasn't gone down isn't grand, but at least it's not at bush-level full-speed ahead.
"the government takeover of the healthcare system" is more of that blustering rhetorical nonsense i was talking about up there. you know that isn't what happened. yet that's what you say. why? (and really, it didn't go far enough into a gov't takeover for my tastes, so i dunno why you'd bring it up.)
and that 4 trillion in debt is covering the mistakes of the (spending-happy) bush admin. and you know it.
just out of curiosity, who do you think owns the national debt? i think the answer to that would surprise you.
17 - Leroy
Archie, I'm a bit confused. Aren't conservatives against abortion?
18 - Arch Conservative
I made one grand exception Leroy.
19 - zingzing
oh course, leroy, but archie's all about being as priggish as possible. he even cheered the guy who shot george tiller. that's archie. he sheds his skin every morning.
20 - El Bicho
too bad ms arch conservative didn't make an exception
21 - Arch Conservative
"he even cheered the guy who shot george tiller."
Hell, I'd buy the man a steak dinner if I could.
22 - zingzing
well, don't get into any sort of disagreement with him. he'll fucking shoot you in the face.