I got three e-mails over the weekend from one Merry Williams, who obviously supports Green Party candidate Cynthia McKinney's run for the White House. I'll include a short bit from one of them:
"The real drama of the presidential debates is that they're rigged to exclude all candidates except the Democratic and Republican nominees ... Voters have a right to be informed about which candidate best represents them, even if the polls and media say that they aren't 'winnable.'"
Oh, come on. Are you saying we really shouldn't look at polls and a candidate's support base when determining who makes the debate cut? Get serious. Otherwise, we'd have every joker who makes it on a few states' ballots behind a podium, delivering their ill-conceived rant and wasting everyone's time. Look at the Georgia ballot - McKinney didn't even make the cut, and she used to represent this state in Congress. At least Bob Barr got on there. I would argue that he should have been at the debates, but he doesn't have a chance of winning, either.
And that, really, is what it comes down to - who's going to win the election. It's Obama or McCain; no one else is going to be sitting in the Oval Office come Jan. 20.
So why should we capitulate to any number of third party candidates who have no chance of leading the country and will only kill air time if we allow them at a debate? With the two-party system we have, candidates such as McKinney would be better off spending their time volunteering it to a good cause, not a lost one.
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