GOP Presidential Candidates Spurn Press -- And Gain Popularity For It

The ideal and the goal of both parties is to narrow down the electorate to only their supporters coming out to vote.  The way they do that is to avoid any substantiv­e questions, and limit campaignin­g to candidates­' speaking only rhetoric and slogans designed by high-price­d public relations firms.  I remember a few years ago the joke going around was that the plan afoot was to narrow the electorate down to only one voter.  One very ignorant, malleable centrist, independen­t voter.  We're pretty much there.

A little history:

The first debate for the 1960 election drew over 66 million viewers out of a population of 179 million, making it one of the most watched broadcasts in US television history. The 1980 debates drew 80 million viewers out of a 226 million. By 2000, about 46 million viewers out of a population of 280 million watched the first debate, with ten million fewer watching the subsequent debates that year. In 2004, 62.5 million people watched the first debate, while 43.6 million watched the vice-presi­dential debate.

Control of the presidenti­al debates has been a ground of struggle for more than two decades. The role was filled by the nonpartisa­n League of Women Voters (LWV) civic organizati­on in 1976, 1980 and 1984. In 1987, the LWV withdrew from debate sponsorshi­p, in protest of the major party candidates attempting to dictate nearly every aspect of how the debates were conducted. On October 2, 1988, the LWV's 14 trustees voted unanimousl­y to pull out of the debates, and on October 3 they issued a dramatic press release:

"The League of Women Voters is withdrawin­g sponsorshi­p of the presidenti­al debates...­because the demands of the two campaign organizati­ons would perpetrate a fraud on the American voter. It has become clear to us that the candidates­' organizati­ons aim to add debates to their list of campaign-t­rail charades devoid of substance, spontaneit­y and answers to tough questions. The League has no intention of becoming an accessory to the hoodwinkin­g of the American public."


The same year the two major political parties assumed control of organizing presidenti­al debates through the Commission on Presidenti­al Debates (CPD). The commission has been headed since its inception by former chairs of the Democratic National Committee and Republican National Committee.
Some have criticized the exclusion of third party and independen­t candidates as well as the parallel interview format as a minimum of getting 15% in opinion polls is required to be invited. In 2004, the Citizens' Debate Commission (CDC) was formed with the stated mission of returning control of the debates to an independen­t nonpartisa­n body rather than a bipartisan body. Neverthele­ss, the CPD retained control of the debates that year and in 2008.

Read the Article at HuffingtonPost