Denying a Qualified Candidate from a Debate is a Contribution to those Included
I'm pretty sure this should be a violation of campaign finance laws. I'm sure a lot of people watched last night's MSNBC infomercial for Clinton, Obama and Edwards. MSNBC will claim that it was a 'debate' and frame it as an event showing off what a Free Press can do to facilitate our Democracy. But it wasn't. It was an in-kind donation of services to the campaigns of Clinton, Obama and Edwards. It was a donation to them because it excluded candidates fully qualified to get on the ballot and get votes.
MSNBC does not determine who a candidate is. We already have ballot access laws (maybe too restrictive even) and they have determined that there are more than 3 candidates. They excluded (and several other 'debates'/gifts-to-approved-candidates have also excluded) my personal favorite, Dennis Kucinich.
Kucinich's site has a statement on the NBC exclusion. Near the end of that statement, and similarly this morning on Democracy Now! he pushed the point:
"the blatant disregard of the public interest in silencing public debate that dissents with the views of NBC, its parent company, GE, and all of the military contractors and their candidate-funding corporate interests. Corporate control of the media is one issue. Corporate media control of the information that is allowed to reach American citizens is much more dangerous, much more sinister, and much more un-American."
While it's possible that this really is directed by corporate over-bosses from GE on down and similarly elsewhere, that's just a shade unprovable and paranoid for me. I think he'd have a stronger case if he went with a straight campaign finance law attack, that media which excludes qualified candidates is giving gifts to the others.
On the other hand, this morning on Democracy Now! they did what I think Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul should have been doing for every one of these debates: edit themselves into it. Hack the debate, make a punchy 5-10 minute version, maybe a full length version, post the video on the internet, and let people know what it might have been like if they'd been in a proper debate.
For our next trick, after a couple more lawsuits make this principle that exclusion is donation settled law, push harder on the equal time theory so that giving double the questions and air time to media-approved candidates is also a no-no.
Of course, that's just my thoughts. I could be wrong.