Topic: Election 2008
Not Invited to the Debate
Americans only got to hear from two of six possible candidates for President, filtered by opinion polls.
by Bob Nightingale
(libertarian)
Thursday, October 16, 2008

Tonight (10/15/08) I listened to the two most popular Presidential candidates make promises that they could not possibly keep.  Their programs will costs trillions in new public debt.  There were many issues that I wished could have been discussed, but were not because the rest of the candidates for President were not there. 

The Commission on Presidential Debates ([link edited for length]) saw fit to allow in only the candidates from the two most popular parties.  Candidates involved in the debates had to fit three criteria (paraphrasing):

  1. Must be eligible to be President by age and citizenship, according to the Constitution
  2. Must appear on enough state ballots to have at least a mathematical chance of being elected president
  3. National polls must show that 15% of electorate support the candidates, by some combination of five polls

It is the last item that trims the participants from six to two.  The Commission doesn't say which polls it used or what the tallies were.  It just mentions in a press release that the Dr. Frank Newman from the Gallup Polling group told the Commission who were most popular ([link edited for length]).  By the assurance of one man, the public gets to hear from a minority of candidates.

If the last criterion was rolled back to even one percent, there could have been four candidates, according to recent CBS News polls ([link edited for length]), including Barr and Nader. 

During the primaries, there were several debates where six or more candidates from the same party were on the same stage.  The mechanics for at least one debate could have been accommodated.   Surely for something as important as President, there must be more than two sets of ideas on how to govern? 

Ballot Access News website ([link edited for length]) tracks candidate eligibility.  This chart from that website shows that three parties and one independent met the requirements of becoming president in most states.

2008 PETITIONING FOR PRESIDENT
(updated October 7, 2008)

TOTAL STATES ON THE BALLOT

Libertarian Party

Green Party

Constitution Party

Nader (Indep.)

45

32

37

46

Do any of these candidates have the potential of getting 270 or more electoral votes?  I worked out the number below ([link edited for length]).

Electoral Votes
LibertarianGreenConst.Nader

503

368

318

456

If this Commission had presented who could be President, instead of who is already popular, we would have heard from: 

But Americans did not get the chance.

 

©2008 Bob Nightingale, all rights reserved. You must have written permission from the author in order to republish this work.
Published: Thursday, October 16, 2008
Last modified: Thursday, October 16, 2008

The views expressed in this article are those of Bob Nightingale only and do not represent the views of Nolan Chart, LLC or its affiliates. Bob Nightingale is solely responsible for the contents of this article and is not an employee or otherwise affiliated with Nolan Chart, LLC in his/her role as a columnist.

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