Exclusion of Jill Stein and Gary Johnson

[Faye]

Historically, the United States has been a two-party system, but those parties have changed several times.

Jill Stein was arrested for trying to enter a debate with Obama and Romney. My question is this: can we really justify excluding Stein, Johnson, and any other prominent candidate who manages to get on the ballot from debating? I know neither of them have as much money backing them as Obama and Romney do, but then again, that is in part because any vote not for one of the two parties is considered a wasted vote in the system.

To me, it just does not seem very democratic. I would even go so far as to say that the U.S. should not consider itself a true democracy because of this. If all we have are two parties heavily influenced by money, then we do not really have a choice about who rules.

 

[Stu]

I agree, but to do it the candidates would have to be compelled, by law or political expedience, to enter a debate with non major party nominees.

I doubt a law would get past the first amendment.

 

[Apone]

Not that I don't agree with you, but is there really anything preventing Stein and Johnson from holding their own 4-party debate somewhere else? Just because Obama/Romney/the media might not choose to show up, it doesn't mean that they couldn't do it.

Also, would you be open to the idea of a white supremacist candidate entering the debate?

 

[the]

They should just declare that they hare having a 4party debate and if the d and r don't show up, mock and humiliate them for being cowards.

 

[this is only temporary]

To me, it says more about the public's lack of involvement in politics than about whether or not the US is a "true" democracy.

What with viral videos, crowdsourcing, etc. etc. etc. these days, it does not take that much money, really, to get the right message in front of tons and tons of people, if you do it right. (Remember Kony?) What they need is good PR. And it wouldn't kill people to volunteer to support their minor party candidates, either.

Haven't heard a whole lot of campaigning for either Jill Stein or Gary Johnson during this election. 99% of people have been largely silent about them, and instead seem mostly interested in bashing one another, and Obama or Romney, and general finger pointing and shouting. Until this changes, I doubt anything much will change.

Also, unless I am much mistaken, Libertarians and maybe Green party members do in fact hold political positions at the state and local levels in all three branches of government. Not so sure about federal. So, why it is considered such an impossibility in the presidential race is somewhat strange to me...

There is no law preventing a multi-party system, is there? (Not that I am aware of. This was not mandated.)

I'm not convinced we should compel candidates to enter debates with each and every person on the ballot. (Have you seen some of the whack jobs that are running in the minority parties? Trust me, they're... um... fringe.)

And the minor candidates do hold their own debates, it is just that nobody seems to listen...

 

[Faye]

I agree, but to do it the candidates would have to be compelled, by law or political expedience, to enter a debate with non major party nominees.

I doubt a law would get past the first amendment.

Not that I don't agree with you, but is there really anything preventing Stein and Johnson from holding their own 4-party debate somewhere else? Just because Obama/Romney/the media might not choose to show up, it doesn't mean that they couldn't do it.

Also, would you be open to the idea of a white supremacist candidate entering the debate?

They should just declare that they hare having a 4party debate and if the d and r don't show up, mock and humiliate them for being cowards.

Basically what UR said, but most importantly, to have a major television network advertise and present it. I am guessing the private sector wouldn't go for that though because they might feel it wouldn't generate enough of a return, but again, that is because people feel that Johnson or Stein have no chance. They have this already:

http://reason.com/blog/2012/10/24/johnson-stein-agree-and-clash-in-chicago

But the fact that its held a hotel is disheartening.

To me, it says more about the public's lack of involvement in politics than about whether or not the US is a "true" democracy.

What with viral videos, crowdsourcing, etc. etc. etc. these days, it does not take that much money, really, to get the right message in front of tons and tons of people, if you do it right. (Remember Kony?) What they need is good PR. And it wouldn't kill people to volunteer to support their minor party candidates, either.

Haven't heard a whole lot of campaigning for either Jill Stein or Gary Johnson during this election. 99% of people have been largely silent about them, and instead seem mostly interested in bashing one another, and Obama or Romney, and general finger pointing and shouting. Until this changes, I doubt anything much will change.

Also, unless I am much mistaken, Libertarians and maybe Green party members do in fact hold political positions at the state and local levels in all three branches of government. Not so sure about federal. So, why it is considered such an impossibility in the presidential race is somewhat strange to me...

There is no law preventing a multi-party system, is there? (Not that I am aware of. This was not mandated.)

I'm not convinced we should compel candidates to enter debates with each and every person on the ballot. (Have you seen some of the whack jobs that are running in the minority parties? Trust me, they're... um... fringe.)

We don't have a multi-party system. We have a winner-take-all system, so the laws effectively do prevent a multi-party system. In a multi-party system, the number of votes that a party receives will allow them to gain a proportional number of seats in the legislature. In our system, it doesn't matter if your party receives votes because you must have a majority in order to get into office. As a result, there are no green party members elected at the federal level, and I don't think the libertarian party has any either. If we had a multiparty system for, say, the House of Representatives, and in an election the libertarian party (for example) received 5% of the vote, they would have 5% of the seats in the house. Of course that would be problematic for the representation of states, so I don't propose that change at the national level, but I would like to see it at the state level so that alternative parties can get into more top positions at the state level.


I personally don't support white supremacists, but at least having one on the ballot would more accurately represent what this country actually thinks and show that the problem of racism does still exist. There are still a ton of racist people out there, and racial domination is still a reality.

 

[ThomasJ79]

There was a 4th presidential debate last night between the third-party candidate ( Jill Stein, Gary Johnson, Virgile Goode, Rocky Anderson), live on youtube. Too bad it didn't get any media coverage. Thanks Larry King for making this happen!

[video=youtube;e0vE5CTTSFI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=e0vE5CTTSFI#![/video]

 

[ThomasJ79]

there will be another one next week

 

[Lerxst]

there will be another one next week

Only problem is, I want to hear these candidates debate with Romney and Obama, not each other. This debate is kind of like preaching to the choir...

This doesn't just end at the exclusion of 3rd parties though. The primaries and debates among the main 2 parties always favor the candidates who are most aligned with the money... err... mainstream values. I mean Ron Paul has almost become a running joke when it comes to exclusion and in 2008, who realized Dennis Kucinich was even in the primaries when he was never televised or invited to the debates?

 

[Sriracha]

The sad thing is that neither will receive enough votes in order to win electoral. I believe we need to do away with electoral and go to popular voting. The election would then be fair to the other candidates (and citizens.)