Appearing at The Blogging Curmudgeon, My Left Wing, and the Independent Bloggers’ Alliance.
Dennis Kucinich has accused Hillary Clinton and John Edwards of attempting to rig the election. It appears they are definitely attempting to rig the debate process and attrit their competition.
Representative Dennis J. Kucinich accused two of the major contenders for the Democratic nomination, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and John Edwards, of participating in a “conspiracy to rig the presidential election,” after they apparently suggested that future presidential debates should be pared down to include fewer candidates.
At the end of a forum with the eight Democratic presidential contenders in Detroit on Thursday, Mr. Edwards walked up to Mrs. Clinton, leaned toward her and said: “We should try to have a more serious … smaller group.”
“We’ve got to cut the number…” Mrs. Clinton responded. “I think there was an effort by our campaigns to do that … it got somehow detoured. We’ve got to get back to it,” and added, “our guys should talk.”
Edwards has confirmed the story, but says he doesn’t want to eliminate candidates, just break them into smaller groups. But get a load of Hillary’s official response:
Mrs. Clinton, who was campaigning in New Hampshire today, declined to be specific about what she meant by her comments on Thursday.
“I think he has some ideas about what he’d like to do,” she said, referring to Mr. Edwards, according to a dispatch from the Associated Press. A Clinton campaign spokesman said he would not comment on “a private conversation” between the two candidates.
In other words this one will be carried out in back-room negotiations, far from the prying eyes of that pesky electorate. And in public she will pass the buck to Edwards.
This is how Hillary deals with the nuisance of competition and democratic process. She cuts the field, like she did when her Democratic challenger in New York state started nipping at her heals. Let us never forget how her big money donor Time Warner eliminated her opponent John Tassini from their televised debate. Their reason for eliminating the up and comer, who was already at 13% in the polls: Not enough money.
Make no mistake. Hillary is as anti-democracy as our current crop of wheeler-dealers. She’s determined to win no matter what minor player she has to cut off at the knees. She has no interest in actually letting the voters choose; not before she’s eliminated as many of our choices as possible.
Oh well. As Tom Tancredo has proved, a debate of one can be damned entertaining.
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