Under the criteria set forth this year by the Commission on Presidential Debates, Minnesota would have excluded Jesse Ventura from their debates in 1998, and he’d have lost the race. If, as the FAIR article says, 38 percent of Americans identify themselves as neither Democratic nor Republican, should the Commission be controlled by those two parties in such a way as to ensure an electoral duopoly. Should Nader and Buchanan be given the chance to participate in the presidential debates?
I am a registered Libertarian, so I believe you know how I feel about this.
On one hand, allowing every fringe character who says, “I’m running for president” equal time in debates and other things would turn the political process into even more of a nightmare.
However, I think it can be argued that the Libertarians and the Reform party have made enough of an impact in elections past (local included) that their representatives do deserve to be heard.
Ultimately, the way our system has turned into a two-party exclusionary practice sickens me, and it’ one of the main reasons I vote Libertarian (and I also agree with a decent amount of what they stand for).