[T]he Thompson campaign knew about the debate - taking place at 9 pm on September 27 at Morgan State University- well before he declared his candidacy. Former RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman chose the date because it worked best for all the potential candidates, Smiley said.
Thompson Refuses To Debate At Historically Black College
September 17, 2007 04:26 PM
Former Tennessee Senator Fred Thomspon has become the fourth leading GOP presidential candidate to shun the PBS debate this month at a historically black college in Baltimore, the Huffington Post has learned.
The debates, moderated by Tavis Smiley, will go on as planned, despite the absence of Thompson, former mayor Rudy Giuliani, former governor Mitt Romney, and Sen. John McCain. Each campaign cited scheduling issues as the reason for their absence. Nevertheless, the rejections underscore the consistent absence of GOP candidates at minority voter forums.
"There is a pattern here," Smiley told the Huffington Post. "When you tell every black and brown request that you get throughout the primary process that 'no, there's a scheduling problem.' That's a pattern... Are we really supposed to believe that all four of these guys couldn't make it because of scheduling?"
The Republican frontrunners' snubbing of Smiley and PBS comes on the heels of their rejection of a debate sponsored by the Spanish-language network Univision (McCain was the only GOP candidate to accept that invitation). This past June, only one Republican presidential candidate, California Rep. Duncan Hunter, showed up at the convention of the National Association of Latino Elected & Appointed Officials.
"It's not just that they are not coming. It's that some of them are visibly insulting us," Cecilia Munoz, vice president of NCLR, told the Politico.
Delicious
Digg
Reddit
Newsvine
Furl
Google
Yahoo
I guess the front runners
I guess the front runners representing the Party of Lincoln have shown their true colors. Still, it will be interesting to see people like Brownback, Tancredo, and Huckabee who have no chance of winning discuss what they think can be done to better black America. Do you think the front runners would have made time in their schedules to attend a Fox-CBC style debate? Is that still scheduled to take place, by the way?
They would have attended a
They would have attended a Fox-CBC debate because there's an incredible amount of negotiation of terms that takes place to set it up. They would have been able to vet the questions up front...and not a single one from Smiley's Covenant would make the cut. The CBCI wuldn't have even asked for it.
It would be one long, inappropriate Sister Souljah moment.
that is a part of it. but
that is a part of it. but this is really a signal that the GOP recognizes that it is the (white) nationalist party. and there is no way they could gain enough non-white votes to offset all the white nationalists they would lose if they came.
True. They ditched the
True. They ditched the Hispanics and Black folks to keep their base happy. But I'm sure the CBCI would have fed them their SS moment...Fox News would require it.