Disappeared News

by Larry Geller

Bob Jones wrote today in MidWeek:

I understand the rationale for TV stations excluding political candidates without big campaign organizations, big money and big poll numbers from their live debates. I defended that myself as a news director.

But I’m troubled. Last week, a TV debate excluded the only Native Hawaiian candidate for Congress.

Yes, some are cuckoos and others have no chance. But I’d like to have heard from Rafael Del Castillo, Jim Brewer and Kalaeloa Strode. Certainly no cuckoos there. [MidWeek, Civil Union Hangup And Debates, 5/12/2010]

Actually, I think there were two debates last week that excluded the only Native Hawaiian candidate for Congress: OHA’s debate on Monday and the League of Women Voters/KITV debate on Friday.

Imagine, OHA excluding a Native Hawaiian candidate.

On Tuesday I began to question the League’s decision to exclude all but the top money-makers. I wrote, in part, in an email:

I understand that the LWV is participating in some way in a KITV program on Friday which will also be exclusionary. While KITV of course can do what they want, I'm surprised that the LWV would agree to be part of that.

On Thursday, one day before the KITV debate, I received an answer. This part relates to the selection criteria that ended up ruling out all but the top three:

For the upcoming debate we set the criteria as listed below. A candidate meeting any one of these qualifications would be included.

    Received significant levels of public support in independent public opinion polls.
    Has received substantial campaign contributions from varied sources.
    Has received a substantial level of votes in prior elections for the same or comparable office(s).
    Has previously held significant public office(s).
    Has received significant news coverage from a wide range of media outlets.

I hope this information satisfies your interest in the selection process used for this upcoming debate.

I immediately fired back some questions but received no answer. And of course, the League did sponsor the debate that took place on Friday.

Since other organizations, if cornered, would no doubt come up with similar criteria, it pays to look at these individually.

1. Received significant levels of public support in independent public opinion polls.

I asked the LWV to let me know which polls they relied upon for this criterion. I’ve been called by pollsters maybe eight times, and each time I’ve been asked only about my choice among the “top three,”  Case, Hanabusa, or Djou.

When I replied “none of the above” a couple of times, I was told “you mean, undecided.” No, I said, none of the above. I plan to vote for someone else. “May I put you down as undecided then?” No, I said. And that ended the call.

Here’s a report of a Honolulu Advertiser poll, which illustrates the problem. In fact, we are all being deceived by these polls because of the way they are conducted. In any case, LWV should know that the polls can’t be used to justify excluding candidates who don’t appear in them.

2. Has received substantial campaign contributions from varied sources.

Fine, you gotta draw the line somewhere. But LWV did not reply to my question about what number they used for “substantial.”

3. Has received a substantial level of votes in prior elections for the same or comparable office(s).

Ok.

4. Has previously held significant public office(s).

Ok.

5. Has received significant news coverage from a wide range of media outlets.

One candidate, Rafael del Castillo, made the cover and feature article of the Honolulu Weekly. He was mentioned in news coverage of the Hawaii Public Radio debate, though the paper excluded from its story anyone other than Case, Djou and Hanabusa, of course. Statements by the others were ‘erased’ as though they had said nothing, but that’s another rant.

All the candidates participated in a debate on Rick Hamada’s show, which has a large audience.

So again, I asked for their criteria.

To date, I have not received a reply, and of course the League proceeded with their sponsorship of the debate.

Permalink posted by Larry @ 5/13/2010 12:22:00 AM