Two Demoted And Two Dropped From Next GOP Debate

The caricature above (by the inimitable DonkeyHotey) shows the Republican presidential candidates allowed into the "big kids" debate last time. The next debate will exclude two of those candidates. Fox Business News (who is hosting the next GOP debate) says Chris Christie and Mike Huckabee will be demoted to the kiddie table (the alternate debate for candidate's whose campaigns are not doing well). This is because neither Christie nor Huckabee averaged 3% support in recognized national polls -- and that was the cut-off point established by Fox.

But that doesn't mean the alternate debate will increase in size. Two candidates were also excluded from participation in that debate -- Lindsey Graham and George Pataki. That's because neither could meet the Fox imposed cut-off of an average 1% support.

I have a hard time feeling sorry for Christie, Huckabee, Graham, or Pataki. They would all make terrible presidents. But I do think it's a terrible idea to let the media, any media outlet, determine for us who the viable candidates are (or should be). Shouldn't that be determined by the voters in a democracy?  And it was just as wrong that Lawrence Lessig was excluded from the Democratic debate.