>From Tom Loughlin Jr 315-735-7223 Independence Party Oneida County ad 115 representative RE: The Non Debate..and dismal viewership numbers. (Reuters article attached.) These debate ratings are understandable...and prove once again that variety and choice draws..”.same old same old” does not. The last good numbers for a debate was the only one with choices...the one which included our guy, Ross Perot. The difference was so vast, that even Reuters did not dare mention it and upset the status quo. The numbers then? More than 70 million viewers...double today’s figure. Why would anybody want to watch a non-debate between two men representing the same corporations and far less than ½ of the American people? Why would anyone want to honor a program with their viewership which was set up as a fix to benefit the Republicrat status quo power structure and hurt diversity of all types in America? Without total citizen empowerment and inclusion in the political marketplace of ideas, there is and can be no true multiculturalism, no true diversity of any sort, in this nation. We are beyond eating out of the hands of the elite. We have rights and they are not subject to regulation by any non-elected, not Constitutionally empowered body. Especially one which is commercially empowered by sponsors whose commercial interests will be affected by the outcome of the election. The fact that Buchanan and Nader were not in on the debates shows the depth of paranoia of the Republicrat’ status quo power monolith and the corporations which fund it. We want our rights and we want them now...and so does everybody else. The debate viewership was abysmal because it offered nothing but old time political baloney slung by the very best baloney slingers the nation has to offer. The REAL public servants with the innovative ideas for public service exist ONLY in the political parties which haven’t been bought off...those are on Row ‘C and down in the voting machine. Citizen participation in the political process will continue to plummet as long as corporate puppets like the Debate Commission keep engineering ways to strangle political diversity in America. Hopelessness will increase as more and more folks realize that they can’t run for office without sucking up to the money mongers. We don’t want citizen disaffection with American citizenship. We want citizen affection with American citizenship. We want them to be in love with our country and their fellow citizens. The Debate Commission and their corporate sponsors are working toward an opposite goal. ..insuring that people who have money and power keep it, and that no new ideas or groups ever break into the power circle except with their prior consent. The FEC/Debate Commission purpose is to kill competition and restrict democracy through disenchantment and disinterest. It is working. The numbers prove it. See the article on the following pages. Should the Debate Commission wish to interest people and get viewers, simply add Buchanan and Nader to the mix the next time. Watch the numbers soar.... Tom Loughlin Jr. 315-735-7223 PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE RATINGS LOWEST EVER--NETWORK By Emma-Kate Symons NEW YORK (Reuters) - The first presidential debate between Al Gore and George W. Bush on Tuesday night may have drawn fewer Americans to their TV screens than at any time since Kennedy and Nixon kicked off the modern televised election campaign in 1960, a network executive said. Based on preliminary figures provided by Nielsen Media Research, an average of 35 million people watched Democrat candidate Gore debate the Republicans' Bush at any one time during the 90 minutes it lasted, according to CBS research executive David Poltrack. This compares with 46.1 million viewers for the first Clinton-Dole debate in 1996, which at that time was the lowest ever recorded for the crucial first tussle. The other two Gore-Bush debates are scheduled for the next two weeks. ``It would appear that this will be the lowest audience of any presidential debate,'' said Poltrack. ``It's fairly certain that the final number is going to come in below 46 million and probably the average audience is about 35 million.'' Nielsen will release final national ratings figures later Wednesday including West Coast viewers, PBS and CNN viewers, as well as those approximately one-third of NBC affiliates that screened the debate rather than baseball. Network executives and analysts said that one of the key reasons for the poor ratings was that for the first time two major networks, Fox and NBC, chose to screen sports and entertainment rather than the live debate. The audience for presidential debates has gradually declined since 1960, despite different methods for collecting ratings and the high audience for the 1992 Clinton-Bush-Perot debates, according to Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government. In 1960, the first debate garnered 66.4 million viewers. However, both CBS and ABC increased their share of ratings in the first debate of campaign 2000 compared with 1996, after NBC and Fox decided to screen sport and entertainment. In 1996 all the networks carried the first presidential debate. Fox's premiere of James Cameron's science-fiction thriller Dark Angel attracted an average 17 million viewers, based on preliminary ratings provided by Nielsen, Poltrack said. No official ratings for NBC's American League baseball playoff between the New York Yankees and Oakland Athletics were immediately available, but Poltrack estimated between 7 and 8 million viewers chose sport over the first presidential debate. He said preliminary figures, including the 48 top TV markets, showed ABC's debate coverage attracted about 18.5 million viewers, to CBS's 12.7 million. Reuters/Variety REUTERS