Open Debates 2016

[ZakCarter]

In light of statements such as “The Commission on Presidential Debates perpetuates a fraud on the American voter”, Free and Equal Elections Foundation hosted the 2012 “3rd Party” Presidential debates that were moderated by Larry King and Thom Hartmann and viewed by an estimated 20 million people. A number of us who worked with Free & Equal then (I was their communications director) have even bigger plans moving forward. We believe that with laying the groundwork down now, we can create debates that are viewed by far more than 20 million people and really help restore honest presidential debates in America.


Our 4 point plan to restore open and honest debates in 2016 and let alternative voices and ideas be heard can be found at http://opendebates2016.com/


The media project I'm working with now - http://benswann.com/ - is with an eye on creating relationships with people in other organizations and media outlets that will potentially help with the 2016 plan. (I'm Ben's pr director)


We are currently looking for organizations, companies, and media outlets would be interested in joining a coalition to help make these debates as big a success as possible, and if you know anyone who might consider joining with - http://ivn.us/ - http://www.saveamericafoundation.com - http://www.watchingamerica.com/News/ - http://www.endpartisanship.com/ - some of the coalition already aboard, feel very free to pass this along. I think we can really shake things up!


In Liberty, Zak Carter
zakcarter@benswann.com
206-551-8704

[eduardo89]

I hope the Libertarian Party is perpetually barred from presidential debates.

[TaftFan]

I do have to say I am skeptical that 20 million saw that 3rd party debate. I actually quit watching because it was so boring.

[cajuncocoa]

I hope the Libertarian Party is perpetually barred from presidential debates.
Threatened much?

[eduardo89]

Threatened much?

Hahahahahahahahahaha. Good one.

[RonZeplin]

The D&R party should only be allowed one candidate, so they'll have to choose between Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush.

[ZakCarter]

"I do have to say I am skeptical that 20 million saw that 3rd party debate."

They were broadcast by RT, Al Jazeera, CSPAN, Free Speech TV, Link TV, and Ora TV and live streamed by a number of well trafficked sites. Enough people watched them that they were trending in the top 10 on twitter, Jimmy Kimmel made fun of us, Lawrence O'Donnell on MSNBC spent time on his show to say that even if you didn't think the candidates on our stages should ever win the presidency, the ideas they were talking about deserved to be heard on a national stage, and they spent about 5 minutes talking about our debates on the MSM Sunday shows. I didn't just pull the 20 million number out of a hat...

[eduardo89]

"I do have to say I am skeptical that 20 million saw that 3rd party debate."

They were broadcast by RT, Al Jazeera, CSPAN, Free Speech TV, Link TV, and Ora TV and live streamed by a number of well trafficked sites. Enough people watched them that they were trending in the top 10 on twitter, Jimmy Kimmel made fun of us, Lawrence O'Donnell on MSNBC spent time on his show to say that even if you didn't think the candidates on our stages should ever win the presidency, the ideas they were talking about deserved to be heard on a national stage, and they spent about 5 minutes talking about our debates on the MSM Sunday shows. I didn't just pull the 20 million number out of a hat...

The combined daily audience of those channels you listed probably doesn't even surpass the 1 million mark.

[Natural Citizen]

The combined daily audience of those channels you listed probably doesn't even surpass the 1 million mark.

Oh, I wouldn't go thinking that, Eduardo. Not for one second. Heck, RT's youtube alone is over a billion hits. Well over. Establishment media caters to a very small and diminishing demographic who remain content to run with the hurry up and get elected gag where toasting super big gulps are the issue of the day. And I dare say one that is ignoring the fact that they are greatly outnumbered by an increasing and geo-politically informed demographic. I've said before that during the next cycle we'll see a turnout like never before. And I'll tell you this much too...they'll be questioning a little more than the corporate news crowd. The we ask, you decide narrative we see from establishment theater won't necessarily dictate the terms of controversy as some in the business of getting elected would want it to be or paint it to be out the wild west we call the www, to be clear. A storm is coming, Eduardo. Oh, yes...rubber duckie you're the one.

[eduardo89]

Oh, I wouldn't go thinking that, Eduardo. Not for one second. Heck, RT's youtube alone is over a billion hits. Well over. Establishment media caters to a very small and diminishing demographic who remain content to run with the hurry up and get elected gag where toasting super big gulps are the issue of the day. And I dare say one that is ignoring the fact that they are greatly outnumbered by an increasing and geo-politically informed demographic. I've said before that during the next cycle we'll see a turnout like never before. And I'll tell you this much too...they'll be questioning a little more than the corporate news crowd. The we ask, you decide narrative we see from establishment theater won't necessarily dictate the terms of controversy as some in the business of getting elected would want it to be or paint it to be out the wild west we call the www, to be clear. A storm is coming, Eduardo. Oh, yes...rubber duckie you're the one.

Fox News' highest rated shows pull in around 2 million views and they are by far the most watched cable news shows in America. The competitors don't even pull in 1 million (CNN and MSNBC), RT's ratings are nowhere near even MSNBC's ratings. Anderson Cooper gets about 500,000 viewers per night, Maddow gets just under a million and those are huge shows.

No RT show is in the top 50 cable news shows in America.

[phill4paul]

How many football teams in the NFL? How many baseball teams in the MLB?

Let's make politics a sport. It's all bread and circus anyway.

[MichaelDavis]

How many football teams in the NFL? How many baseball teams in the MLB?

Let's make politics a sport. It's all bread and circus anyway.

Do you want something similar to Louisiana's Jungle Primary system?

[ZakCarter]

The number was an estimated global audience - RT and Al Jazeera have very large international audiences. (Example... in the U.K., RT is the 3rd most watched news station) And thanks to the more than 50 U.S. sponsors we had that were spreading the word beforehand, a number of the networks broadcasting the debates were setting viewership records.


A huge thank you to Governor Buddy Roemer and https://www.facebook.com/TheReformProject for joining our 2016 coalition today!

[eduardo89]

RT and Al Jazeera have very large international audiences.

RT and Al Jazeera's broadcasts outside the US are completely different from their US broadcasts.


(Example... in the U.K., RT is the 3rd most watched news station)

That's actually not true.

Average daily reach for the week of January 20th - 26th 2014
http://www.barb.co.uk/viewing/weekly-total-viewing-summary?_s=4

BBC News 3.3 million daily viewers
Sky News 1.9 million daily viewers
AlJazeera English 270,000 daily viewers
BBC Parliament 134,000 daily viewers
ARY News 130,000 daily viewers
ABP News 115,000 daily viewers
Geo News 108,000 daily viewers
RT 107,000 daily viewers

Source: Broadcasting Audience Research Board
http://www.barb.co.uk

[ZakCarter]

Rather than spend time arguing over the number of people who watched the debates in 2012 (and the numbers didn't come from me) I'd rather get feedback from people on how to increase the number of people watching them in 2016... (although I did read something recently that had RT at 3rd in the UK)

We added our resident liberal to the core team this week (Jacob Dean, Thom Hartmann's former associate producer) and now have over 60 organizations, companies and media producers in our coalition - already more than we had in 2012!

[The Rebel Poet]

My idea would be to have some advertising that doesn't play up its being a multi-partisan debate. Just say it's the next presidential debate. I know a lot of people would like to see a more fair debate, but think about how many other people there are who think anything that isn't red team/blue team isn't legit. Then you invite the R and D nominees too and if/when they don't show, make a big deal about how they were invited, but didn't want to debate.

In other words, don't pitch it as a rump debate; pitch it as a normal debate.This is the best way to get more sheeple to pay some attention. Then you can just say Jeb and Hillary couldn't make it, but we have 70% participation. Make the Republicrats look like outsiders, instead of painting us us as outsiders.

[Peace&Freedom]

The problem remains one of the R team and the D team don't want to face the real or fundamental questions and follow-up that the other candidates will challenge them with. They also don't want to "elevate" the "non-mainstream" contenders by having an even-handed confrontation with them.

As we all recall, Ron Paul's exchange with Rudy Giuliani at the 2007 SC debate catapaulted his visibility and grassroots momentum, while seemingly destroying Rudy's campaign. In subsequent debates in '07-08 and then in the '11-12, the mainstream kept trying to pair up Paul in scuffles against "second tier" contenders (Huckabee, Keyes, Bachmann, Santorum, Huntsman), in order to protect the main selected frontrunners from repeating Rudy's mistake.

That's the real purpose of the debate exclusion or marginalizing. It's not to keep out the riff-raff---it's to keep IN the riff-raff, who would otherwise be wiped the floor with by the higher-quality alternative candidates.

[albertstyles]

Why?

[compromise]

How many football teams in the NFL? How many baseball teams in the MLB?

Let's make politics a sport. It's all bread and circus anyway.

Only the top 2 teams make the final.