Weapons Maker General Electric Rewrites Criteria to Exclude Kucinich from Debate

Military Industrial Complex and Mainstream Corporate Media are one, and they have decided who we Americans will "select" for the next President.

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"Weapons Maker General Electric Rewrites Criteria to Exclude Kucinich from Debate
Submitted by davidswanson on Fri, 2008-01-11 19:11. Elections | Media
DETROIT, MI - Less than 44 hours after NBC sent a congratulatory note and
an invitation to Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich to participate in the
Jan. 15 Democratic Presidential debate in Las Vegas, the network notified
the campaign this morning it was changing its announced criteria,
rescinding its invitation, and excluding Kucinich from the debate.

NBC Political Director Chuck Todd notified the Kucinich campaign this
morning that, although Kucinich had met the qualification criteria
publicly announced on December 28, the network was "re-doing" the
criteria, excluding Kucinich, and planning to invite only Senators Hillary
Clinton and Barack Obama and former senator John Edwards.

The criteria announced last month included a fourth-place or better
showing in a national poll. The USA/Gallup poll earlier this month showed
Kucinich in fourth place among the Democratic contenders.
In an email to the Kucinich campaign at 2:35 p.m. on Wednesday, January 9,
Democratic Party debates consultant Jenny Backus wrote:

"Congratulations on another hard-fought contest. Now that New Hampshire is
over, we are on to Nevada and our Presidential Debate on Tuesday January
15. This letter serves as an official invitation for your candidate to
participate in the Nevada Presidential Debate at Cashman Theatre in
downtown Las Vegas. You have met the criteria set by NBC and the Debate."
Todd notified the Kucinich campaign this morning that the network had
decided to change the criteria and limit participation in the debate to
only three candidates.

Kucinich is the only remaining Democratic Presidential candidate who:
voted against the original Iraq War authorization in 2002 and every
war-funding measure since; voted against the so-called Patriot Act;
advocates a national, not-for-profit health system that covers all
Americans; has called for the repeal of NAFTA and withdrawal from the WTO;
and proposes a national back-to-work program (Works Green Administration)
patterned after the Depression-era Works Progress Administration (WPA).
The Kucinich campaign, which filed an emergency complaint with the Federal
Communications Commission last week because of ABC's decision to exclude
the candidate from a nationally televised debate, is considering legal
action to address "the blatant disregard of the public interest in
silencing public debate that dissents with the views of NBC, its parent
company, GE, and all of the military contractors and their
candidate-funding corporate interests. Corporate control of the media is
one issue. Corporate media control of the information that is allowed to
reach American citizens is much more dangerous, much more sinister, and
much more un-American."

"When 'big media' exert their unbridled control over what Americans can
see, hear, and read, then the Constitutional power and right of the
citizens to vote is being vetoed by multi-billion corporations that want
the votes to go their way," the Kucinich campaign said."