Topic 72 WASH. POST COL.: Don't Exclude Agra 1 response harelb elec.democracy 9:36 pm Jan 28, 1992 (at math.cornell.edu) From: harelb@math.cornell.edu (Harel Barzilai) Subject: WASH. POST COL.: Don't Exclude Agran from Pres. Debates. Subject: WASH. POST COL.: Don't Exclude Agran from Pres. Debates. >>TELEPHONE NUMBERS TO CALL MACNEIL/LEHERE BY FRI. INCLUDED AT BOTTOM<< "After [Sen.] Rockefeller mouthed some platitudes on the importance of the discussion, Agran rose from the center of the hall to demand that he be allowed a place on the platform. Rockefeller called on security to oust this disturber of New Hampshire's peace. "But the crowd, more enlightened in the ways of free speech than Rockefeller the patrician, protested that Agran had a right to be heard. By popular demand, he went up to take his seat [...]" - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - This article was released for publication on January 28, 1992, by syndicated columnist Colman McCarthy of the Washington Post. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - WASHINGTON -- It looks prim and polite, five Democrats in New Hampshire running for president and coming together for high-minded debates. Tom Brokaw handled the first, Cokie Roberts the second. News pros were matched to political pros. The public was to be well-served. It wasn't. The public is being manipulated by television executives and Democratic Party officials. Whether by coincidence or conspiracy, they have relegated Larry Agran, Lenora Fulani and Gene McCarthy -- to take only three candidates -- to the outer circles of attention while reserving the inner circle for Jerry Brown, Bill Clinton, Tom Harkin, Bob Kerrey and Paul Tsongas. The argument is that the anointed five are major candidates with current or past service in the Senate or statehouse while the unanointed others are irrelevant never-was-beens. Applied to Larry Agran, this dismissal not only ignores his record as the progressive mayor of Irvine, Calif., but it mocks the ethic that the electorate deserves as wide a selection of options as possible. [Note: I also posted a NH poll showing Agran just ahead of Brown a few days ago --HB] Agran is not in New Hampshire on a lark, nor is his candidacy a caper. That was proven in the one televised debate he did manage to get onstage, although for a moment it looked as if he were headed for jail. That was in Nashua in December when Sen. Jay Rockefeller presided over a discussion of health care. After Rockefeller mouthed some platitudes on the importance of the discussion, Agran rose from the center of the hall to demand that he be allowed a place on the platform. Rockefeller called on security to oust this disturber of New Hampshire's peace. But the crowd, more enlightened in the ways of free speech than Rockefeller the patrician, protested that Agran had a right to be heard. By popular demand, he went up to take his seat -- near a squirming Rockefeller, it turned out -- and so did Lenora Fulani, the two of them joining Gene McCarthy and the big fellas. Agran more than held his own. The sky didn't fall and the oceans didn't rise. Instead of the New Hampshire primary being a Democrats' free-for- all, it has been a free-for-some. To their discredit, the some -- the Favored Five -- have lacked the broadness of spirit to protest that Agran should be allowed to debate among them. Their model for narrow- mindedness is Chris Spirou, the New Hampshire Democratic Party chairman whose idea of full intellectual exchange occurred in November at a state convention. He shut off Agran's microphone because he was a "minor" candidate. What's minor about being on the ballot in 27 states -- with 23 pending -- and raising $200,000 in 37 states and none of it PAC money? What's minor about having repeatedly won elections for 12 years as a liberal Democrat in conservative Republican Orange County, California? One reason Agran, an honors graduate from Harvard Law, is a major candidate is that he is breaking in a major way from the tepid reforms called for by conventional Democrats. Cut the military budget by half, he has proposed. That isn't a wild notion -- $150 billion for the Pentagon is still plenty, with a few billion thrown in for fraud and waste so as to allow defense contractors a gradual and more merciful withdrawal from their addictions. Agran isn't a tame-the-Pentagon Democrat because he reads The Progressive or The Nation too much. It's worse than that. He's been a mayor, the one political job in America that sees the devestations to families, schools and neighborhoods caused by squandering our wealth for military adventurism and defense fantasies. Mayors, much more than senators or governors, see the mounting human pain caused by the pro- military money hemorrhage of the past three decades. Why, Agran is asking, "must the average American family be taxed $2,000 a year to pick up the tab for European and Japanese security? Isn't it time for the Europeans and the Japanese to pay ALL the costs -- whatever they are -- to defend their own citizens?....Meanwhile, our government should get on with the business of defending the interests of American citizens in Seattle and Birmingham, in Manchester and New York...." Agran represents the voice of local government. Maybe he is qualified for the presidency, maybe not, which can also be said of the others now in New Hampshire. His experience has been traditionally Democratic -- in city hall delivering the services. His popularity in Nixon-Reagan country suggests his deliveries have been efficient. Agran's own party refuses to hear him, with much of the media plugging their ears also. The next televised debate is Jan. 31, with candidates invited by producers of the PBS "MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour." Agran hasn't been invited, even though last September a senior producer wrote an admiring letter to tell him that, following a Roger Mudd interview in August, the program took pride in "not being 'gatekeepers' deciding who was a 'legitimate candidate' and who was not." If they took pride then, they should be ashamed now. Among the bosses -- party and news -- it has been decided arbitrarily that Agran is a loser. The larger loss is the public's. (c) 1992, Washington Post Writers Group - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Action: Please call MacNeil/Lehrer to insist Agran be included in this Friday's televised debate! Robin MacNeil Dan Werner, Assoc. Exec. Producer The MacNeil/Lehrer Newshour The MacNeil/Lehrer Newshour 356 W. 58th Street 3620 S. 27th Street New York, NY 10019 Arlington, VA 22206 (212) 560-3113 (703) 998-2870 Conf? Topic 72 WASH. POST COL.: Don't Exclude Agra Response 1 of 1 harelb elec.democracy 9:47 pm Jan 28, 1992 Note that Agran was ahead of Brown in both the first poll I posted: 62*NH Poll: Agran ahead of Brown; Bush harelb and the second 71 LATEST NH POLL: Agran & Tsongas Gai harelb with Agran starting to get close to Harkin in the second. see see 59*Agran and the UnDemocratic Party 1 harelb for more about the Democrats' (and Chris Spirou's) antics; see the Agran _Fact Sheet_ for a summary of Agran's plan, and the comprehensive Announcement (of candidacy_ Speech for the details (search for the word "first" with your editor twice; once for a listing of Agran's very specific plans for cutting the military; and the second time for Agran's list of specifics about how he'd re-direct how much of the resultant savings where. And please call (and fax, too, but don't rely on that as previously faxes where bouncing as they'd apparently turned their machine off) MacNeil/Lehrer ASAP! Harel Conf?