Hill Shill Debate Fraud

The most striking performance during the November 15 Democratic Presidential debate was not given by any of the candidates. Audience participation was the dominant factor, and it was heavily tilted in Hillary Clinton's favor.

I'm a political independent, so I don't have a dog in this fight. But what happened in Las Vegas last week was downright un-American. The oratorical playing field was heavily skewed in the front-runner's favor, leaving several candidates with little face time.

The debate, moderated by CNN's Wolf Blitzer, was held at the University of Las Vegas. The seven candidates were introduced in the following order: Senator John Edwards; Senator Chris Dodd; Senator Barack Obama; Senator Hillary Clinton; Congressman Dennis Kucinich; New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson; and Senator Joe Biden. Hillary got the loudest applause during the introduction.

In fairness, Obama and Edwards badly fumbled several answers. The debate ran two hours, and during most of it, all the candidates presented themselves competently. But in a few five- or ten-second sound bites, Obama and Edwards performed poorly, and those excerpts, which were repeatedly played in news reports, are the ones people will remember. The entire debate can be downloaded at http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/11/16/nv.debate.video/index.html .

Obama inexplicably stepped in the same quicksand as did Hillary a couple of weeks ago: he equivocated on whether illegal aliens should receive driver's licenses. Senator Obama should be held accountable for his evasiveness, but the audience reaction was unacceptable. For several seconds, Senator Obama was shouted down with heckling, hoots, and catcalls. Obama suffered this fate several other times during the evening, especially when he made the valid point that his proposal to lift the cap on income subject to Social Security tax would affect a small percentage of Americans.