Richmond can still host a 2008 Presidential Debate
The news came yesterday that Richmond was not selected as one of the sites for a Presidential / Vice Presidential Debate in Fall 2008. It's certainly too bad given the potential it had for bringing attention to Richmond, but as EDC President Jim Dinkle has been saying, just the unity and positive image we presented in bidding for the debate was itself a great achievement, and one we can build on in the future.
Of course, we still CAN have a Presidential / Vice Presidential Debate here in the Fall of 2008, and one that gets national media attention. The Commission on Presidential Debates that turned us down is a private corporation that represents the Democratic and Republican parties, and that works to explicitly exclude other political parties from the debate process. While the practice of third-party exclusion is largely accepted in mainstream politics, it is certainly counter to the very notion of a true democratic process, as I discussed in an RNR podcast episode about Richmond's bid.
So, now that we've shown we have the resources and interest in hosting a presidential debate, we can make an additional contribution to the political process by joining the Open Debates movement and petitioning the Citizen's Debate Commission to host a debate in Richmond. Not only will we get national media attention and Presidential Candidates taking the stage at Civic Hall, we'll also be helping to work for an important change in the election process - a debate that actually serves the interests of the American people first.
(Full disclosure: I participated in the Debate Bid Steering Committee as an adviser on matters related to telecommunications infrastructure and marketing.)
(No Ratings Yet)
Loading ...
Related Posts
If you thought that was interesting, you might also enjoy these related posts:
Chris, I appreciate your civic enthusiasm shown by participation in the steering committee. Having written that, I have to challenge the notion that bringing a spotlight to the city of Richmond will, apparently of and by itself, be of any lasting, meaningful benefit to most of the area's residents.
Danville, Kentucky's experience has proven to be, at best, a short-lived shot in the arm for it's local college's self-esteem. Economically, besides a fleeting moment of service industry boom, almost entirely in Lexington where most visitors stayed, ate and shopped, no one has been able to make the connection that the debate ever became high on the list of business owner's criteria for establishing a facility.
As for Centre College's desire for external approval via media attention, I suspect that they've learned what many young, insecure college students have felt the morning after sleeping around in hopes of better acceptance. This is a lesson, I would suggest, for Richmond to keep in mind.
In addition to not having spent the $2,000,000 of locally generated funds needed BEFORE the debate even came to Richmond, we should all breathe a sigh of relief that we were not chosen. It is unlikely that the recent, and well-deserved, labeling of our local high school as a "dropout factory" will have produced much change. Our workforce will be no more literate, our Whitewater River no less polluted. The bullet we just dodged was exposing Richmond to the world as a snapshot by which we'd not like to be remembered.