They need to drop Ron Paul next.

You wish, Phil. Dr. Paul is not going away. We, his supporters, are tireless and vocal. Just ask anyone who tries to exclude our candidate like Saul Anuzis tried back in May. We have only grown in number and passion since then, and much harder to silence. Good day.

Phil A, Florida:

Ron Paul is the only voice of reason among the republicans.

Please explain why "they need to drop Ron Paul next"

I will cross party line to vote for after seeing him in the last debate.

Ron Paul does need to be dropped. The only people listening to him are his supporters which are about 1% of the Republican voters. They hype him up on the internet because that is the only place that his supporters can make it seem as though he is mainstream. This guy is an idiot. The only reason he calls himself Republican is so he will be elected in Lake Jackson. If your not from Texas in this area, you really dont know him and that includes his internet supporters. You guys don't know jack about Paul.

The only polls that count are the polls on electon day. Using money as a criterion for selecting who will attend the debates is unjust and unfair. Gravel has been to all of the debates thus far, and shouldn't be excluded.

Who are you to decide? You are not 300 million Americans.

Invite Gravel.

This goes to show you that only the very rich can run for president.  MSNBC playing god with freedom of speech?  Hope this wasn't a deal maker between John Edwards and Hillary Clinton.  Who's next; Obama?

Ron Paul did not bring his "A" game last night to the GOP debate, maybe he just had an off night.

Will you Ron Paul spammers please talk to the issue of the attempt to exclude Mike Gravel from the debate! Or is it a case of "First they came for Mike Gravel, but I was not Mike Gravel so I said nothing..."

Stop and think. This is clearly a case of the media extorting money from candidates for coverage. If you haven't the money or inclination to pony up for air-time, for that's what all those millions are used for, then the media will kneecap you.

From the 'top-tier' candidates, it's "pay-to-play"... that's bribery.

Two of the 'top-tier' Democrats were caught on tape colluding to exclude Mike, and now here's NBC conspiring to make it happen.

This is what's termed a pattern of racketeering by the RICO Act.

Clearly NBC/MSNBC, the 'top-tier' candidates, and the DNC are open to prosecution under RICO for their pattern of racketeering activity.

I hope that NBC/MSNBC comes back to their senses and allows us all to spend our time listening to all the candidates speak at the "debate" rather than following their prosecution as racketeers.

Let the people speak, invite Gravel!  He's the only candidate thus far who has the integrity to speak the truth, the guts to do it, and the experience to lead  and fix this mess our country is in.  He fixed Nixon's screw ups, he can fix Bush's, too.  
Who do you think you are deciding who we can or can't listen to and choose as our future President?  ALL candidates should be able to speak for the SAME amount of time.
Gravel is for the people, not big business and special interest groups.  You may silence Gravel, but you can't silence the people!  In the long run, who do you think will preservere?  The PEOPLE!
Let Gravel speak!

It's about time Gravel is dropped. He's funny, in an inappropriate way. But this is far too important. Now if MSNBC, could actually try to give each of the candidates on stage equal time, that would be great!!!!!!!!!

Mike Gravel is the only honest democrat in the field of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs......

Him being dropped from the debates shows that the liberals have no idea what the truth is....

I am absolutely stunned that people are O.K. with the media choosing who they can and can't listen to at the debates!  This election is crucial in the direction that our country takes.  Why on earth is anyone happy with the fact that ANY candidate is being silenced??  People seem to have become so lax and are apparently so hoodwinked by the media that they are O.K. letting the media choose which candidates they can and can't choose from.  
If people believe about a candidate only that which the media wants them to believe then the state of our country is worse than I ever imagined!  We need to hear what EVERY candidate has to say and for each to speak with EQUAL time!

"The standards we used included measuring the amount of time the senator spent campaigning, as well as poll standing and financial resources."

Translation: Our standards are based on how much money the candidate will spend advertising themselves with us.

It is clear from earlier debates that Gravel got no speaking time from MSNBC. You can say all you want about giving him a chance, but it is a lie.

Many studies showed a direct correlation between money raised and speaking time on MSNBC.

jerry, that was big of you to defend a Democratic candidate.

Mr. Todd and Mr. Murray,

Your stated reasons for excluding Mike Gravel from the debate do not hold up under closer examination. First of all, Gravel has been on the campaign trail every day for some time now. His polling numbers are the same or better than Chris Dodd, who you continue to include in your debates. This indicates that financial resources are the main criterion you are using to exclude candidates for your debates. I assume that you are only looking at total funds raised and ignoring the fact that many of the candidates have received most of their donations in dollars from special interests, namely lobbyists and corporations. Mike Gravel does NOT accept money from lobbyists, big business or PACs, so naturally he would have less money than other candidates. Is taking a principled stand for fair campaign financing at odds with being part of the national debate about the future of this country? Excluding Mike Gravel from your debates I think speaks for itself regarding your views on that issue.

Ahhh....so the media admit it's all about THE MONEY!!   HOLY BOWDLERIZATION BATMAN...and all this time I thought we lived in a democracy - WOW - was I ever wrong and thank you NBC for pointing that out to me!!!!  

The real reason Gravel was not invited was because the DNC did not like him challenging Hilary and exposing her lies. This all goes back to corporations like NBC and money.

well, Nuanced:

After all, when you have Hillary Clinton in your field, you need someone with some kind of honesty....

Seems to be a bit lacking in the current field of democrats....

Please let Mike Gravel debate...Like you said Mr. Murray, there's only 73 days left, why cut him out now?  You allow him to debate the entire process and now all of the sudden when it's crunch time you decide to cut him out?  Makes no sense...Isn't it better for America and the world to hear as many voices and opinions as possible when making a decision?  You and I both know it is.  Please be fair, do the right thing and invite this great American hero.  

MSNBC, I was one of those people who sent in letters, and surely you'll forgive me for not wanting the media to thin out the field of candidates for me before a single democratic vote is even cast. You say that there are 135 candidates on the Democratic side alone, but you have only let eight of them into the debates up to this point. That includes Mike Gravel, so I really wouldn't include him with the other 127 candidates who haven't managed to make it to the debates.

The fact of the matter is that Gravel is a completely valid candidate (he has been at all debates up to this point, he recently met the requirements for Matching Funds, and he is a Former Senator), who should be at this debate. I'm confused as to why he is not invited, while Chris Dodd and Dennis Kucinich are. Dodd's and Kucinich's poll numbers are not significantly more than Mike Gravel's, and they, like Mike Gravel, have little chance of being elected. Why not keep Dennis Kucinich and Chris Dodd out of the debate as well?

Senator Gravel has more Senate experience than Hillary or Obama.  Senator Gravel is the only candidate with actual military experience.  Senator Gravel's accomplishments are more relevant than anyone else running:  He helped end the Vietnam war, tore the lid off of government secrecy, won a supreme court battle defending congress' rights vs the executive branch, and he even ended the draft.

What the heck have Hillary or Obama accomplished that even qualify them for the job?  Seriously, someone reply and contrast their accomplishments with Gravel's.  I DARE YOU!

It is clear this is all about money.

It's a tough job weeding out everyone who's brave enough to say what the majority of the American people already know is true. We depend on shills such as NBC to set the stage so when election day comes around the American people will always have to choose between the lesser of the two evils that corporate America has picked for them.

This is bunk. Gravel's fundraising has been surging the last month. So what does he have to raise to earn  his way in. His funds are only going up.
Also he's done enough for the country to belong just on prestige, he's not like 150 other nonames. He's played an important role in U.S. history. He also happens to be the only candidate willing to call the others out, which is probably the real reason he's getting banned. He also is calling for a new 9/11 investigation and willing to talk about it. Too testy for weak mainstream candidates. Blegh. If they think they are going to get away with this they have another thing coming.

Hell, I might give Gravel $100.....

And I don't approve of giving either party money!

I'll give him $100.00 I like to hear him make a fool of himself. Besides Kucinich and pretty ricky edwards, he is funny as hell. When I watch Dem debates, we dont even get mad, we just laugh our ass off. All are very goofy.

Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, the author of this load is not able to be contacted by email.  I would like some clarifications on this, if possible.  


1.  Is there an available list of these 135 candidates you speak of?
2.  What exactly are your "minimum standards", and is there a list of how these 135 candidates meet or don't meet these standards?
3.  Who are the "leaders and activists from both parties" that believe your requirements (whatever they are) are "very fair"  Are there any "leaders and activists" who disagree on the fairness of your requirements?
4.  When using the standard of "financial resources", does NBC news make any distinction between personal donations and corporate donations?


And just a comment.  "no network     has given Gravel more of an opportunity to get his message across than NBC and its affiliates"  Giving Gravel 6 minutes of coverage, when the other networks only gave him 5, just makes you the white spot on top of the chicken poo.  Not much to be proud of.


I was just watching MSNBC, and they were talking about the issue of the Congress declaring the armed forces of Iran as a terrorist group, which was first brought up in the media by none other than Mike Gravel.  Please give him some credit.

Despite his lack of funding and limited air time, Mike Gravel has had a strong presence in the debates, especially on issues pertaining to the war in Iraq.  At the last debate at Dartmouth, he brought public attention to Hillary Clinton's vote on a resolution declaring the Iran Revolution Guard a terrorist organization.  In my opinion, this was one of the most memorable moments of the debate and this issue resurfaced in news reports as Obama and Edwards followed suit in their criticism of Clinton's vote.  As a person speaking out against the occupation of Iraq, Mike Gravel should be respected for his role in ending the Vietnam War.  In his release of the Pentagon Papers, he set a precedent allowing future senators to declassify documents deemed important for the public's knowledge.  The senators who are running against him today have more money and more time to speak, yet hardly demonstrate a fraction of his courage and integrity in these times of crisis.  All I see are games of political survival while people die in Iraq and nothing substantive is done to address the true problems undermining our society.

The really sad thing is that there is a lot more to Mike Gravel as a candidate than speaking out against the war, but corporate media portrays him as a one-dimensional novelty candidate who has little else to say.  His proposed National Initiative for Democracy addresses a serious problem of corruption in our broken political system, yet his ideas are never seriously discussed among the other candidates in the debates.  Too many people who watch the debates are unaware that Mike Gravel is a candidate who stands for empowering the people and introducing transparency in our government’s policies.  His message of “Citizen Power” is a powerful one that has the potential to awaken the masses from apathy and cynicism towards our government.  Unfortunately, the harsh time constraints placed on him during the debates do not allow him to express his vision for the future of America.  As a viewer of the debates, this is especially frustrating to watch when a current do-nothing senator is given more than ten minutes of extra air time, yet twice refuses to answer fundamental questions of foreign policy.  

We live in very strange times now.  Mark Murray, to say that NBC’s treatment of Mike Gravel is “very fair” is an absurdity approaching a level to that of the Newspeak in George Orwell’s 1984.  As a young person, I am not yet brainwashed enough to accept your authoritarian declarations of fairness.  The debates will not be fair until you give all candidates equal time to answer the same questions.  This was done in the Univision debates; why cannot NBC do the same?  Mike Gravel has been an active participant in the presidential DNC debates this year and to impose these arbitrary requirements at the last moment is a heinous form of censorship that contradicts the ideals our country was founded upon.

Why do people not have the maturity to handle Gravel?  Thus far, his main criticizers are those laughing at his "cantankerous" attitude and his failure to gain support.

He speaks his mind.  You can tell that he's a sociable person, and has not been jaded by the modern pseudo-politics of today.  And now he's being excluded, because in a democratic country, you need lots of money to win an election?

It's just not right.  NBC couldn't be lying more by saying that they have given him opportunity-- at every debate so far, they have given him about 5 minutes of speaking time (and when he speaks, they cut him off).

I guess the truth is too hard to handle.

Let Gravel Debate.  i can personally guarantee you that you will lose thousands of people. Dont make this mistake.  LET GRAVEL DEBATE AND DON'T CENSOR HIM.

Dear NBC,

Your actions of recent have confirmed that you are an active player and tool in the corporatocracy of America.  The reasons you provide for not inviting Senator Gravel are weak and unfair.  Gravel has been very active on the campaign trail--working relentlessly to get his word out, and trying to make up for the time he never got in the NBC and other debates (is it fair that Obama gets 16 minutes to speak and Gravel gets less than 5??).

It is clear from the recent footage of John Edwards and HIllary Clinton that you are a mere pawn in the corrupt game of U.S. politics.  Maybe one day the American people will wake up from the dream and set out to fix this problem.  Corporate America cannot last--democracy must be saved.  Spread the word.

I suspect the reason that Gravel, who has filed for FEC Matching funds (the traditional measure of viability) is being excluded by MSNBC is not his poor poll standings (which are virtually identical to Kuchinich, Dodd and Biden when the margin of error is considered).

The real reason MSNBC is excluding Gravel is that its parent General Electric is worried about the effect of his antiwar position on its profits from Department of Defense contracts. Gravel in the last debate outlined the way the Democrats could end the war if they want to end the war.

That is censorship at its best!

I am mad as hell and I am not taking it anymore.  I will not watch the debate and will skip "Hardball" for a while.

A mainstream news network censoring an elder statesman who has devoted his life to both public office and military service is inimical to the tenets of good journalism and democracy.
Me thinks Chuck Todd and Tim Russert are in dire need of a high school civics class brush up.

Your space for his message has always been shameful. Trying to tout your covering Gravel is either insult or ignorance. How many links of his campaign do you have?
Your trying to silence a viable candidate stems from personal interests.

http://www.pollingreport.com/wh08dem.htm

According to most recent polls, Kucinich, Dodd, and Biden have the SAME amount of support. Why aren't they being excluded?

MSNBC is not operating in the public interest when they filter candidates on the basis of money. This is an elitist, hierarchical, totalitarian concept and violates the principles of an open, free, and democratic society. MSNBC must reverse this censorship. Part of MSNBC's arbitrary, selective criteria is also a lie to begin with, as Sen. Mike Gravel has indeed spent more than 14 days in New Hamspire. And the very idea that money should triumph over equal representation makes a mockery of the United States in the eyes of the entire rest of the World. The rest of the World looks at the United States and scoffs at our endless hypocrisy, our dishonesty, and our total corruption of the very heart of what democracy means. Sen. Mike Gravel has, in fact, distinguished himself during the Vietnam-era, and is too important a voice to censor now with our Country on the road to bankruptcy and further human tragedy. MSNBC must reverse this disgraceful decision.

These "minimum standards" were specifically developed to exclude Senator Gravel from the debates.  I wonder why?  The debate hosts never asked him questions anyway, so what's the harm in having him there?  Oh, I forgot, when he has a chance to speak he tells the truth about the war, the political parties, and the media.  Can't have that, can we Chuck?

I am ashamed that our country has been deduced to the MEDIA deciding who we vote for.  Because he is impassioned, honest, and stands up for himself and his beliefs, YOU have excluded him from this debate - thereby giving him less airtime, less publicity, and maybe his "1%" can go to Hillary or Obamba.  Thats obviously what everyone wants, right?  You might as well just not let ANY other candidates in the debate.  Seriously, they just get in the way.

MSNBC/Chuck Todd, you are worthless tools of the man.  The only question here is whether anyone ever actually colluded or if it is just as usual, the gaint machine of our society continuing to mute any real debate so that we can remain asleep and unaware of how corrupt things have become until we get in an even bigger war and/or collapse our economy.
I could care less if he gets riled up in debates.  Only a fool would think that was the real dishonor when half the lot of them are soaked in actual dishonesty.

Without Gravel in the debate there is no debate just drivel. Gravel makes the debate exciting and worthwile.  Without Gravel there is no point of listening to the debates because all the other candidates are so bland, boring, and evasive on all subjects, and besides they look so fake and artificial. You do not need to be a rocket scientist to figure that out. But maybe this is the reality that the masses can not figure out because they also are so boring and sujected to artifical and fake lifestyles and philosophies.  

MSNBC is eliminating the ONLY MAN who has challenged establishment Democrats, head-on.

Mike Gravel is one the most popular Democratic candidates on YouTube. His clips get more hits than other lame candidates like Kucinich and Dodd.

Sure, MSNBC will let Senator Gravel speak...when NO ONE IS WATCHING. So they can give Gravel a few early debates.

But they'll BAN him WHEN IT MATTERS. People pay more attention when it's closer to election time.

So much for giving American democracy.
So much for giving American voters a choice.

Your standards are completely artificial. They were designed specifically to keep Gravel out. Let Gravel speak!

SHAME ON YOU!  let mike gravel debate. he is the only one willing to stand up to this kind of dirty politics.

These kind of dirty decisions are the very thing that is killing America.
shame
shame
shame
shame
shame
shame
on you.

If the posts on your own web site do not convince you, perhaps you should ask your viewers on-air how they feel about the importance of forcing Gravel out.  Ask Ralph Nader, Kucinich, or Paul.  Be fair & thanks for this post*

The media are starting to control the race for '08. I thought this country is a DEMOCRACY not a Media controlled Communism??!!

Let Mike Gravel Speak!

GE doesn't want to include mike gravel? figure$$$$$$$

It appears that Mr. Gravel has met this $1M criteria from generous donations to his campaign. Looks like we win. For all those at GE/NBC/MSNBC, Mike Gravel Will be Heard.

http://gravel2008.us/LIVEDEBATE/

An Iowa person commented that Gravel's comments in previous debates had been inappropriate.  Since when is the truth inappropriate?

Its a shame that Iowa has such an effect on our electoral process... SOME of its residents are ignorant fools!

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