Dodging the League of Women Voters?
Published September 1, 2014
by Doug Clark, Greensboro News-Record, August 29, 2014.
Republican commissioners in Wake County say they won't participate in candidate forums sponsored by the League of Women Voters, WRAL reports.
"While we appreciate your offer, we believe your group has a scope that is too narrow to adequately preserve the impartiality of the setting needed for a full and fair discussion of local issues," the four commissioners said in a joint letter to the League.
They did not express a similar concern about the Wake County Taxpayers Association, a conservative group that held a forum last night, WRAL noted.
I'm sure it was no coincidence that the conservative Civitas Institute yesterday issued a statement urging Republican U.S. Senate candidate Thom Tillis to withdraw from a debate co-sponsored by the League of Women Voters because the League opposes the state's Republican political agenda.
“Speaker Tillis should not be lending his stature to the League of Women Voters while they are working with left-wing groups standing in the way of beneficial legislation,” Civitas President Francis X. De Luca said. “And if he is going to fight against entrenched liberal groups in Washington, he should show he’s no pawn of liberal groups here.”
Of course, the League of Women Voters has sponsored many presidential debates without prompting complaints of bias from Ronald Reagan or other Republican candidates.
Nevertheless, it is true that in North Carolina the League is not particularly friendly to Tillis. That does not, however, mean it can't conduct a fair forum or that a candidate for statewide office should not attend.
If Tillis is elected to the Senate, it will be his job to represent all the people of North Carolina -- not only those who agree with him on every issue.
Too many partisans, on the left and right, want only their own point of view to be heard or spoken for. They won't listen to or consider other ideas. Even being in the company of others, apparently, can be considered becoming a "pawn."
The Civitas Institute might expect Tillis to be one of those narrow-minded partisans, but I'm confident he will do better than that and better than the Republican commissioners in Wake County.
September 1, 2014 at 9:42 am
Richard Bunce says:
Yes, it does.
September 1, 2014 at 10:39 am
Norm Kelly says:
Libs are funny people. Not funny ha-ha like. But funny sad like.
Libs object to Fox News people being on a panel for a debate, claim the questions will be biased and unfair to the socialist candidate. Yet, when the majority of media types are die-hard libs themselves, the 'conservative'/Republican candidate isn't supposed to care that the entire panel is made up of socialist supporters. Even when the moderator specifically steps out to clarify what the socialist candidate MEANT to say cuz it's not what he said, the libs berate conservatives for pointing out the obvious bias. Yet, for some unknown reason that libs can't explain, what's good for their candidate isn't supposed to be good for our candidates.
How many lib pols would accept an invitation to a debate where the entire panel of moderators, say 6 or 7 of them, were from Fox News and Fox Business? How many media-type libs would consider this a fair forum? How many media-type libs would suggest that every socialist pol MUST show up for the debate anyway? None. Not one media-type lib supporter would encourage participation. And not a single socialist pol would attend, claiming the forum would not present a true picture of anything. And every one of you media-type libs knows this is a fact. But like always, facts aren't something libs like to recognize or acknowledge.
If a moderator from Breitbart or Drudge were to be on the panel, every lib media type and every socialist pol would object to the makeup of the panel. And every one of you libs knows this is true. Since the moderators would be from a conservative-leaning institution, are biased in the conservative/Constitutional direction, libs would do whatever was possible to avoid the situation. But when the panel is made up of media types who have demonstrated their bias in the past, have specifically endorsed a socialist candidate, have donated to a socialist candidate, has been 'on the air' berating the conservative/Republican candidate, somehow the Republican candidate is supposed to ignore this and consider it an unbiased, fair forum. For what reason? So it makes the lib media types FEEL good?
I say most of the media types and the lib pols who complain about the makeup of a panel are just pansies. You can't take the heat, but you expect that conservatives/Republicans should take the heat without complaint. Duh!
