Ben Pershing with the Washington Post indicates that WDBJ-7 in Roanoke is more than open to the idea:
The rules required that Sarvis average at least 10 percent in public polls, a standard he missed by a fraction of a point. (As of Saturday evening, Sarvis’s poll average on the RealClearPolitics Web site was 9.8 percent.)
But on Friday, according to an e-mail obtained by The Washington Post, WDBJ’s news director, Kelly Zuber, wrote to the McAuliffe and Cuccinelli campaigns, “We have received quite a bit of negative reaction to the exclusion” of Sarvis.
“WDBJ7 will live up to the agreement we have with both of your campaigns,” Zuber continued, “but want you to know we would certainly entertain an amendment to the agreement allowing Mr. Sarvis to participate with no restrictions. Our organization is dedicated to providing as much information to the voters as possible.”
Sarvis is seen as pulling more support from the Republican side, and Cuccinelli’s team has pushed all along to exclude him, according to sources familiar with the debate negotiations.
…and the RCP polling averages, depending on how one chooses to parse those numbers, is frankly a weenie move at 9.8%.
Frankly, Libertarian candidate Robert Sarvis has earned a seat at the table. Republicans being the party of free minds, free ideas, and a free society have zero to lose from giving him a seat at the table… so the question is whether or not Terry McAuliffe has anything to lose by agreeing.
So what sayeth the McAuliffe campaign? If it’s OK with them, it’s OK with the conservatives here at Bearing Drift… and who knows? Maybe we’ll get an honest policy debate this election cycle.
Gauntlet down. Let’s do this.
