There is no denying the Ron Paul effect. It's powerful and people looking for advertising dollars know this. Even Fox Propaganda News knows this now. That had to be tough on them. Tougher still is the conundrum they find themselves in. They are still a business and the number of viewers they have is an important number when selling advertising slots. The question for Fox is how to get Ron Paul on their network without letting him point out how stupid the 5 NeoCon candidates are. They'd have better luck trying to prove that Britney Spears is a fit mother.
You may remember that Fox didn't allow Ron Paul to participate in the last debate. I know I remember that. Some interesting things came out of that. I mentioned many of them before but what I didn't know at the time was that CNN was going to rerun a debate against Fox's non-Paul debate. The rocket scientists that first aired the CNN debate put it up against NFL play offs. Apparently, in the second airing, the debate with Ron Paul had more viewers than the brand new debates sans Ron Paul.
Fox must have seen the light and dollar signs and invited Ron Paul to the next debate. They had to craft the debate in a way that would allow him to participate but showcase that he's not a viable candidate.
It backfired.
They started off the debate by asking the 5 NeoCons (they should just form their own party) a serious question and then asked Ron Paul about 9/11 Truthers. He answered the question and then asked if he could answer the serious question. The moderator asked again about the Truthers and asked if Ron Paul would like to tell them to stop their talk of conspiracy theory. Ron Paul said he couldn't tell anyone to stop talking and that he could only speak for himself and asked again to answer the serious question.
They let him.
Near the end of the debate, in an extremely mocking fashion (one of the moderators was laughing as the question was asked), they asked Ron Paul if he was even electable as a Republican nominee because he was so out of step with the 5 warmongers. He pointed out that he was the only actual Republican on the stage and that the others were out of step and then he went on to show how stupid the NeoCon foreign policy is.
For Ron Paul supporters, it was a beautiful moment. It pointed out that the question was wrong, the NeoCons are wrong, and that for die-hard Republicans, there was only one candidate that could be nominated.
Following the debate something interesting happened that I haven't seen get much press but it really is worth noting. From what I've seen in this election, the candidates that are the most desperate for airtime do post-debate interviews. They visit what's called the "spin room" or talk with the hosts on a little stage. Following this debate, the 5 NeoCons did interviews but Ron Paul said he had more important things to do. It's a huge step to go from begging for attention to turning down interviews. The roles are being reversed and this has to be frightening for Fox and the other candidates.
Fox re-aired the debate later for people who weren't lucky enough to catch it the first time. This time though, they edited out a couple of Ron Paul's answers, including the one on electability. Ron Paul supporters noticed (did you have any doubt?). Instantly the blogosphere was a buzz with links to a YouTube video of the answer. Digg went crazy with the story.
The video was taken down by YouTube.
Another one was put up. It was taken down by YouTube. The battle has been going on. YouTube is trying to keep the video off their site and Ron Paul's "internet savvy" supporters are trying to keep it on. Here's a link that works for the moment if you want to see what all the controversy is about. If the link doesn't work, go to YouTube and search for "Ron Paul electability" and I'm sure you'll find another video in its place.
So, the battle rages on to try to make money off of Ron Paul while keeping him from getting enough Old Media exposure to win.
Ron Paul supporters agree that this debate was Ron Paul's finest. He was given time for rebuttal, he ended up actually debating with the NeoCons. He turned the stupid questions around in his favor and bitch-slapped Fox and the NeoCons in the process. Old Media will continue to try and write him off but the Revolution isn't over yet.
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