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All-Iraq Debate: Biden By Himself?
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ShareMay 24, 2007 4:27 PM
ABC News' Rick Klein reports: Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., is getting his wish: an Iraq-only presidential debate, to be held June 6 at the Johns Hopkins Center on Politics and Foreign Relations in Washington.
Now the question will be whether Biden has any company on stage. None of the other five Democrats invited to participate -- Gov. Bill Richardson, former senator John Edwards, and senators Hillary Rodham Clinton, Barack Obama, and Chris Dodd -- have RSVP'd as of Thursday.
If the debate does go off as planned, it should be an interesting one. Organizers have lined up Lee Hamilton, one of the co-chairs of the Iraq Study Group, as one of the moderators. They are asking three Democrats who dropped out of the 2008 race -– Sen. Evan Bayh and former governors Mark Warner and Tom Vilsack –- to join Hamilton in posing questions. They are even inviting former vice president Al Gore to help moderate, though they acknowledge snagging him is a long shot.
And this will be a "real" debate, according to Robert Guttman, the center's director. The plan is to offer propositions to the candidates – "the US should remove all troops from Iraq by Sept. 1," for example – and then have candidates debate the merits.
Guttman said the debate will be held even if Biden has to be surrounded by a "bunch of empty seats." The date was chosen to coincide with the congressional calendar, so candidates should have no excuses if they choose not to show up.
"If we find out that people are going to fund-raisers rather than talk about Iraq, that will be interesting," Guttman said.
May 24, 2007 in Vote 2008: Democrats | Permalink | User Comments (4)
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why isn't Dennis Kucinich or Mike Gravel invited?
Posted by: fred | May 24, 2007 6:21:25 PM
I'll second that. Kucinich at least has his 12-Point Plan; it would be interesting to watch him defend it against the frontrunners.
Posted by: Julie | May 25, 2007 4:16:51 AM
The problem is that no front runner wants to participate in a give-and-take debate with someone who's only polling 12% or so. It would give free air time to a "back bencher" in the run for the nomination. It could well spell disaster if an accomplished debater such as Biden could sink his teeth into one or more of them. None of them have his debaying skills and experience, and they know that.
Sharing a stage where each of them is asked different questions by a television news anchor is quite a bit different where each person is asked to respond to the same question and then has to deal with the "gotcha" questions from the other candidates on the dais.
Posted by: Joe C. | May 25, 2007 5:30:35 PM
When is it airing?
Posted by: Gayle | Jun 5, 2007 9:17:17 AM
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