Mondale no-shows debate...

[Guest kkktookmybabyaway]

I guess the debate was past his bedtime or something...

 

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20021102...02-88349966.htm

 

ST. PAUL, Minn. — All the Senate candidates met here last night for a prime-time TV debate — except former Vice President Walter F. Mondale, who said he couldn't make it.

 

Three days after Mr. Mondale agreed to replace Democratic Sen. Paul Wellstone on the ballot, Mr. Mondale, the 1984 Democratic presidential nominee, still had not agreed to a time and place to debate his Republican opponent, former St. Paul Mayor Norm Coleman.

 

Mr. Mondale's absence — from a debate that Mr. Wellstone agreed to many weeks ago — angered Republican state officials, who charged that he was trying to avoid a debate and "play out the clock" with only three more days remaining in a race that both sides said was too close to call.

 

"The guy's got to earn it. This is not an entitlement. Part of earning a U.S. Senate seat means debating your opponent, especially a candidate who hasn't put himself up for elective office in decades," said Bill Walsh, spokesman for the Minnesota Republican Party.

 

Republican officials here say their party's tracking polls show that "the race is tightening" and that Mr. Mondale may have peaked soon after he was officially named the Democratic candidate. Mr. Coleman's campaign headquarters has been besieged by phone calls from volunteers and pledges of campaign contributions since Democrats held a memorial service Tuesday night for of Mr. Wellstone that turned into a raucous rally for Mr. Mondale.

 

"In the last three days, lines of voters have come by to pick up more than 3,000 'Democrats for Coleman' yard signs," a Coleman campaign official said.

 

Last night's debate was sponsored by KSTP, Channel 5, in St. Paul and the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Mr. Coleman participated, along with two third-party candidates, Jim Moore of the Independence Party and Ray Tricomo of the Green Party.

 

Tom Hauser, KSTP's chief political reporter, who moderated the debate, said that it appeared that Mr. Mondale was "playing a Rose Garden strategy" for the remainder of the campaign. Presidents who get into political trouble have sometimes used managed events in the White House Rose Garden to promote their image, while avoiding outside public debate that raises questions about their policies and positions.

 

Declining the invitation, Mr. Mondale told Mr. Hauser that "I have to get around the rest of the state so that they can get a chance to hear me and what I have in mind, and then we'll have a debate."

 

"I've always agreed to debate, but this is a very unusual circumstance. I don't like it at all," he said.

 

But Republicans said that if Mr. Mondale needed to talk to voters, statewide television was the most efficient way to do it. "He would reach far more voters on TV than in a town meeting," said Ginny Wolfe, spokeswoman for the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

 

Officials in both camps said there were discussions about holding a debate and that Mr. Mondale's advisers wanted to hold one on Monday, the final day of the campaign.

 

"We're talking to them, and they are talking to us. There will be a debate," a Mondale campaign official said last night.

 

But Coleman strategists were opposed to holding a debate on Monday, the day before voters go to the polls, because it would not give voters and news organizations time to absorb, analyze and critique what Mr. Mondale said. "We've never heard of a debate being held the day before Election Day," said a Coleman campaign official.

 

The NBC television affiliate here also has offered to hold a debate this weekend, with "Meet the Press" interviewer Tim Russert serving as the moderator, an offer Mr. Coleman has already accepted. But there has been no response from the Mondale campaign.

 

Last night, Mr. Coleman said that, if he is elected, he would "reach across the aisle" in the Senate to work for energy independence, Social Security reform and a prescription-drug benefits plan.

 

Mr. Coleman, a Democrat-turned-Republican, repeated his campaign theme that "the future is now" and that the old politics of rigid partisanship and gridlock had to be overcome by problem-solvers who can move legislation through.

 

Notably, despite months of Democratic attacks accusing him of backing Social Security privatization, Mr. Coleman defended President Bush's idea to let younger workers invest some of their payroll taxes in stocks and bonds to build richer retirement savings. But he said he would "not vote for anything that cuts one dime" from what beneficiaries have paid into the system or what they have been promised.

 

Mr. Coleman has been striking a generational theme in the final days of the race, saying that this campaign "is about the future," thus implying that Mr. Mondale, 74 — who hasn't held elective office in 22 years — represented the past.

 

Mr. Coleman, 53, has been flying around the state in a whirlwind, final round of campaign appearances, in sharp contrast to Mr. Mondale's more sedate schedule of two or three events a day.

[Guest Kotzenjunge]

OMG~! COWARDLY DEMOCRAT!!!!

 

I'm glad he didn't show up, myself. Mondale's term would be up, if he were elected, at the age of 80 years old. As a resident of South Carolina, I really can't stand incredibly old people in Congress.

 

If Coleman is willing to expend that much effort to get elected, more power to him. I've never been a big Mondale fan.

 

Kotzenjunge

Would've Voted for Mondale Just to Get a Female Vice-President

[Guest The Czech Republic]

Good old Strom is going on 100, isn't he?

[Guest Downhome]

Good old Strom is going on 100, isn't he?

Yes, and God bless him! (I'm from SC, heheheh)

 

Really, is anyone here suprised by Mondale? I know I'm not, I suppose they think their "rally celebration" was enough to get the job done.

[Guest kingkamala]

Good old Strom is going on 100, isn't he?

Yes, and God bless him! (I'm from SC, heheheh)

 

Strom better watch out for Anna Nichole Smith *honks clown horn* thank you thank you I'll be at the Holiday Inn Lounge from the 15th through the 18th

[Guest Mad Dog]

Looks like the Democrats might be shooting themselves in the foot with this. They probably hurt Mondale's chances greatly by turning the Wellstone memorial service into a political rally.

[Guest Olympic Slam]

Looks like the Democrats might be shooting themselves in the foot with this. They probably hurt Mondale's chances greatly by turning the Wellstone memorial service into a political rally.

I doubt it highly. Mondale has a (D) next to his name and that's all that matters really. Democrats vote for (D)'s no matter what and Republicans vote for ®'s no matter what.

[Guest Mad Dog]

According to the article a number of Democrats are supporting Coleman. 3000 people picked up Democrats for Coleman signs.

[Guest kkktookmybabyaway]

Just read that they are going to debate Monday at 10 a.m.! Guess that's when Mondale is up and vigorous...

[Guest Vern Gagne]

If I'm not mistaken Wellstone refused to particiapte in a debate moderated by Tim Russert. Who's supposedly really good and grills both sides.

[Guest Mad Dog]

Yeah God forbid a democrat have to answer hard questions.

[Guest kkktookmybabyaway]

I dig Russert, and from what I've seen over the years, he grills everybody...

[Guest Vern Gagne]

I went to see the President this afternoon. The line to get inside was 2 hours long. We were sitting in the third deck, but it was incredible that the you where that close to the President.

 

Who should be outside when the rally is over. The tree hugging hippies. I told one lady she doesn't seem to understand that these people want to kill us. I told an old guy to get out of the 60's.

These people never cease to amaze me. Don't they have rally's and fundraisers for their socialist candiate. I never remember seeing a bunch of Republicans picket a Wellstone or Mondale rally.

[Guest kkktookmybabyaway]

"These people never cease to amaze me. Don't they have rally's and fundraisers for their socialist candiate."

 

You need to have people with money to have a fund-raiser. I'm sure one of these hippie functions would net a cool $.50 and bead necklace...

[Guest NoCalMike]

The whole Democrat party right now is just a bunch of lying cowards. They went on and on about their views against giving Bush the power to go to war with Iraq, right before they voted the damn bill in. Democrats are just as bad as republicans, they all deserve the same treatment from the public. Damn them all.

[Guest EricMM]

I think the American Political System has broken NoCalMike

[Guest NoCalMike]

well if people are paying attention, it had should have broken all their spirits by now. I am not sure why people so confidentally(sp?) vote for a Dem or Repub, thinking, "wow, I know my agenda is gonna get addessed now

[Guest Mad Dog]

I will say this:

 

Republican's are the lesser ot 2 evils for the simple fact that they are who they are. They don't portray themselves one way and then act another like Democrats do.