Sorry, Ron Paul: Why Fox Should Limit Debate

With wide-open races for both parties' presidential nominations, the extent to which TV networks affect the outcome by bestowing attention upon, or withholding it from, candidates has been a latent theme of this primary season.

Now it's front and center thanks to Fox News, which is drawing howls for declining to invite two low-polling Republicans, Ron Paul and Duncan Hunter, to an upcoming debate in New Hampshire.

Predictably, Fox is getting accused (mostly by Paul's wild-eyed supporters) of short-circuiting democracy by anointing the winners and "stacking the deck." There's some merit to that critique. But, rather than pile on, why not consider whether Fox is, in fact, doing something radically honest and even praiseworthy?

One fact in all this is beyond argument: TV networks do wield a scary amount of influence over elections. Well-played face time on Meet the Press or The Tonight Show can affect the perception of a candidacy, and the cable-news wolf pack can set the narrative of a campaign by deciding whether to ignore or run with a "story" such as, say, the Swift Boat ads.

Still, the network news operations prefer to pretend they're observers, not participants. In keeping with this fiction, they typically open debates to all comers, or gin up neutral-sounding criteria for inclusion, like those ABC established for its own upcoming debate, to ensure also-rans stay on the sidelines.

More often than not, however, "open" debates still focus on a few front-runners, leaving the second-tier candidates desperate to get a word in. The frustration of being consistently ignored even led Democrat Chris Dodd to post a "Talk-o-Meter" on his website, tracking how many minutes each candidate was allowed to speak.

Fox may be restricting debate to the candidates it considers legitimate, but at least it's doing so in a relatively transparent fashion, rather than using the lesser candidates as silent props to suggest, falsely, that everyone has an equal voice.

And, hey, not for nothing, Fox's decision means we'll get to hear more in-depth answers from the candidates who actually stand a reasonable chance of moving into the White House a year from now. Shouldn't those of us who like to complain about the debates offering nothing but sound bites be grateful for that?

Finally, I have a thought about how the networks could sidestep this whole pitfall, were they so inclined. More on that later.