Let them be heard

To many American voters - and almost all overseas observers - there are two names that will be largely unknown in the nomination contests unfolding among the Republican and Democratic parties.

They are Ron Paul, a Republican congressman from Texas, and Dennis Kucinich, a Democratic congressman from Ohio. Part of the reason is that both have failed to attract enough voters to have any hope of winning a state, let alone the ultimate prize.

But the second, and much more damaging, reason is that both candidates have been deliberately barred from recent debates. This has happened because the media and other candidates have clubbed together to either exclude them or simply to mock their views, no matter how relevant they might be. It is no coincidence that both Paul and Kucinich have radically different views from any of their rivals. Those views - on Iraq, the economy, civil liberties and corporate influence - are thus now also shut out or laughed out of the political discussion.

Which is a shame. Because, watching the debates and the election contest unfold, there is often little real difference between any of the candidates. Apart from a few sticking points like abortion and gay marriage, nearly all the focus is on personality and style.

Much is made of John McCain's testiness or Mitt Romney's business acumen, Hillary Clinton's lack of likeability or Barack Obama's inspiring oratory. There is no discussion of actual policy on either side, and when it does occur (such as when the Democrats talk about healthcare) the policies turn out to be almost the same. Thus each candidate in each party has now suddenly embraced "change" as their most prized mantra, yet none says exactly what needs changing or how they would do it. It is a barren victory of style over substance.

Except Kucinich and Paul. Both have some genuinely wacky ideas, like Paul's desire to return to the gold standard or Kucinich's aim of creating a federal department of peace. But both also question the fundamentals of what has happened in America over the past decade in a way unlike any other candidate. In the most recent Republican debate Paul (who was excluded from a previous Fox News debate in New Hampshire) raised the eminently sensible point as to why the US was giving billions of dollars of military aid to both Israel and the Arab countries that are its sworn enemies. Far better, he suggested, would be to give nothing to any of them, especially now that Israel has nukes and is thus more than capable of looking after itself. The response to Paul's suggestion was for all the other candidates to ridicule him. Not to debate him, but simply to laugh.

The same has been true of Kucinich. When it comes to Iraq, Kucinich has been anti-war from day one. He wants out, he has always wanted out and when he says out he means all American forces. He says so openly and without caveat, unlike any other Democrat. Given that many Americans actually agree with him, the response should have been at least to see his position as valid, or point out its flaws. But no. Instead Kucinich has mostly just been ridiculed by rivals and the media for once admitting he thought he had seen a UFO (another thing he has in common with many ordinary Americans but no other candidates). Then he was excluded from the debates.

The standard argument is that Paul and Kucinich are excluded, not because of their views, but because they attract no real support. This is misguided. Kucinich was excluded from the last Democratic debate in Las Vegas because MSNBC chose to invite only the three top-placed candidates after Iowa and New Hampshire. So, apparently the decisions of two small states out of a total of 50 is enough to decide who and what should be heard. Some "debate". And why is a television station making the decision anyway?

As for Paul, he has recently raised more money than almost all other Republicans and beaten Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson in several states. Yet no one sought to bar Giuliani or Thompson from the process. The key thing it seems is not to have genuine ideas or want radical change. It is to have the same policies as your rivals, just a different way of presenting them to a complicit media as "change". Then you get let into the same old club. One is reminded of the tragic Greek heroine Cassandra. Paul and Kucinich are similarly doomed to speak much truth, only to be scorned and laughed at, not actually heard. Now that is a real tragedy.