Ron Paul, Dennis Kucinich, and Bill Moyers

This evening, Bill Moyers held excellent interviews with Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich, two candidates who have been more or less excluded from serious coverage by the mainstream media. Ron Paul, in fact, has been excluded from the next Fox News debate, despite his respectable 10% showing in Iowa, while Kuinich has been “dis-invited” by ABC as well as being excluded from the Des Moines Register debate (which even had Alan Keys, for crying out loud). Both candidates conducted themselves well, especially Ron Paul. Bill himself did a good job; in largely sympathetic interviews, he nevertheless challenged the candidates on some of their more problematic points. Moyers pointed out to Ron Paul that it is the private media, and not the federal government, that has excluded him. I don't think Paul had a good answer on this point, because libertarians generally don't. Libertarians generally don't like to acknowledge the fact that private owners, when they become too rich, can raise barriers to free markets just as effectively as the government can. The point that my libertarian friends never get is that free markets are created by regulation of a certain sort, just as they are destroyed by regulation of another sort. It is important to be able to tell one sort from the other.

Kucinich was taken to task for his rather odd “endorsement” of Barack Obama in Iowa, bypassing some candidates that may have more affinity with his point of view. In any case, they were very good interviews, much better than what one usually on television. The interview with Ron Paul can be seen here and the one with Dennis Kucinich here.

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