Wednesday 28 November 2007
Los Angeles - A planned televised debate among the Democratic presidential contenders was canceled on Wednesday after candidates vowed to boycott the event rather than cross picket lines of striking Hollywood writers, organizers said.
CBS Corp., whose Television City studio in Los Angeles was the venue chosen for the December 10 debate, is embroiled in two labor disputes with the Writers Guild of America, including the screenwriters' strike.
Writers Guild members have routinely rallied outside the CBS facility since the strike against film and TV studios began November 5, and several leading candidates recently pledged to forego the debate rather than cross WGA picket lines.
Organizers said they tried but failed to get assurances from the union for a moratorium on picketing outside CBS studios in Los Angeles for the night of the debate.
Further complicating the situation, CBS News writers, producers and editors represented by the WGA East recently voted to authorize a strike against the network in a separate contract dispute, though no work stoppage has been declared.
The Democratic National Committee, or DNC, cited "uncertainty created by the ongoing labor dispute between CBS and the Writers Guild" in a statement announcing it was pulling the plug on the debate. It said there were no plans to reschedule.
CBS News added in its own statement: "The possibility of picket lines ... and the unwillingness of many candidates to cross them made it necessary to allow the candidates to make other plans."
Latest Casualty of Strike
The cancellation comes just over a month before Iowa on January 3 holds the first of the state-by-state contests to determine which Republican and Democrat will face off in the November 4, 2008, election.
The debate was to have been moderated by CBS News anchor Katie Couric for live broadcast on a sub-network of at least six West Coast affiliates of CBS. It also would have aired nationally on the C-SPAN political cable network.
The event became the latest casualty of a screenwriters' strike that has thrown the television industry into disarray and forced postponements on several high-profile films in the worst labor crisis to hit Hollywood in 20 years.
Talks aimed at settling the strike resumed again on Wednesday for a third day since the walkout began more than three weeks ago in a dispute that hinges on how much writers should be paid for work distributed over the Internet.
CBS Corp. is one of several major media companies being struck by some 12,000 film and TV screenwriters, whose contract expired November 1.
The 300 CBS News employees represented by the WGA East have been without a contract for 2 1/2 years and without a pay raise since April 2004. The union rejected CBS's latest contract offer, which called for a two-tier wage package for workers.
The WGA expressed "regret" that the debate was canceled, but blamed "CBS' fear that the Democratic candidates would not cross a picket line ... a concern that could have been avoided entirely if CBS would simply sit down and negotiate a fair contract for its news and entertainment employees."
The DNC-sponsored event is the latest of several presidential debates canceled in recent weeks, most of them because not enough candidates were willing to participate.
Fireworks Erupt At Republican Debate
Reuters
Thursday 29 November 2007
St. Petersburg, Florida - Republican presidential candidates Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney angrily accused each other on Wednesday of failing to be tough enough on illegal immigration as fireworks erupted at a debate.
The CNN/YouTube debate was as close to a free-for-all as can be expected at such events. The candidates did not shy away from open confrontations with each other and the questions were submitted by the public on videotape.
At a tense time in the Republican field with little more than a month until Iowa starts the state-by-state U.S. election contests, Arizona Sen. John McCain accused Romney of supporting torture methods for terrorism suspects and ripped Texas Rep. Ron Paul for his demand to bring U.S. troops home from Iraq.
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, close on Romney's heels in the polls in Iowa, might have gotten off the line of the night with a wry attack on the Republicans' favorite enemy, Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton, when he said he would not support sending astronauts to Mars.
"Whether we need to send somebody to Mars, I don't know. But I'll tell you what, if we do, I've got a few suggestions, and maybe Hillary could be on the first rocket," he said to laughter.
As the leader in national polls in the Republican race to be the party's nominee in the November 2008 election, Giuliani was in the crossfire early and often.
Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts who is leading in the two early voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire, scoffed at Giuliani's insistence he did not turn a blind eye to illegal immigration when he was mayor of New York.
Illegal immigration is a key concern for Republican voters, with many wanting stronger enforcement of immigration laws and better control of the U.S. border with Mexico.
Giuliani shot back that Romney had employed illegal immigrants at the governor's mansion in Massachusetts and accused him of having a "holier than thou" attitude on the issue.
"You did, you did have illegal immigrants working at your mansion, didn't you?" Giuliani asked in a tense, personal exchange with Romney standing at the next podium.
"No, I did not," Romney responded, calling Giuliani's charge "offensive," and saying any illegals would have been working for a company hired for upkeep at the mansion.
"If you hear someone with a funny accent, you as a homeowner are supposed to go out there and say, 'Let me see your papers?' Is that what you're asking?" he replied.
When Giuliani pressed the issue, some boos were heard in the crowd at the Mahaffey Theater in St. Petersburg.
Giuliani, held in deep suspicion by the U.S. gun lobby, heard more boos from the crowd when he answered a videotaped question on why he required people in New York to pass an exam to possess guns.
Iraq, Waterboarding
Paul, who has shown surprising fundraising strength on the Internet, including $4.3 million in one day last month, drew the ire of McCain by saying the United States could save $1 trillion by bringing home U.S. troops from Iraq.
McCain said he just returned from a Thanksgiving visit to soldiers in Iraq and their message to Americans was "let us finish" the job.
"I want to tell you that that kind of isolationism, sir, is what caused World War Two," McCain told Paul.
Paul fired back, "The real question you have to ask is why do I get the most (campaign) money from active-duty officers and military personnel?"
On a question about whether he supported "waterboarding," an interrogation method that involves simulated drowning, Romney said he would not specify what measures might be necessary to gain useful information from terrorism suspects.
McCain accused Romney of waffling and said he should be able to take a definite stance that "we will never allow torture to take place" by U.S. personnel.
Giuliani was forced to respond to a story by Politico.com that as mayor he billed obscure city agencies for tens of thousands of dollars in security expenses amassed during the time he was beginning an extramarital relationship with future wife Judith Nathan in the Hamptons.
Giuliani said the money spent was handled "as far as I know, perfectly appropriately," by his security personnel at a time when he had received a lot of threats.
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