David T

Larry Agran sat leaning against a wall, head down and silent, outside trial room 1B in the basement of the Bronx Criminal Courthouse. Standing over him, wearing tightly-laced combat boots, camouflage pants, and a V-neck undershirt, a man leaned against the same wall and smoked a cigarette. “You guys can’t stay by the door,” said a policeman. “And you can’t smoke!” The men, waiting for their own, separate court appearances, moved to another wall, and Agran sat down again and waited. It isn’t easy to run for President of the United States.

Larry Agran, the former mayor of Irvine, California and a “minor” presidential candidate, was, at the height of the New York Democratic primary, waiting for his arraignment hearing. The week before he had been arrested during a televised presidential debate in the Bronx after he repeatedly asked to be allowed on the podium; he was charged with trespassing, resisting arrest, and disturbing the peace. Now, as he sat against the wall in the Bronx Criminal Courthouse, accompanied by two supporters, three reporters (two of them students), and his lawyer, the candidate contrasted starkly with the two “major” democratic candidates, Jerry Brown and Bill Clinton, who were at that moment debating each other on “Donahue.” This was the low point of the Agran for President campaign.

Daniel Brookman, Agran’s attorney and second cousin, walked up to the candidate, looked down at him, and smiled. “You better get your ass back to California,” Brookman told Agran. They laughed and thought about how the sun must be rising just then.

It was not always this bleak. Agran had been picked by the nation’s mayors as “the single candidate who truly understands urban needs,”[1] participated in two early national debates, and beat Jerry Brown in an early New Hampshire opinion poll.[2] But since that second debate, Agran, who espouses a liberal program of social spending funded by a fifty-percent cut in the military budget, was shut out of every avenue of media access. This paper explores Agran’s shut-out and looks at the coverage of the “major” Democratic candidates, Clinton and Brown; through interviews with Agran, Governor Clinton, and various journalists, I try to understand the campaign coverage in terms of the issues of credentials and access.

Call it the Press Office As Metaphor For The Entire Campaign: Mr. Clinton, who had become the Johnny Appleseed of five-point-plans, has been accused of promising more than he can deliver.[3] A woman in Clinton’s press office, when asked about the Governor’s New York schedule said, “Oh, why don’t you call our ‘Clinton Scheduling Hotline.’ It’s an up-to-the-minute recorded announcement and we’re always updating it! We’re really proud of it. Pretty high-tech, huh?”

Thank you for calling the Clinton Scheduling Hotline. To reach governor Clinton’s schedule, press 12 and then the pound sign at this time. Beep Beep Beep. Function is not available: Please call again later. (Hangs up)...

Thank you for calling the Clinton Scheduling Hotline. To reach governor Clinton’s schedule, press 12 and then the pound sign at this time. Beep Beep Beep. Please enter password and the pound sign...Beep Beep Beep (Hangs up)...[4]

Governor Brown had been labeled by various newsmen and nighttime talk show hosts as “Governor Moonbeam.” When asked about upcoming debates, a man in Brown’s press office responded, “I’ll have to call you back, what’s your name again...Ed? Okay, look, why don’t you call us back around seven or eight? The schedule is finalized on the West Coast and they’re on Western Time. So we’re on... What is it, Daylight Time? And it’s 5 or 6 over there and 11 o’clock here. So call back tonight.”[5]

When I reached Larry Agran’s press office to inquire about the candidate’s schedule, Mike Kaspar, the Press Director asked, “Do you want to speak to Agran?” A phone interview was proposed, and Kaspar asked, “Is there any chance you can call him tonight? We’re night owls; we’re open ’till twelve-thirty, one, easy.”[6]

Agran’s campaign was almost completely ignored by the various media. And the corollary to a candidate’s being shut out of the media’s coverage is that access to the candidate is complete. Whereas the “major” candidates could only be found in a swirl of supporters, security enforcers and press people, Agran was always available to shake hands, talk on the phone, or discuss a position at length.

Imagine you’re a presidential candidate, you hold a press conference, and no one shows up. On the day of his arraignment, I rushed to Agran’s “press conference” outside the courthouse, and found the candidate standing with three supporters; two reporters, including a journalism student (“Tom Moore, Columbia J-school. Nice to meet ya.”); a Voice reporter who is much less known than the Times’ Russell Baker but shares the same name; and a video camera crew, hired by Agran. Wearing shiny handcuffs and talking into the rented video camera, Agran beseeched his supporters to help him “unhandcuff our democracy and make our democracy work again.”[7] It seemed like an effective advertisement-- albeit unscripted and unfocused-- until I found out it was not an ad at all but a tape that Agran’s people expected to give to stations to air. I remarked to the reporters that, in my experience at CNN, staged videos from non-journalist professionals, such as P.R. firms or politicians, were almost never aired, and that it was surprising that the Agran people wouldn’t know that, but Russell Baker assured me that it was not uncommon.

The courthouse itself was a constant lesson in access and credentials. The entrance was divided into two sections, the employees’ entrance, which allows attorneys and court workers to walk through without impediment, despite the sign asking for identification, and the “public entrance,” which means a long, serpentine line and metal detectors. Agran was on the latter line, which was appropriate and fair, even though most of his fellow Harvard Law School graduates would be on the first line, not with the poor and disadvantaged of the Bronx.

The gruff tone of the guards and the endless lines and bureaucracy in the courthouse reminded Agran and his co-defendant, Arthur Goldstein, of the humiliation of the arrest. Agran remembered that the handcuffs were “nice and tight”; Goldstein recalled being fingerprinted five times. All of the police reports were tediously handwritten, not even typed, let alone computerized, said Agran.

After a long meeting between Agran’s cousin/lawyer and the assistant district attorney, the prosecution of Agran was postponed until an undetermined time in the future. Agran was free to go, which made the whole process seem even more like a big waste of time. While Clinton and Brown were debating and being swarmed by the press, Agran was making his way through the corridors of Bronx Criminal Court, a completely empty morning in terms of getting votes and access to the media; If a man gets arraigned and the media doesn’t hear it, did it happen?[8]

Had Clinton, after winning more than a dozen primaries, been left out of a debate, it seems unlikely that he would have been arrested for requesting inclusion. This is because his request would have seemed only fair, given that we can all accept voters’ approval as a criterion for inclusion. But to go back to September, before the voters had their say, the issue becomes less clear. When asked about the reasons for his exclusion, Agran said that “there are no criteria,” and railed against the politicians, from Ron Brown down to “state party chairs” and “a whole host of democratic politicians who would rather substitute their judgement...instead of having the ordinary citizens and voters make up their own minds.”[9] Agran’s own criteria would favor “inclusion,” he says, and would have added two or three people to the pool of “major” candidates at the beginning of the primary season. These criteria include

One, If a person is very well known, if they’re a governor, a senator, a member of Congress, a well known mayor--even a not so-well-known-mayor--somebody who is well known by virtue of the fact that they are a television celebrity: Pat Buchanan or Pat Robertson, or Ralph Nader.

Two, [That] they raised a substantial amount of money...have ...qualified for federal matching funds. Has someone qualified for the ballot in many states? Not just one state, like New Hampshire where all you have to do is pay a thousand dollars, but are you on the ballot in five states or ten states early on? Are you on the ballot in twenty or twenty-five later on? These are, I think, real tests, because if you’re on the ballot in state after state that means that millions of people will see your name, and doesn’t it stand to reason that they should see your face and hear your arguments and take the measure of your candidacy?

Agran’s criteria would, of course, guarantee his own inclusion: He had raised $300,000 from donors in 37 states and qualified for federal matching funds, and was on the ballot “in most states.”[10]

Also, while Agran wasn’t “very well-known,” he had received some national attention for advocating the “conversion” of military plants to businesses that will help cities and the environment. The New York Times, in a 1990 editorial, applauded Agran for saying that the government shouldn’t spend “billions to put guided nuclear missiles on rail cars; what we need is to put thousands of commuters on rail cars.”[11] Outside of Massachusetts, Tsongas was probably not much more “well-known” at the start of the campaign than Agran. Like Agran, Tsongas did not hold elective office at the start of the campaign. And there were other, better known candidates, such as Buchanan (and later Perot), who had never held elected office, as did Agran.

20,000 League of Women Voters Rules Under Scrutiny
or Mr. Agran Goes to Nowhere Land

The League of Women Voters’ criteria for inviting candidates to its New Hampshire primary debates is similar to those used by Agran: First, the candidate must have publicly declared his or her candidacy; second, must be legally qualified for the presidency; third, must be qualified to run in the New Hampshire primary; and fourth the candidate must be “significant.”[12] The fourth criterion, of course, needs to be further clarified, and the League does so by defining “significant” candidates as eligible for federal matching funds, actively campaigning in a number of states, and “recognition by the national media (emphasis added).”[13]

The requirement of media recognition is problematic at best. Agran’s campaign, for example, had all the credentials except the last, but he was still excluded. Also the press would often ignore Agran’s legitimate achievements: When Agran came in fifth, beating Brown, in an early New Hampshire poll, ABC skipped over Agran’s name and went right to Brown.[14] However, trying to discuss the issue of criteria with journalists is nearly impossible, as my interviews with Tom Hannon, CNN’s political director, and others reveal. I include the short interview with Hannon in its entirety to underline its futility:

TOM HANNON: Oh I don’t know that it takes any criteria to see him as a fringe candidate. You’ve lost me, I don’t know what you’re trying to get at here. Who says he was a fringe candidate? What do you mean “fringe” candidate?

Q: If, let’s say, Clinton or Tsongas, holds a press conference, they would be more likely to receive coverage than someone like Agran or someone who simply had his name on the ballot.

Q: But Agran’s big complaint was that he wasn’t getting the press coverage of the other candidates. So you don’t think that’s true.

HANNON: I do know it’s true that he didn’t get the coverage that other candidates got. And he got more coverage than some others, the bulk of them. But he didn’t get as much as some of the others did, sure.

HANNON: (Laughs) Oh we didn’t call up all the other press people and vote on whether we should cover Agran!

Q: So, what I’m asking is what are the criteria for covering Agran less than some and more than others.

HANNON: You’re assuming that every candidate starts out with an equal right to coverage and I’m not sure that’s true. We never developed any type of criteria based around Agran and our coverage. It’s your position that every candidate is entitled to X amount of coverage and I’m not sure where that’s written!

Q: It’s not my position that they’re entitled, I’m just trying to figure out what are the assumptions that govern the decision to give one candidate more coverage than another, based on whether he’s viewed as a fringe candidate or a major candidate.

Q: So you wouldn’t consider him at the outset a fringe candidate; everyone would get equal...

HANNON: No! Larry Agran’s the mayor of a very small city in California. We also had a guy who ran a drug rehabilitation center in Montana. We had Lenora Fulani. There were dozens and dozens and dozens of candidates, and Agran was just one. We never made any special effort to develop criteria for him alone.

Q: But, why, for instance, would someone like Brown or Tsongas, who are ex-politicians like Agran, be considered mainstream candidates and Agran not be considered mainstream. That’s what I’m getting at. (Silence) Agran, for instance, beat Brown in an early poll in New Hampshire.

Q: I’m not saying anyone’s making mistakes, I’m just trying to figure out...if Agran’s making a small measurable showing in an early A.P. poll, why would the press give Brown more attention.

HANNON: I don’t know at what point you’re talking about, but Tsongas was at one point the leader in the polls.

HANNON: ...He was never very significant in the polls in New Hampshire, and he complained he didn’t get enough coverage.

HANNON: Well, that’s part of it, I suppose, but it’s certainly isn’t any kind of mechanical formula that we use.

HANNON: Well, it’s a very specific sense of what’s newsworthy on a given day.

The interview was, of course, circuitous and shallow. But its vapidity is important to examine, too. Mr. Hannon implies that not “every candidate is entitled to X amount of coverage,” and that Agran is not as newsworthy, in general, as Brown and Tsongas, but he resists the notion that news does anything beside reflect “what’s newsworthy on a given day.” It is as if he resists the notion that CNN makes any decisions at all. This vision of journalism-as-mirror was echoed by Tom Brokaw in 1984 when he said of campaign coverage, “We’re not a consistent business. This is not a mathematical formula in which we’re engaged. You know, journalism is a reflection of the passions of the day. It’s a reflection of the change that occurs.”[16]

It is also not certain that CNN had no specific criteria. According to another CNN political producer, the CNN political unit divided the candidates into “major” and “minor” categories and listed Agran as “minor” before any of the primaries.[17] How did they know in 1991, before the first votes were cast?

The word “major,” in the course of the campaign, was often translated into “viability”; this was the reason offered to Agran by a number of debate organizers. “Look, you keep talking about viability,” Agran remembers telling the organizers. “We’re talking here about politics, you know. You guys aren’t obstetricians, what going on here?”[18]

The issue could not only be viability, because no one ever suggested that Buchanan could beat Bush. Reporters did take Buchanan seriously, in part, perhaps because he was a confrere, but also because he promised to be an exciting and entertaining competitor. In the same way, Perot was not always seen as viable, but capable of damaging the Democratic and Republican rivals.[19]

If viability is not the overriding factor, a good fight might be. Agran said that one producer, Paula Walker of WNBC-New York, told him that she could not include him in a debate moderated by Gabe Pressman because she wanted to “keep it lively.”[20] Walker said that she told Agran, “based on our wanting to produce a television show that would hold interest, that unfortunately it would come down to the whole question of ‘front-runner’...that for this debate we would probably talk to the people who probably had the best shots at securing a place.” When I asked about a numerical cut-off point for including candidates, (let’s say Agran consistently received 10% instead of 1% of primary votes) Walker said, “Unfortunately, there must be a more scientific way of coming up with what a front-runner is, but I guess if you’ve been covering politics for years....you know what a front-runner is.”[21] This was echoed by Mr. Pressman, who, in his opening statements, summarized the event in pugilistic terms: “Two men have emerged as key fighters in the Democrats’ battle for New York.”[22] Mark Crispin Miller suggests a wider reason for a boxing metaphor: “TV news...must translate all conflicts into the crudest of binary schemes....It creates an overall conception of events simple enough to take in with one quick mental glance.”[23]

But Pressman in particular, and pressmen in general, have set up two contradictory constructs; the inclusion of only “key fighters” and the syllogism that 1) Most voters are unhappy with the presidential choices (Pressman: “Governor Clinton, more than fifty percent of Democratic voters have doubts about your character.”[24]) and 2) That someone else should enter the race. Thus, the press seek to “keep it lively,” choose the participants carefully, but bemoan the choices (which are their own).

...scarce had he pushed from the ship, when numbers of sharks, seemingly rising from out the dark waters beneath the hull, maliciously snapped at the blades of the oars, every time they dipped in the water; and in this way accompanied the boat with their bites.[25]

The UPI “daybook,” a schedule of the next day’s events, included Governor Clinton’s schedule for Sunday, April 5. “At 3:15 p.m., takes walking tour of Flatbush from Lincoln Road to Lenox Road, Brooklyn,” read one entry.[26] Clinton was already on Lincoln and Flatbush when I arrived at three-sixteen. Except for Clinton, a dozen Clinton men, and about thirty reporters, field producers, camera and deck people, everyone was black. One man, coming out of a barber shop, peered across the street at the crowd and shouted, “Okay, Mr. Clinton, you want my vote, you better shake my hand.” He ran across the street and waded into the sea of Clinton.

The “walking tour,” curiously arranged, had an even curiouser affect on the crowd dynamic: that of a whirlpool. At the center, the candidate, only visible for moments to the crowd, walked slowly and stopped often to talk with the people. Around Clinton swirled the Secret Service men, wearing ear pieces and bored, unblinking expressions, and the somewhat more animated New York City police, yelling to the blacks and uncredentialed reporters who came too close. The Clinton men (actually there was one woman among them) swirled around the cops, and held a long taut white rope between Clinton and the street-side crowds. These crowds, in turn, were confined to the area between the rope and the parked cars, which was okay, except when the crowds drifted to and pressed against a mailbox or a noisome dumpster; then they would wade back out to the street to risk being flattened by one of the slow moving press vans which moved slowly alongside the Governor. Leading the procession of press vehicles was the Big Daddy Flat Bed Giant 8 x 8 Pickup Truck on which the cameramen stood and got the perfect shot. The credentialed press reporters walked alongside with the residents, but they kept to themselves, basically ignoring the candidate and speaking among themselves about mutual acquaintances, or transportation to the next “location.”

The reporters were territorial, often more so than the Secret Service agents. I heard at least one reporter shout at a person who came too close to Clinton. One cameraman, climbing onto The Truck, found two kids sitting on the truck and taking it all in. “Beat it,” said the man, and they did. Whose truck was it? Clinton’s.[27] Whose space? The cameraman’s. Later, my own attempt to board the caravan failed, too. When I asked about the press van (Which took the newsmen to the next “location”) I was asked by a reporter, “who are you?” No, free-lancers can’t ride the bus. I had to run past the row of empty and half-empty network and print buses until I hopped onto the M41 Local, which waited a half-hour until the caravan moved out. Anyone can cover a story or run for president. But bus seats and podium seats require credentials. A dollar and a quarter will get you on the M41; what gets you on the podium is more elusive.

Clinton tarried at fruit stands, barber shops, laundromats, and all other places of business that he passed, lingering just long enough to trade compliments and questions with the shop keepers. Occasionally someone would take hold of the rope with two hands and press against it, shouting at Clinton. “Go back to your country club,” yelled a man (During the campaign, Clinton played golf at a whites-only club). Generally, however, calm questions were asked, and Clinton, amidst the confusion, was able to respond to a surprising number of petitioners. Occasionally, people expressed anger or disbelief at Clinton’s appearance. One man shouted in anger about Clinton’s rope, complaining that “he’s roping us in like cattle, in our neighborhood.” One boy, dragging a skateboard, asked a reporter from U.S. News and World Report what’s going on. “Mister, who’s that?”

A woman holding a baby, who told me she attends Medger Evers College, shouted a question for Clinton about tuition and college costs. As if guided by radar, Clinton whipped around and looking the woman in the eye, talked to her closely for a while about his plan to pay tuition costs in exchange for the student’s coming back into the community and working as a teacher or in the public sphere. I could hear him, because I was standing directly behind her, but someone next to me shouted, “how about tuition costs?” a question Clinton was quietly answering. It was at that time that I noticed the microphone booms swaying like palms above Clinton’s head. He wasn’t there to address the local crowd, but the woman and the much larger crowd represented by the men atop The Truck, not necessarily in that order.

The woman’s baby, about a year-and-a-half and very curious, reached for a boom mike above. The baby’s head began to rise between Clinton and the woman and cameras. As Clinton kept talking, cool, articulate, and charismatic as always, he placed his hand gently atop the baby’s head. He gently caressed the baby’s head, even as his answer caressed the woman. In this way, the baby’s head was prevented from blocking Clinton’s.[28]

It is interesting to examine the event’s importance in light of the campaign’s wider goals. It would be hasty and mean-spirited, I feel, to claim that Clinton wasn’t expressing affection to the baby or sincerity to its mother. But in a pragmatic sense the wider television audience, potentially numbering in the millions, meant much more than this young woman.[29] In fact, the television audience means more, in terms of impact to the campaign, than the hundreds of African Americans swirling alongside the taut white rope. Conversely, in a seemingly impossible way, the folks at home had greater access than the crowd; they had no white line, because the media truck reached over it. In a way that might baffle Walter Lippmann, the distance between the event and the public was greater for people at the event than those sitting at home. This is the magic of television, as reflected by baseball fans who sit in stadiums fixated by the Sony Watchman in their laps.

The boy with the skateboard was right, but not for the reason he would guess. The assumption in his question, it seems to me, is that the tall white man behind the white rope wouldn’t need anything from the poor folk that are the boy’s neighbors. In fact, these people mattered little more or less, as individuals, than the more privileged sort swirling around Clinton’s and Brown’s “walking tours” of the Upper-West-Side. The access to the candidate is often greater for a television viewer than for a uncredentialed citizen. While one could try to find the unadvertised “walking tours” and ask a quick question and attend the publicized rallies, one’s access to the candidates is generally more direct, if only one-way, on television. A quick rally by Brown in New York's Washington Square Park is a case in point. While Brown spoke for about fifteen minutes about his platform, he rarely got beyond generalities (“Bush can forgive a $7 billion loan to Egypt, but he can’t forgive education loans. It’s a big rip-off. Let’s start investing here.”[30]). And while Brown often answered television reporters with equal brevity (“Sure, I support that”[31]), follow-up questions occasionally elicited greater depth.

Brown’s Washington Square Park rally asserted that its aim was to return power to the uncredentialed; Brown’s chief slogan, “Take Back America,”[32] was echoed often by Brown and other participants. The whole rally reflected the anti-organizational theme, from Allen Ginsberg and the other artists to Brown himself, who, in contrast to Clinton’s precision, was more than an hour late.

The pre-Brown rally felt like an outrageous, disorganized, anti-establishment carnival. An announcer introduced Matthew Modine by saying “here’s a very famous actor who was in...What were you in?” Modine, in turn, said of Clinton, “Not only did he not inhale when he was smoking marijuana, but when he was making love to those women he didn’t have an orgasm.”[33] This was followed by Joey Ramone and the Resistance, who played a song about censorship. “We call it censor-shit,” said Ramone. A woman standing nearby mumbled, “he should keep his day job.” Then came Ginsberg, gray and articulate, who strangely enough seemed the most respectable artist.[34] Two acoustic guitarists, called the Murmers, were asked to play to an increasingly exasperated crowd. The Murmers took the stage and one said, “Jerry Brown’s not here yet, but we’ve got music!” Groans from the crowd. “You don’t like music? You guys have a real attitude problem!” Groans. At this point the Murmer mumbled “Okay, well then, Jerry Brown for president,” and started to play. While all this was happening, campaign workers were making their way through the crowds, holding brown bags (“Brown Bags”) with red dollar signs and asking for donations.

When Brown finally spoke, he positioned himself as the consummate outsider. Listing issues from corruption to power sharing (“people...are making obscene salaries; we need to have employee stock ownership”[35]) to his endorsement of Jesse Jackson, his message would seem to appeal to the anti-establishment left of the Democratic party.

Brown spoke about a key plank in his platform-- his plan to cut the military budget in half and give the money to social programs. This all reminded of me of Agran, and not surprisingly, also reminded Agran of Agran. “I’ve seen a number of things picked up by other candidates, things that I have suggested. And that’s actually a source of encouragement to me,” said Agran. “Brown is a latecomer to the notion of cutting the military...He’s what I call a ‘Jerry-come-lately’ to these military-spending-cut propositions.”[36]

What the Candidates Think About “Inclusion”

Both Clinton and Brown commented on whether Agran should be included in the public debates. During his Flatbush “tour,” Clinton was cornered by an uncredentialed reporter between a dumpster and tree, and asked if Agran (and the perennial Eugene McCarthy) should be included in the next day’s debate. Clinton told me: “I asked for them to be included. I think they should.”[37] Although Clinton did not publicly display his support for Agran as the police were handcuffing the “minor” candidate, Clinton had earlier conveyed a message through an advisor, Victor Kovner, that he supported Agran’s right to debate.[38]

Brown, on the other hand, told the New York Times, “I’m not going to nullify my candidacy to help a guy who got only 270 votes in New Hampshire.”[39] Agran admits he did poorly (“however, I think I received four-hundred votes”) but he has no kind words for his former governor: “He is the consummate opportunist and quite frankly, I have very little respect for him....He talks about inclusion and breaking open the system-- I think his slogan is ‘take back the system’--but in fact he plays exclusionary politics and relishes in it. He’s only for opening the system for himself.”[40]

Flashback to February: The South Dakota Democratic party leaders invited Agran to his second major debate, and the “minor” candidate is onstage with Clinton, Tsongas, Harkin, Kerry, and Brown. Agran tries to position himself as The Outsider: “When I hear Jerry Brown, the grand champion of raising special-interest money in the 70’s and 80’s...I’m up to here with it!” At the end of the debate, Agran raises a sign with his own one-eight-hundred number, and turning to Brown, says “I want to make Jerry Brown feel more comfortable.”[41] But that means there are two Jerry Browns, right? I’m confused. As Miller says, television resists complexity. Agran and Brown are both outsiders, but Brown is already known. Hey, that’s the California governor who dated Linda Ronstadt!

Flashback to December: Agran requests and is granted admission into a debate. The New York Times reporter writes, “The forum did not get much beyond generalities because two uninvited candidates were allowed to take part after their supporters nosily objected to their exclusion. The addition of these two candidates left little time for follow-up questions.”[42] The assumption, as always, is the “uninvited” are a distraction: the debate is not too short, there are too many candidates.

The results of the New York primary, while showing strong support for Clinton and Brown, also reflected dissatisfaction with the two. Forty-one percent and 26% voted for Clinton and Brown, respectively, but 29% voted for semi-candidate Tsongas, and the others, Agran, Harkin, Kerrey, and McCarthy received about 1% apiece.[43] If Agran had had more exposure, how much support would he have received from the Democratic voters (33%) who did not vote for Clinton and Brown? If Agran’s advocacy of cutting the military and giving the cities a big, no-strings-attached check would have been well-received, the candidate might have been seen as a foil to voters dissatisfied with Clinton and Brown. Agran’s exclusion meant he does not matter; conversely, in an exercise of dubious teleology, Agran was not seen as “significant.” But that is a decision based on assumptions, however murky and unquestioned, held by the media.

The forces of exclusion are much more powerful than the forces of inclusion. Candidates and press people resist outsiders, both in politics and in the press. The question I was asked when I tried to board the press van, “who are you?” is the same question, asked in various ways by the media of the candidates. Without answering the question, loudly and with the right credentials, a candidate is ignored.

Baker, Russ. W. “Whodunnit? How the Press Killed a Candidate.” Village Voice, March 24, 1992.

Meyrowitz, Joshua. “The Press Rejects a Candidate.” Columbia Journalism Review, March/April 1992.

Miller, Mark Crispin. “A Viewer’s Campaign Diary, 1984” from Boxed In: The Culture of TV. Evanston: Northwestern U. Press, 1988.

Berke, Richard L. “The 1992 Campaign: Democrats; Mayors Appear Unmoved by the Major Candidates,” New York Times, January 24, 1992.

-------- “The 1992 Campaign: South Dakota; Democrats, in Midwestern Debate, Aggressively Court the Farm Vote.” New York Times, February 24, 1992.

-------- “Debate on Health Care: Long on Posturing, Short on Details” New York Times, December 21, 1991.

AP, “The 1992 Campaign: Clinton Rating Falls in Poll,” New York Times, January 27, 1992.

Rosenbaum, David. “Responses of Rivals Cover Up Similarities.” New York Times, April 5, 1992.

“1992 League of Women Voters Education Fund New Hampshire Republican Presidential Primary Debate Participant Selection Criteria.” (Pamphlet sent to author).

Melville, Herman. Moby Dick. Eds. Harrison Hayford et al. Evanston: Northwestern University Press and Newberry Library, 1988.

Phone conversations with Gov. Bill Clinton’s press office, Friday April 3, 1992.

Phone conversation with Gov. Jerry Brown’s press office, Friday April 3, 1992.

Phone conversation with Mike Kaspar, Agran’s Press Director, Friday April 3, 1992.

Phone interview with Tom Hannon, Cable News Network (CNN) Political Director, April 27, 1992.

Brown and Clinton’s “walking tours,” Upper-West-Side and Flatbush, respectively, April 5, 1992.

[1] Richard L. Berke, “The 1992 Campaign: Democrats; Mayors Appear Unmoved by the Major Candidates,” New York Times, January 24, 1992.

[2] AP, “The 1992 Campaign: Clinton’s Rating Falls in Poll,” New York Times, January 27, 1992.

[3] David Rosenbaum, “Responses of Rivals Cover Up Similarities.” New York Times, April 5, 1992.

[4] Phone conversations with Clinton’s press office, Friday April 3, 1992.

[5] Phone conversation with Brown’s press office, Friday April 3, 1992.

[6] Phone conversation with Mike Kaspar, Agran’s Press Director, Friday April 3, 1992.

[7] Recorded outside the Bronx Criminal Court, April 6, 1992.

[8] The above is from observations and conversions with the candidate, supporters, and other reporters, inside and in front of Bronx Criminal Courthouse, April 6, 1992.

[9] Interview with Larry Agran, Friday, April 3, 1992.

[10] Interview with Larry Agran, Friday, April 3, 1992; Russ. W. Baker, “Whodunit? How the Press Killed a Candidate,” Village Voice, March 24, 1992.

[11] “Converting to Peace,” Editorial, New York Times, March 22, 1990.

[12] “1992 League of Women Voters Education Fund New Hampshire Republican Presidential Primary Debate Participant Selection Criteria.” Pamphlet sent to author. The criteria are identical for Democratic and Republican debates, according to the League.

[13] League of Women Voters pamphlet.

[14] Joshua Meyrowitz, “The Press Rejects a Candidate.” Columbia Journalism Review, March/April 1992.

[15] Phone interview with Tom Hannon, Cable News Network (CNN)Political Director.

[16] Quoted in Mark Crispin Miller, “A Viewer’s Campaign Diary, 1984” from Boxed In: The Culture of TV (Evanston: Northwestern U. Press, 1988), p. 102.

[17] Interview with an unnamed political producer, CNN, March 3, 1992.

[18] Agran interview, April 3, 1992.

[19] In interviews with a reporter from U.S. News and World Report, (April 5, 1992) and Agran, (April 3, 1992) both mentioned that Perot’s money was the single factor that mattered the most. He is taken seriously because “he has a hundred-million dollars and is willing to spend it,” said Agran.

[20] Agran Interview, April 3, 1992.

[21] Phone interview with Paula Walker, WNBC producer, April 27, 1992.

[22] Debate on WNBC, April 6, 1992.

[23] Mark Crispin Miller, p. 99.

[24] Debate on WNBC, April 6, 1992.

[25] Herman Melville Moby Dick. Eds. Harrison Hayford et al. (Evanston: Northwestern University Press and Newberry Library, 1988), p. 713.

[26] UPI, “Daybook,” Saturday, April 4.

[27] Clinton’s press office told me that they hire a truck for every “walking tour.” Interview, April 20, 1992.

[28] The above impressions were taken from viewing Clinton’s “walking tour” of Flatbush, April 5, 1992.

[29] The woman, incidentally, said she would probably write-in Dr. Lenora Fulani.

[30] Brown rally, April 2, 1992.

[31] David Rosenbaum, “Responses of Rivals Cover Up Similarities.” New York Times, April 5, 1992.

[32] Brown Campaign pamphlet and elsewhere.

[33] Washington Square News (April 3, 1992), Except where noted, the impressions of and quotations from the rally are taken from my own notes.

[34] In fact, a colleague of mine insists that Ginsberg turned up the volume on his microphone every time he spoke, displaying an understanding of his surroundings that the other participants did not.

[35] Washington Square News (April 3, 1992)

[36] Agran interview, April 3, 1992.

[37] Twenty second interview with Bill Clinton, April 5, 1992.

[38] Agran interview, April 6, 1992.

[39] New York Times, April 3, 1992.

[40] Agran interview, April 3, 1992.

[41] Richard L. Berke, “The 1992 Campaign: South Dakota; Democrats, in Midwestern Debate, Aggressively Court the Farm Vote.” New York Times, February 24, 1992.

[42] Richard L. Berke, “Debate on Health Care: Long on Posturing, Short on Details” New York Times, December 21, 1991.

[43] AP, April 8, 1992.