It looks like Rand Paul has decided to take Thursday night off.
Just before Christmas Fox Business announced how they would select which candidates would make the prime time debate this coming Thursday night:
Place in the top six nationally, based on an average of the five most recent national polls recognized by FOX News OR Place in the top five in Iowa, based on an average of the five most recent Iowa state polls recognized by FOX News, OR Place in the top five in New Hampshire, based on an average of the five most recent New Hampshire state polls recognized by FOX News.
On Monday they announced who would be invited to which debate. The seven in the primetime debate are Donald Trump; Ted Cruz; Marco Rubio; Ben Carson; Chris Christie; Jeb Bush; and John Kasich. For the happy hour debate they are inviting Rand Paul, Carly Fiorina, Mike Huckabee; and Rick Santorum.
The operative word is inviting. One of the happy hour four has announced he will be staying home. Just before Fox Business made their announcement Rand Paul was on CNN making his.
“I won’t participate in anything that’s not first tier because we have a first tier campaign,” the Kentucky senator told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer.
(..) It’s a mistake because the thing is we actually have been in the top five or six in most of the recent polls. In fact, last week in a national poll we were just one point out of fourth place. So I think it’s a mistake to try to exclude me from the national debate,” he told Blitzer.
Following the interview, Paul’s campaign released a statement in which it protested Paul’s treatment by the media.
“By any reasonable criteria Sen. Paul has a top tier campaign,” the statement read. “He will not let the media decide the tiers of this race and will instead take his message directly to the voters of New Hampshire and Iowa.”
“Multiple national polls including CNN, CBS, Fox, Marist and others have him in 5th or 6th place, one had him just a single point out of 4th,” the statement continued. “In multiple polls he scores ahead of Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, John Kasich and Carly Fiorina. In yesterday’s Marist Iowa poll he was alone in 5th place. In fact his numbers are on the rise in recent weeks.”
Rand it’s time to grow up a bit, the only thing that makes the early debate second tier is you are calling it that. The RCP average has you at 7th in New Hampshire and 7th Nationally (behind Bush, Christie, and Bush in each), they have you at 6th in Iowa (behind Bush and Christie).
Guess what, the more people in a debate the less the viewers and potential voters get out of it. So stop being a baby and if you really wish to continue your campaign for president, take the free air time. But to be honest, perhaps it would be better if you quit the race and concentrated on your re-election campaign. If you remain in the national race please remember presidential politics is like baseball, and we all know there is no crying in baseball
