ACTION: Demand Our Candidates Boycott Fox News Debate

Update:  BlogPac has a petition you can sign here.  (and another here)

If you haven't read this recommended diary, you might want to do so before continuing.

In that diary, Tom Collins, the head of the Nevada State Democratic Party makes his case for why they've decided to grant a Democratic primary debate to Fox News.  Now, I'm glad that Tom came to dkos and shared his views.  I respect that.  But after reading the comments in that diary I still think he's completely wrong on this.

Some people in the comments had the idea that we should create a BlogAction to demand that our Democratic presidential candidates boycott the Fox News debate.

I think that's a great idea.

Hopefully, if we put the pressure on now, we can get commitments from the Dem candidates quickly and stop this train-wreck from happening.

Let me quote (liberally!) from some of the comments in that recommended diary:

but isn't the point of a primary debate to speak to Democrats???  doesn't seem like there will be too many watching Fox - and that Republican audience will see a bunch of Democrats disagreeing with each other.

--DBJ

I agree.  This is about Democrats hashing it out, which is fine, but not really designed to appeal to or convince non-Democrats to vote for us.

If you are like me, you likely have an aversion to Fox News because of your hard-core party affiliation - are you seriously going to tune in to this debate or are you going to skip it because you can't swallow the idea of tuning in to the channel of Brit Hume, Bill O'Reilly, and Sean Hannity?

--DBJ

Exactly.  How many Democrats will this reach?

Won't it be just peachy when Fox renegs on all the prior agreements and the Dems cry foul and Fox airs that we're cry-babies through-out the election?

--madgranny

Raise your hand if you trust Fox News.  That's what I thought.

Really - this diary was a great case study in how not to engage with blogs - don't write a diary and try to latch on to an established netroots figure (Dean), don't make vague assurances (some "secret" non-humiliation deal with Fox), and don't post four or five canned message points instead of taking part in a dialogue.  You only look out of touch and dismissive of others' thoughts.  

What "Mr. Collins" unwittingly did was to help us understand how a bad deal like this one could come about - from a Party leadership that is increasingly out-of-touch and distanced from the sentiment of its base.

--DBJ

And finally...

FOX News is a joke - please treat it that way

--reef the dog

I agree with that reasoning.

So how should we start the boycott?  Some people suggested getting a commitment from Obama first, since he's already boycotting Fox News because of the whole "madrassa" fake story.  I think this is a great idea.  Any ideas for how we tell Obama to commit to boycott the Fox News debate?

Hopefully once Obama commits then others will too.

Where's Chris Bowers when you need him?  He's great at these kinds of campaigns.  Chris, help us out here!  Ha, silly me.  Bowers is already on it!

As is MoveOn, apparently!