The Daily Background

The Democratic National Committee today announced the locations and media sponsors of the final six sanctioned debates of 2007 among Democratic primary contenders for the presidency.

The media organizations that the DNC will be partnering with are ABC, CNN, NBC, CBS and…. (wait for it)…. YouTube. That’s right, YouTube.

The official list, released today includes debates in several early primary states including New Hampshire, Iowa, South Carolina, Nevada, Pennsylvania and California. CNN will be allowed to host two debates, NBC will also hold two, while ABC and CBS will host one each.

“Our strong field of Democratic candidates have been working hard, talking about the issues the American people care about and laying out a positive vision for America’s future,” Democratic National Committee Chair Howard Dean said in a statement. “We are grateful to the media sponsors and our state parties for their role in providing important, diverse settings for the American people to hear directly from our candidates.”

Although the scheduling decisions are likely to please progressive bloggers, the Fox News Channel is sure to be angered by their notable absence on the list, and the unexpected presence instead of a relative political newcomer; YouTube.

YouTube and their corporate cousins at Google will cosponsor the July 23rd debate in Charleston South Carolina with CNN, the DNC announced. The debate will also be simulcast on CNN’s Spanish-language channel, CNN en Español.

Fox News, which has already held one Republican presidential primary debate, had previously arranged a debate with the Nevada State Democratic Party, although several candidates announced they would not attend the event for a variety of reasons. Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) cited the lack of DNC sponsorship in declining their invitation, while former Senator John Edwards said he was too busy and besides had no interest in debating on Fox.

The debate was later cancelled.

Fox, criticized by many as a partisan news outlet which has promoted false stories about Obama, was reportedly furious at the snub. Fox later tried to arrange a debate with the Congressional Black Caucus, a group of made up of Democrats in the House and Senator Obama in the Senate, although several candidates announced they would not participate and the fate of that debate is unknown, although it does not look good for the cable network.

Google has previously entertained 2008 candidates such as Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Hillary Clinton (D-NY) at their headquarters in California before an audience of Google employees, although their cosponsorship with CNN is the most significant inroads the high-tech company has made into politics thus far.

It was not immediately clear what role YouTube would play in the debate, however there are strong hints that it will serve up video content from the debate after it concludes on July 23rd. One possibility network executives may be considering is allowing YouTube users to upload videos of themselves asking questions they would like the candidates to answer, and then airing those videos during the debate, giving candidates a chance to respond.

Opening the door to a this possibility was the announcement CNN made in early May that it planned to make all footage broadcast from the debate publicly available without restriction under a Creative Commons type license. Senators Obama, Edwards and Chris Dodd (D-CT) had personally advocated for this approach, as have several high-profile bloggers and media organizations.

In a move that could irk some candidates, CNN will also allow users to remix debate footage, allowing brand new content to be created.

“The Internet has enabled an extraordinary range of citizens to participate in the political dialogue around this election,” Obama said recently. “Much of that participation will take the form of citizen generated content. We, as a Party, should do everything that we can to encourage this participation.”

“CNN and YouTube/Google are excited to be working together to bring the American public the first-ever, voter generated presidential debate,” CNN said in a statement. “In the coming weeks we will reveal details for this first-of-its-kind event, as well as plans for an upcoming CNN and YouTube/Google Republican debate.”

Filed under: Z-Feature