{news} Fairfield U student paper reports Duffee-Carrano debate

[David Bedell]

http://www.fairfieldmirror.com/news/1.843605

The Fairfield Mirror

Third Party Congressional Debate is held at BCC

Kim Grzybala

Published: Thursday, October 23, 2008
Updated: Thursday, October 23, 2008

About the only item that maintained the usual, official atmosphere of a
congressional debate Oct. 21 was the presence of the Fairfield University
logo in a repeating pattern stretched across a small stage.

Cameras, backed by student operators, surrounded the area as the crew
prepared to begin recording the 3rd party congressional debate hosted by
Finding Our Way, a new politics show on the Ham Channel.  Sitting in the
five chairs squished onto the platform sat two congressional candidates from
third parties, two panel members, and a moderator.

Darryl Brackeen Jr. '10, the host of the show, moderated the debate between
Richard Duffee, the Green Party candidate and M. A. Corrano, the Libertarian
Party candidate.  Brackeen was accompanied by Queenie Paniagua '09 and
Spencer Thibodeau '10 whom he referred to as his "distinguish panel."

When asked how he would vote on the future of the war in Iraq, candidate M.
A. Corrano didn't mince words.

"The war on terror is a fraud. Period," he stated.

Corrano gave a direct answer but still did not shed any more light on the
proposed policies that he would bring to congress.

"I would vote to end the war on terror. Simple as that," he said.

Both candidates were present for "Finding Our Way" as a result of their
exclusion from the congressional debates that were held on campus less than
a week ago with Democratic candidate, Jim Himes and Republican candidate,
Christopher Shays.

Fiorela Canaj '11, who works on "Finding Our Way," took note of this and
made it a point to expose students to the parties that were left out.

"We thought it wasn't really fair, so that's why we got them here now," she
said.

Other students also commented on the exclusion of the third parties from the
congressional debates.

"I didn't think it was fair but I understood why they didn't let these
candidates debate," said Rob Lavin '09.

He explained that it would be difficult to have four candidates debating
especially when their points of view contrast each other's so sharply.

However, that aside Lavin doesn't think that simply excluding the candidates
from the debate was the best way to go.

"They should have given more attention to [the candidates] rather than just
dismissing them," he said.

Though the mission of having the debate was to inform students, Canaj wasn't
discouraged by the low turnout to the live recording.

"It's what I expected," she said.  "We're more hoping to get people to watch
online or TV than live."

Other students observing the debate took notice of the differences in
conduct of the candidates during the debate.  At one point during the debate
candidate Richard Duffee burst out into laughter at his opponent's response
to the panel's question.

"I've never really seen a candidate laugh like that," said Kristina Ravanis
'11.