Medina surges into Dallas debate

Medina is in.

Debra Medina, the favorite Texas Republican Party gubernatorial candidate for many Libertarians and virtually all Ron Paul supporters, has been invited to the big dance in Big D.

Initially excluded, The Dallas Morning News announced late Monday afternoon that Medina would participate in the one-hour statewide debate hosted by WFAA-TV, the local Dallas/Ft. Worth Channel 8 outlet, scheduled for January 29.

The event had originally been touted as “The Belo Debate: Perry Versus Hutchison” between Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison and Governor Rick Perry.

Judging by the email traffic from area libertarian and Ron Paul Meetup groups Medina supporters were none too happy about Debra Medina's exclusion from the Belo-sponsored event.

By many accounts, including mainstream media sources such as channels 4 and 11 in the Metroplex and two Austin stations, Medina handily won the recent three-way debate with Hutchison and Perry staged by the North Texas PBS affiliate, KERA.

So Meetup group members launched a pressure campaign to include Medina in the upcoming WFAA debate. Not only were they circulating names and contact information for the executives and boards of directors of both WFAA and the Dallas Morning News but also for the A. H. Belo Corporation, which owns both the media outlets plus TV stations in Houston, Austin, San Antonio, and cable news channel TXCN.

But the Meetup groups took it a step further, targeting advertisers in the Dallas Morning News with emails, hoping to pressure them into pressuring Belo to invite Medina to the state's second Republican gubernatorial debate.

The exclusion of Medina was based on her poll numbers. Belo's criteria required a 15 percent standing in independent public opinion polls for participation.

But Medina had surged in the polls following her KERA debate and Rasmussen pegged her at 12 percent. With the 3.5 plus-or-minus margin of error factored in, Medina's poll numbers topped the 15 percent standard.

The Dallas Morning News reported Tuesday morning that both the newspaper and Belo TV stations had been flooded with complaints about debate rules, and Medina supporters had rallied in front of the TV and newspaper offices in downtown Dallas.

Some supporters are already claiming it was the pressure, not the polls, that got Medina into the debate. "I'm going to chalk this up to our demonstration today" one Texas Liberty Campaign Meetup group member crowed.

Whether pressure or polls or both, Medina is in.