According to a release from the Western Mass Greens Nader/LaDuke campaign office Nader has been shut out of the political process once again. After seeing Green Party Presidential Candidate denied access to the presidential debates, barred from even entering to view the debates, and then prevented by police from going to scheduled interviews with the media, news of Nader being denied the right to speak will come as no surprise to those who follow the independent media. The surprise to this time might be that it is not the overtly funded corporate interests keeping Nader at bay. It is our public airwaves: PBS television.

According to the Western Mass Greens statement, PBS television is giving two and half minutes at the end of the News Hour with Jim Lehrer for four nights each to Al Gore and George Bush Jr. “But,” say the Greens, “this offer was not extended to all the candidates — Ralph Nader has once again been silenced and the American people have been denied the opportunity to hear a candidate address issues like universal health care, the dysfunctional death penalty, trade agreements that harm labor unions, and meaningful environmental protection.”

A petition has been

Readers wishing to contact PBS may so through their local PBS affiliate and directly at:

News Hour with Jim Lehrer

phone: (703) 998-2150

fax: (703) 998-4154

email: newshour@pbs.org


or jlehrer@newshour.org

Sandra Hebert, Director of News and Information Programming at PBS

fax: (703) 739-5295

email: sheberer@pbs.org