The following interview was conducted by Phil Defer, a French student who has been interviewing US presidential candidates for his forum.
1. Could you introduce yourself in a few sentences ? ‘
I am a leader for medical rights here in the USA and I have written two books on drug policy reform.
2. How was your political engagement born ?
I helped write and pass California’s historic medical marijuana law and then was arrested for passing a law the police did not like.
3. What personal way drove you to compete for the presidency of the United States ?
The sorry legacy of George W. Bush.
4. Can you tell me some key points about your program, the main ideas ?
I am a one issue candidate who believes this is no more about Marijuana than the Boston Tea Party was about Tea. Our struggle today is for true liberty from tyrannical governments.
5. How do you view the upcoming campaign, can you give us some elements about what it represents in term of hardships, opportunities… in the US system, and what about your strategy ?
This election is a complete mess with anything as a possible outcome.
6. Political fiction : It’s January, the 20th, 2009. You have just been elected president ! What are your first steps, your priorities ?
My first step, within minutes of being sworn in as President, would be to issue Executive Order 13420 which would immediately defund the DEA and all laws against marijuana.
7. What are America’s biggest internal problems today, and what are your answers ?
America is saddled with an illegal, unconstitutional, power-hungry oligarchy of thugs.
8. Same question for America’s external problems.
Same answer.
9. More specifically, what do you think should be done on Iraq and national security ?
Leave NOW!
10. What about environment ?
Allow private citizens to sue giant corporations when their pollution enters your land or body.
11. What about your political (institutions), social, economic and societal (civil rights, abortion, homosexuality…) positions ?
I support free choice and a policy of non-intervention by the government.
12. What should be America’s relationship with the rest of the international community ?
America needs to learn some manners and respect for it’s neighbors, especially the French, because of all they did to help us achieve our independence for Britain.
13. Political fiction, again. You’re at the White House. Iran just acquired nuclear weapons, with abilities to launch them to Europe’s doors. It now threatens to launch one on Tel-Aviv if the Israelis don’t evacuate the territory under 48 hours. As the Commander in Chief, what do you do ?
Let Israel defend herself. With over 200 nukes, Israel does not need intervention by the USA.
14. What assessment do you make of George W. Bush’s presidency, and on which points will you be inspired or distance yourself from him ?
George W. Bush’s presidency is the lowest point that America has ever sunk to and both Bush and Cheney should be impeached.
15. Could you tell me about you day of September the 11th, 2001 ?
My biggest fear at the time was that the US government was involved in 9/11 and would use the attack to gut civil rights and the rule of law. I regret that my initial assessment has proven to be correct.
16. What are, according to you, the 21st century’s greatest stakes, and how to face them ?
Our steady loss of liberty and civil rights is what worries me the most.
17. We were all marked by historical events. What are yours ?
All of us suffer from the continuing consequences of a Drug War that cannot be won and only helps the bad guys.
18. What is your “vision of America” ?
My vision, like other Libertarians, is to secure real liberty through limiting government and allowing the free market and private citizens to run society.
19. Since I’m French, how do you view this nation, this country, what do we inspire to you, notably our new president Sarkozy ?
Americans are largely ignorant of the glorious history of France or the bravery of the French underground in the face of Nazi occupation. My own view of France is that it is one of the most anti-cannabis countries in Europe and so I have always avoided traveling there. I don’t see that Sarkozy has any intention of changing that.
20. More specifically, what did you think when President Chirac strongly opposed Bush on the issue of the war in Iraq ?
I have gained enormous respect for Chirac’s courageous and inspired leadership.
21. Which historical presidents, persons, dead or living, inspire you the most today ?
Thomas Jefferson.
22. In private, what do you like to do ?
I took some time off a few years ago to ski nearly 2 million vertical feet. That’s pushing hard all day for over a hundred days, in conditions varying from blizzards to minus 28 below, I managed to ski some of Canada’s steepest terrain, without a single injury or serious fall.
23. Do you have a motto in live, and if yes what is it ?
Go big, or go home.
24. Finally, why YOU more than another one at the presidency ? Please give this interview’s readers an infallible argument.
I am the only candidate for President who has a proven track record of helping to write and pass pro-freedom legislation. I even went to jail after passing the new law to uphold patient’s rights that were recognized by our new law.
25. Free question, if you want to add anything…
My apologies to our French friends for the crude and uncivilized behavior of our president and government. America can and will be a civilized place again, once we put all the Neo-cons out to pasture and lock up the thugs from the Bush administration.
UPDATE: PaulieCannoli, from whose page I got the interview, stated the following in comments: “Whoops! This is a preliminary version of the answers and is being redone. I was not aware of that at the time when I posted this on my blog. I will publish an updated version when it has been finalized and made available. This turned out to be a preliminary version and I should not have published it, especially ahead of the interviewer. I was unaware that it was an unfinished product. The final version will go into more detail, and correct some possible wrong impressions based on overly hasty preliminary answers.”
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aynrkey
bostonteapartygoer
Kenn Jacobine
mattdharris
Mike Seebeck
Miche
paulie
Jim Davidson
ponggod
Stuart Richards
Steven Greffenius
Todd Andrew Barnett
Whoops!
This is a preliminary version of the answers and is being redone. I was not aware of that at the time when I posted this on my blog. I will publish an updated version when it has been finalized and made available.
This turned out to be a preliminary version and I should not have published it, especially ahead of the interviewer. I was unaware that it was an unfinished product.
The final version will go into more detail, and correct some possible wrong impressions based on overly hasty preliminary answers.
Hiya, Paulie. I put your statement into the entry itself, as an update.
Cool, thx
The proper thing to do would be to de-publish it, since it was not intended for publication in the first place.
Translation: The Tom Knapp spin machine doesn’t want Steve Kubby to talk about 9/11 so off down the 1984 Memory Hole it goes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_hole
Hey Tom, why don’t you stop putting words in Steve Kubby’s mouth?
The 9/11 Truth Movement is growing far more rapidly than the Steve Kubby campaign. Steve is obviously open to riding that wave if but Tom Knapp wants to take away his surf board.
Andy,
You write:
“Translation: The Tom Knapp spin machine doesn’t want Steve Kubby to talk about 9/11 so off down the 1984 Memory Hole it goes.”
It doesn’t matter what Tom Knapp wants to talk about — Kubby is going to talk about what >em>Kubby wants to talk about. But, in fact, Steve Kubby has talked about 9/11 several times, in campaign statements which I helped craft.
“Hey Tom, why don’t you stop putting words in Steve Kubby’s mouth?”
In order to stop doing something, I’d have to have started doing it first. In point of fact, it is Kubby himself who decides what message he’s trying to get out. I go over the words coming out of his mouth and try to help him improve them, but ultimately he is 100% in charge of what he says.
At present, I have no particular reason to believe that Kubby said what he’s quoted as saying. It’s certainly possible that he did, but if he did he did not do so using the campaign’s procedures, under which text/hypertext interviews are vetted by the communications director (me) before release. The candidate always has final say on what he says, but the normal course of things is for the communications director to suggest changes/improvements on text materials (when he’s speaking live, obviously, that would be impossible, or at least burdensome).
You are correct that if the alleged interview had gone through the established channels, I would have given Kubby a call or an email and urged him not to in any way impute that 9/11 was an “inside job,” for the simple reason that in six years of public investigation, not one iota of evidence for that proposition has ever surfaced. But if he had gone ahead and decided to make that statement anyway, that would have been his call.
Hey, here’s an idea — why don’t you give Alex Jones or Dave vonKleist a call and ask one of them to have Kubby on a show to discuss 9/11? As mentioned, I don’t have a microphone connected to an earpiece on Kubby. You’d get the straight poop from him on what he believes, with no “Knapp spin machine” involved.
Tom: No, the proper thing to do is publish it and then add Paulie’s addendum, just as I have done, and to also publish the final version when it is released, as I intend to do.
I posted this only after Paulie, who is a known Kubby supporter, sent out a request that someone post it to LFV, and that request included a link to it on his blog. I couldn’t post it at that time because I had already fulfilled my LFV quota for that day. So after waiting until the next day, and seeing that no one else had fulfilled the request and nothing had been said or done withdrawing the request for publication, I published it as previously requested as a courtesy to Paulie (and, by extension, as a courtesy to the Kubby campaign).
I did nothing improper by publishing it, and I am doing nothing improper by declining to de-publish it. No one has suggested that the responses were not written by Steve Kubby, or by someone on Steve Kubby’s behalf and with his permission. I therefore have no reason to believe that those are not Steve Kubby’s responses, preliminary or otherwise. As such, the publication stands.
Elfninosmom,
In suggesting a proper course of action, I did not mean to imply that you had acted improperly, i.e. unethically. However, the “interview” is not an authorized statement from Steve Kubby or his presidential campaign. It’s pure hearsay, and the proper course would be to either de-publish it or to label it as hearsay rather than as an “interview.”
You write:
“No one has suggested that the responses were not written by Steve Kubby, or by someone on Steve Kubby’s behalf and with his permission.”
What other possible meaning could you plausibly get from the campaign’s communications director’s flat statement that he has “no particular reason to believe that Kubby said what he’s quoted as saying?”
Tom: Actually, when I started writing that last comment, you had not yet responded. For that reason, I did not see your comment until after mine had been posted.
Nevertheless, I still have no reason to believe that the responses were not written by Steve Kubby, since you also stated that “It’s certainly possible that he did, but if he did he did not do so using the campaign’s procedures”.
Whether Kubby failed to follow internal campaign protocol, by asking for your approval first, is not my concern. That you did not approve of the responses, before release, proves absolutely nothing with regard to whether Kubby wrote those responses. In fact, nothing you have said proves or tends to prove that Kubby didn’t write those responses; quite the contrary, as it appears that you think he may have done so without first consulting you.
I have absolutely no reason whatsoever to believe that my source (Paulie) is spreading untruths, much less falsifying an interview; and every reason to believe that he is distributing the interview as it was presented to him by someone within the Kubby campaign.
The entry thus stands as-is, and I am still happy to post any later revision of the interview when it is made available.
ElNinosMom,
If you’re going to keep the “interview” up, you’re going to. However, saying that you have no reason to believe that the responses weren’t written by Steve Kubby is like saying that you have no reason to believe that someone didn’t store Mao Zedong’s mummified corpse under your bed while you were out shopping yesterday.
The fact that you don’t have reason to believe that Kubby didn’t write the responses doesn’t mean that you do have reason to believe that he did write them, much less that if he did they were intended for public display — and the notion that disproof of either possibility would necessarily rely on Paulie being dishonest is incorrect.
BTW, Andy, here’s a chance to put your money where your mouth is on 9/11. Surf’s up at:
http://knappster.blogspot.com/2007/07/truth-is-out-there-but-is-it-waaaaaay.html
Whether this was “intended for public display” is completely and utterly irrelevant. It’s not as if I received it in a private email and published it without permission, after all. I received it from the public blog of a Kubby supporter in a position to receive legitimate documentation from the Kubby campaign, and I posted it at that person’s request. Even you have admitted that it’s “certainly possible” the answers were written by Kubby. I therefore have no reason whatsoever to doubt its authenticity.
As previously stated, when you come up with a Knappsterized version of this same interview, toss it to me and I’ll be more than happy to publish it on LFV as well.
ElfNinosMom,
Remind me to see if I can get a sample of your Victoria’s Secret wardrobe from your dry cleaner. After all, that dry cleaner is in a position to receive legitimate lingerie from you.And whether or not is is intended for public display is completely and utterly irrelevant, right?
ENM, would it be so bad to take the interview down until they’ve completely finalized it? I’m sure they’d do the same for us.
Knapp is a friend of LFV – I think we could do him this solid.
Tom,
I did not make up any answers from Steve, I published exactly what I received in my email and later also confirmed with Steve by phone.
I just got back from work and found several statements from you on various blogs that indicate you believe that I faked Steve’s answers, after I already told you that I hadn’t.
I don’t think you really believe that since we discussed this extensively yesterday and Steve would have presumably told you if that had happened, or I certainly would have if he hadn’t.
I have never put words in Steve’s mouth and don’t intend on starting.
If your level of trust in me is that low, feel free to remove me from the campaign organization chart and redirect campaign inquiries to yourself, Steve, or anyone else you wish.
After we talked I got an email from Steve saying that I should not publish it. I told him I had already published it, other people had already published and linked it elsewhere, and that I would put up a disclaimer and put up a corrected version when it became available.
Steve’s response was “perfect.”
Here is the disclaimer.
==============================
Whoops!
This is a preliminary version of the answers and is being redone. I was not aware of that at the time when I posted this on my blog. I will publish an updated version when it has been finalized and made available.
This turned out to be a preliminary version and I should not have published it, especially ahead of the interviewer. I was unaware that it was an unfinished product.
The final version will go into more detail, and correct some possible wrong impressions based on overly hasty preliminary answers.
========================================
This leaves plenty of room for a more nuanced answer later.
Here is what I said on your blog.
=======================================
The quote is authentic. However, I’ve posted a notice:
(notice printed above quoted)
I asked Steve about this and he said he is not a 9/11 expert and should not have made such a definitive and categoric statement. He has some questions about the official story, and it sounded like he may be in favor of a new and more independent investigation. We’ll see what he says when he publishes a final version of the interview.
=========================================
Your reply:
Quoth Paulie,
“The quote is authentic.”
That remains to be seen.
[...]
The first time the campaign’s communications director — me — saw this “interview” was when it popped up on Paulie’s site, and I have reasonable doubts as to whether or not the statements in it even originated with the candidate himself.
========================
Paul) Now, I admit I screwed up in publishing this before I should have, however, I did not fake anything and I don’t really want to work with people who think I did.
I was not aware that we had a policy that interviews have to be vetted by you. First I’ve heard of it, or at least as far as I remember.
I think removing it now would only make us look less honest and in any case I have no control over what ENM or anyone who may have saved or cached it in the meantime does.
Last word from Steve was that the disclaimer solved the problem, so I’ll do what he says.
By the way, Andy is a friend of mine and is one of the top activists in the Libertarian Party. He was also endorsing Steve for the LP nomination before this interview ever came out and he is not changing his previous statement that he supports Ron Paul, but considers Steve the best candidate in the LP race.
Speaking of which, your over the top (by your admission) attacks against Ron Paul are working against Steve in the LP, despite your disclaimer that you are not speaking on his behalf on that. Unless you have a REALISTIC plan to sign up a LOT of new LP members, *get them selected as delegates and get them to Denver*, this is going to backfire against us way, way more than calling for a more independent investigation of 9/11 ever possibly could.
paul
Meg,
Taking it down or not is no big deal, and I certainly wouldn’t ask for it as a “favor.” Since it was already out of the bag, so to speak, taking it down wouldn’t have done the Kubby campaign any great good. This was more a matter of opining that ElfninosMom should make LFV look classy rather than trashy on the matter. But thanks, anyway.
Paulie,
You write:
“I just got back from work and found several statements from you on various blogs that indicate you believe that I faked Steve’s answers, after I already told you that I hadn’t.”
You’ve found no such statement anywhere — or if you have, it was, um, faked. I’ve said no such thing here or anywhere else. Nor, until I received your email (corresponding verbatim, or nearly so, to the comment to which I am replying), have I seen any prior statement to you denying that you had done what I had not accused you of.
“we discussed this extensively yesterday and Steve would have presumably told you if that had happened, or I certainly would have if he hadn’t.”
At no point during that discussion did I ask Steve if he had in fact made the statement as published, nor did he at any point in that discussion assert that he had, in fact, made that statement. I didn’t ask him that question until today, and I have yet to receive an answer to it from him. Since he’s the only one who can answer that question, it remains unanswered.
Neither, during that discussion, did I ask you where you got the copy of the alleged interview that you had published. I had no reason to believe that you had received it from Kubby rather than from, for example, the French web publisher to whom you attribute it on your blog.
At the margins, I thought it possible that for one reason or another Steve had asked you, rather than the usual me, to “rough in” answers for an interview, and that there had then been some kind of miscommunication as to whether it was “finished” or not. But that’s as far as any even tentative assumptions of mine went . Not only have I assiduously avoided accusing you of any dishonest behavior, the idea frankly never really crossed my mind.
At some point, Steve will answer that he made the statement in question, or that he didn’t. I’m fully prepared for him to answer that yes, he did make it — but I’m not going to assume that answer, I’m going to get that answer (or some other answer).
I’m well aware that my attacks on Ron Paul are hurting Kubby. That’s why I have continued to keep open an unconditinal offer of my resignation from the campaign. He’ll take that offer, or he won’t. That’s his call to make. I’ve explained to you elsewhere why I won’t resign with or without his acceptance.
OK, I have an answer from Steve Kubby himself, which I will quote:
“I wrote it. Nobody changed it or influenced me.”
Case closed.
Er, I left off a bit of that statement:
“I wrote it. Nobody changed it or influenced me. It was my late
night response to a 22 year old student in France.”
His view of 9/11 seems to be quite a bit more nuanced than “the US government was behind it.” I expect he’ll speak to that issue at more length — especially if Andy has the balls to try to set up an interview on a 9/11 “Truth” show.
I agree with that… It kind of makes us look obnoxious.
I think all of this says something about the Kubby campaign and the candidate. It all seems a little unprofessional and chaotic.
What does it say about a candidate that has a communications director who believes he is acting in a manner that hurts the candidate but does it anyway?
What does it say about a candidate’s ability to articulate issues that has trouble answering written questions? Kubby needs to be able to talk on his feet.
I’m truly baffled by all of this – Kubby’s original statement, Knapp’s reaction, and Kubby’s statement about a late night response. There is also a lot of discussion that might be best done in private between the interested parties as opposed to being on a public blog.
After all, this statement:
“My biggest fear at the time was that the US government was involved in 9/11 and would use the attack to gut civil rights and the rule of law. I regret that my initial assessment has proven to be correct.”
could be interpreted to mean that Kubby regrets that his initial assessment that government would use the attack to gut civil rights and the rule of law has proven to be correct – as opposed to meaning his initial assessment that 9/11 was an inside job was correct.
I’d hate to see the Kubby campaign implode because of egos, emotions, anger, disorganization, stupid comments, and Ron Paul.
Far more dangerous to the LP than Ron Paul is Root and it is Root that Kubby is running against, not Ron Paul. It would be terrible for the LP and the libertarian movement if Root wins the nomination. Most people realize that Ron Paul is more of an anti-war fusion candidate. Root would be out there as the face of the LP.
Tom Knapp wrote: “This was more a matter of opining that ElfninosMom should make LFV look classy rather than trashy on the matter.”
It’s far more important that ElfNinosMom make LFV look correct on the matter, which is exactly what I have done. I do however find it amusing that someone who would discuss my intimate apparel in a public forum would also suggest that I am the one who is trashy.
Meg wrote: “I agree with that… It kind of makes us look obnoxious”
Sure, my refusing to remove a simple candidate interview – now proven beyond any doubt to be an accurate and legitimate interview answered in Steve Kubby’s own words – makes us look far more obnoxious than …. oh, I don’t know …. maybe Meg falsely and repeatedly, with no proof whatsoever, accusing Stephen Gordon – then an LP official – of stealing money from LP members and being a “fraud”, in this very same forum.
Tom Knapp wrote, on behalf of Steve Kubby; “I wrote it. Nobody changed it or influenced me. It was my late night response to a 22 year old student in France.”
What a huge coincidence, since my post says, “The following interview was conducted by Phil Defer, a French student who has been interviewing US presidential candidates for his forum.”
I have to say, I feel completely vindicated. That’s mostly because I have been completely vindicated, by none other than the candidate himself.
ElfNinosMom,
“I do however find it amusing that someone who would discuss my intimate apparel in a public forum would also suggest that I am the one who is trashy.”
What I was suggesting was that perhaps I should do what you had just done — procure and display other people’s private material in public.
There are, of course, big differences, the main one being that I know your undergarments are private — you didn’t know the interview notes you published were private until after you had published them.
I didn’t expect that you’d “un-publish” the interview notes after being informed that they were not for publication, but it didn’t hurt to ask.
Ouch. But your analogy isn’t really apt. In my circumstance, I was asking questions that had gone unanswered for over a year. If I’d immediately started using the F word (fraud) after just a few days after LibertyMix was announced, instead of like 18 months, then you might have something. Or if they promised the interview a year ago and raised $10,000 to pay for it, but the interview was never delivered, and both the interviewer and interviewee refused to comment on where the money was – you see what I mean. Then your analogy would make sense.
In any case, I’m not calling YOU obnoxious. I just want to know what harm would be done in respecting their requests?
Sorry but this has to be the most retarded set of comments I’ve ever seen here at LFV. Keep the interview up unless Kubby himself requests that it be taken down.
Whose requests Meg?
After we talked I got an email from Steve saying that I should not publish it. I told him I had already published it, other people had already published and linked it elsewhere, and that I would put up a disclaimer (see above) and put up a corrected version when it became available.
Steve’s response was “perfect!”
Taking it down now would just make us look like we are engaging in a coverup. Other people already have it saved, linked and cached. One guy I know has already told me he’ll print it and promote it if we take it down.
He’ll spin it as a coverup and try to make it a big story. Bad idea.
There is nothing all that wrong with the interview, the answers were just too short and some may have inadvertently created a false impression. Tom Blanton suggests one plausible alternative reading of the most controversial response.
Hopefully there will be a corrected, expanded and updated version soon, and we’ll post that. Please stop making a non-issue into an issue.
I’ll put it to you this way…
Since Steve hasn’t made it to Michigan yet, the only way I get info about Steve Kubby’s campaign is either via his website, various interviews & blogs such as Last Free Voice. I read the interview and it didn’t strike me as being the least bit unusual. However, Knapp making a huge stink over this is the reason why I keep saying that Knapp is causing more harm to Kubby’s campaign than good.
When someone like W.A.R ends up getting the nomination, I’m going to say to Knapp “Maybe you should have toned it down a notch”
Does Steve Kubby have to get Tom Knapp’s permission to go to the bathroom?
It sounds like Knapp should do the Kubby campaign a favor by resigning.
Jason,
I’m not sure how:
“The proper thing to do would be to de-publish it, since it was not intended for publication in the first place.”
… is a “huge stink.”
I don’t think it really take a lots of “balls” to try to set up a radio interview. What I was talking about which would take a lot of balls is to put together a public debate about 9/11. I’ve been thinking about trying to put something together like this for the LP National Convention in 2008, or perhaps some other venue(s). I’ve put out this challenge several times and so far there haven’t been any takers. I could still try to put something together and if nobody accepts the challenge to debate on the side of the official government story then the event could simply turn into a symposium on 9/11.
As far as me getting Steve Kubby on a radio show that talks about 9/11 Truth such as The Alex Jones Show or The Power Hour with David vonKleist, it’s not like I really know any of these people. I met Alex Jones in person very briefly at a 9/11 conference but I don’t think that he’d remember me. I also briefly met Jack Blood and the guys from Loose Change at the same conference but I don’t think they’d remember me either. I’ve never met David vonKleist. So it’s not like I’ve really got any “inside tracks” to get Steve Kubby on any of these shows. You and Steve Kubby as well as anyone else from the Kubby campaign would have about as much of a chance as I would of getting Steve on a radio show.
Also, it should be noted that most of these shows are supporting Ron Paul for President, and it should also be noted that the Steve Kubby campaign hasn’t done that much yet. I’m not saying that Steve Kubby couldn’t or shouldn’t get any coverage, I’m just saying that as of now the campaign hasn’t done much to where radio shows are going to be beating down his door for an interview.
Would I like to see Steve Kubby get on these radio shows? Sure. In fact, I would be willing to help try to get him on some shows. I’m just pointing out that I don’t really have much in the realm of “inside tracks” to get him on any shows. It’s not like I can call up Alex Jones and say, “Hey Alex, book Steve Kubby for your show next week.”
I obviously believe that Steve Kubby’s instincts about 9/11 are correct. My advice to him would be to spend more time studying the issue. I sent him an e-mail with a bunch of links to videos and articles that I think contain some of the best evidence that points to 9/11 having been an inside job. I hope that Steve Kubby takes the time to examine each of these links and that he checks out other sources as well.
As I’ve said before, the 9/11 Truth Movement has grown rapidly over the past 5 years and 10 months since 9/11/01. During the same time period the Libertarian Party has shrunk. 9/11 Truthers are more open to “third parties” than most of the rest of the general public and are particularly more to the Libertarian Party due to the fact that they are already distrustful of government.
Steve Kubby questioning the official government story about 9/11 and calling for a real investigation is not going to hurt anything because people who’d be offended by that are not likely to vote Libertarian anyway. The people who do question 9/11 are the people who we want, and this group of people is growing larger every day.
Andy,
Not only do I have a standing offer in to resign, I’ve urged Kubby to take me up on that offer repeatedly. So long as he insists that he requires my assistance on his campaign, however, I’ll continue to be there for him.
Kubby doesn’t need, nor does he request, my “permission” to do anything.
However, the campaign does have some fairly standard procedures. I’m not the only one who sees campaign material before it goes out (Paulie is one of the people who sees most or all of it as well), but I’m one of the people who sees campaign material before it goes out. Every piece that DOES go out goes out because Kubby approves it … but he gets suggestions for improving it FIRST. In this case, a piece got out “into the wild” without having been through that process.
You continue to seem to think that “Tom Knapp doesn’t want Kubby to talk about 9/11.” In point of fact, Kubby has talked about 9/11 before, will talk about 9/11 again, and indeed must be prepared to talk about 9/11 any time he’s asked about it.
This did happen to be the first time that an interview question went to his personal reactions to 9/11. Had the piece been properly “round-robined,” I would not have suggested suppressing the question, because that’s just not something that can really be done. I would have questioned the meaning of his answer to find out what it meant, I would have suggested more clarity of meaning in that answer, and if it means what you think it means, I would have asked him to look at the evidence before going out on that limb.
Now that he is a bit out on that limb, my recommendations are … exactly the same. Before he decides whether to go further out on the limb, or climb back toward the trunk, or saw the limb off behind him, I’ve asked him to go over your laundry list of 9/11 “Truth” material, seriously consider its factual and argumentative merits, come to his own conclusions — and then rigorously test those conclusions in private debate so that he is either prepared to defend them in public debate or to reconsider them.
If he’s a one issue candidate as he claims, this campaign has more problems than Tom Knapp. There are other candidates that hold the same position, so why doesn’t he just throw his support behind one of them? If it is because none of the others jive with him on other positions, he’s no longer a one issue candidate and shouldn’t label himself as one. It’s turning me off and I’m undecided.