It appears Cudahy Mayor Ryan McCue will not be participating in this week’s primary debate for the Cudahy mayoral candidates on Friday, February 12th 2010 at 7:00 p.m. at the Cudahy Middle School auditorium. In explaining his decision not to participate in Friday’s debate, Mayor McCue indicated he wouldn’t participate for a number of reasons:
- Doesn’t like the length of time for the debate.
- Doesn’t like the debate format.
- Doesn’t like the choice of panelists.
- Doesn’t think enough people will attend.
- Doesn’t like that Randy Hollenbeck is associated with it.
As I read the list of reasons Ryan McCue gave for not wanting to participate in Friday’s debate, I can’t help but notice one reason that’s missing: he doesn’t want to participate because he doesn’t want to have to face Cudahy’s voters before the primary on February 16th.
Zach, where are you getting the first and fourth points in your post from? I read through Mayor McCue’s response to Mr. Hollenbeck, and the only two points I see as valid are the second and third points. The fifth, to a lesser extent; McCue said he wants a debate run by a neutral party, which does not at all seem to be the case for this one.
That said, while I appreciate Mr. McCue’s desire for a neutral venue, I don’t think it’s smart for him to withdraw from this debate. Even if it wasn’t stacked, without him it will likely be a one-sided exercise in slapping an absent body. If he were there, it might convince a few undecided or hesitant voters to give him a vote. They do add up.
To me, it’s too soon to tell how this will play out in the long run, and whether it will effect Mr. McCue in the end. We’ll see!
I got the first and fourth points from Randy’s entry.
As to the debate itself, I’ll just note while Randy Hollenbeck has been more public about his efforts to organize the debate, I’ve been involved in planning as well; in fact, I approached Randy about he and I organizing a debate on behalf of the citizens of Cudahy. This isn’t just Randy’s debate, so while I get McCue’s concerns about bias, that’s my role in things; to act as a counterbalance to Randy.
Also, he claims to do actual face-to-face with voters by doing doors. That rebuts your assertion of his not wanting to “face Cudahy’s voters before the primary…” If he is not doing doors, that’s another matter. But do we have hard proof either way on that?
Jason, Ryan McCue says a lot of things; that doesn’t necessarily make them true. I’ve not seen him knocking on doors in my neighborhood, but perhaps he just hasn’t made it to my part of town yet.