I feel a little bit sorry for Carly Fiorina, losing all her debate partners in the span of two days and all. Not really.
ABC News officially killed the undercard debate for the upcoming Republican debate Saturday night, and set the rules for which candidates would appear on the main stage. Under those rules, Fiorina does not qualify.
So she's thrown herself on the ground and having a bit of a hissy fit over it.
As of today, I will be the only candidate kept off the debate stage. To review, we beat Governors Christie and Kasich in Iowa this week when voters actually had their say. This campaign has the same number of delegates as Governors Bush and Kasich while Governor Christie has zero. We’re ahead of Dr. Carson in New Hampshire polling. We are 6th in hard dollars raised and have twice the cash on hand as either Governors Christie or Kasich. We are already on the ballot in 32 states, and there is a ground game with paid staff in 12 states. Yet, all of these candidates will be invited to the ABC debate. I will not.
Quite frankly, with a caucus, a Democratic town hall, a Democratic debate tonight, and the Republican debate on Saturday, I'm already in this for the long haul. I could definitely survive a little better without Carly Fiorina on the stage.
But the truth is, as long as she's a candidate, what's the harm in putting out an extra podium and inviting her into the debate? It doesn't seem very fair to exclude only her from debating and leave it to the men in the race only. I'm no Carly fan, but I do think they could manage to have an eighth candidate on the stage without doing terrible harm to the process.
As an alternative, perhaps Carly would consider holding an "alternative event" where she raises money for puppies she terrifies?
