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HenchPAC NewsWASHINGTON - CNN is calling its session with Hillary Rodham Clinton in Amherst tonight a "town meeting," but the encounter at the University at Buffalo will be anything but open and spontaneous. UB alumnus Wolf Blitzer, anchor of Cable News Network's "The World Today," will moderate the one-hour meeting with the first lady and Democratic candidate for U.S. senator from New York.
CNN personnel allocated about half the 350 tickets to UB students for "The New York Senate Race: A Late Edition Town Meeting," which will air live at 10 p.m. on CNN and WNED-TV.
The UB administration asked 28 student clubs and organizations to select students who would receive those tickets, according to Dean of Students Barbara Ricotta. All the names submitted by the student groups were given to CNN.
Questions from university students have been screened by CNN staff members.
The remainder of the tickets were distributed by the network to community groups to ensure a variety of questions, said CNN spokeswoman Kelly Keane. She did not identify the groups, which were selected by CNN.
An Associated Press reporter and an AP photographer will be admitted to the Katharine Cornell Theatre auditorium, Keane said. Other media, including editors of the university's student newspaper, the Spectrum, will be barred from the auditorium. They will view it on monitors in a media center in another building.
"The whole screening process makes a bad statement for any politician to feel that they have to screen their questions so heavily," said Beena Ahmad, the Spectrum's editor in chief.
"It indicates that you are not prepared to answer to some kind of question or not prepared to stand firm with your platform. (Clinton) would rather have these prepared answers, which aren't going to say a whole lot to the public.
"It's a much better message to send to the public that you're willing to take on the questions - you're willing to stand up to the heat if it exists, you're willing to be completely candid - and that you're not going to limit yourself to prepared responses."
Ricotta declined to say why Spectrum reporters were denied admittance. "I am not having this conversation," she said.
UB officials emphasized that CNN was in control of all arrangements for the live broadcast.
Eileen Cain, spokeswoman for UB, said CNN is paying a rental fee for use of the theater. Several UB students said university administrators who offered them tickets also gave CNN the students' telephone numbers.
One student, Eric J. Judka, said: "A representative of CNN contacted me. They asked if I would be interested in asking a question. They said they would be contacting me between 4 and 5 (o'clock) to ask me the nature of the question."
"I was asked if I was a registered New York State voter or not and what I was registered under, whether a Republican or Democrat."
Keane said, "We're encouraging all audience members to ask questions, and we're reviewing them for balance, to avoid repetition. "Every different question from every different demographic and every different voter group and every different social group - that's a fair town meeting."
New York City Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, Clinton's Republican opponent in the Senate race, was invited to take part in a similar town meeting with Blitzer, CNN said, but the time and place of the event was left open.
Giuliani spokeswoman Caroline Nolan said the network "gave us only one day - Thursday - and we were already scheduled for another event." Nolan said Giuliani will appear on MSNBC's "Hardball" program with host Christopher Matthews on May 3 at Rochester Institute of Technology.
CNN maintained that the Clinton campaign made no special demands on the network in terms of audience or location in exchange for the Democratic candidate's willingness to take part in tonight's event.
A town meeting held by Clinton as part of her listening tour at the former Philip Sheridan School in the Town of Tonawanda in August raised some eyebrows when it was disclosed that the audience had been handpicked by influential local Democrats.
HENCH adds: Hell, she can't get stumped by a question about Bill's raping or other crimes, like Al got stuck with. It's all the VRWC's fault.
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