Candidate plans to answer debate queries via Internet

"Give 'em hell, Mike Gravel."

It is the earthy message that rhyming bloggers are delivering via the Internet to the presidential candidate who has been excluded from tonight's CNN debate at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, because of lackluster fundraising.

"I get the message," the 77-year-old Gravel told the Review-Journal Wednesday.

The former two-term U.S. senator from Alaska, who has loudly noted during earlier debates that he's frightened by some of the other Democratic candidates, said supporters like Stabbone and McGraw, authors of "An Anti-Mayonnaise Blog," need not worry.

He will, he said, "Give 'em hell."

"People need to hear what the military industrial complex is doing to this nation," Gravel said. "My message will get out."

So he can't be silenced, Gravel, with the help of a digital video recorder, will answer questions that will be put to the Democratic candidates by a CNN panel.

"If people go to my Web site, they'll be able to see me," he said.

While the seven other Democratic presidential candidates will be at UNLV, Gravel will be holed up in a room with a TV set at Paris Las Vegas. When a question is asked that he wants to answer, he'll freeze the video and answer it. After he's done, the debate will again go forward.

Gravel's debate with the TV will be available as it happens on his Web site, www. gravel2008.us.

One of Gravel's most popular campaign videos shows him staring fiercely into the camera for two minutes without speaking.

"We need to try new things in this nation," he said.

David Bohrman, CNN senior vice president and Washington bureau chief, said one of the criteria to be invited to the debate was to have raised at least $1 million in campaign donations. Gravel had raised about $240,000 through Sept. 30.

"This is corporate censorship sanctioned by the Democratic Party," Gravel said. "It's embarrassing."

Gravel was also shut out of a recent debate in Philadelphia.

"I rented a room for about $20,000 there to use the Internet but I really didn't know how to use the technology," Gravel said. "Now I do."

Gravel won't have to use streaming video on the Internet to spread his message during the Clark County Democrat's Jefferson Jackson dinner at Paris Las Vegas that follows the UNLV debate.

"I will challenge the Democrats for not challenging corporate censorship, for not saying we can't go to war in Iran," he said. "I am proud that the Clark County Democrats have allowed me to be on equal footing. I have to speak up."

Contact reporter Paul Harasim at pharasim@reviewjournal.com or (702) 387-2908.