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candidate, thus avoiding catastrophes like President Benjamin Harrison, elected when sick and dead three months later.

The theme of this reporting is obviously one whom the two present Presidential candidates would like to comment upon...John McCain, at present a losing candidate with a despairing gap between him and victory, looks for a reason to explain his lack of support...he has several times referred to the "press' as his enemy, though to the mind of this reporter, he has been treated more than fairly, though his mistakes (like choice of Sarah Palin as a running mate) have been paraded through the press.

We can make small references to several of our President's attitudes toward the public press controlling them...Washington and Jefferson avoided the press of the time, which was really favorable to them as it consisted alnost entirely of the papers of Benjamin Franklin!

The Boston Presidents were treated very well by the new Northern presses..Abraham Lincoln was treated by the North as a hero and the South as a monster in the current papers of those days.

Theodore Roosevelt, having knocked down graft in New York City, when his President (McKinley) was assassinated and he, the VP, became President, he used the aura of reformer in New York as a platform to be re-elected.

Lyndon Johnson did the same thing, using racial reform.

In conclusion, there is no need for "laws" to hold press conferences. The American press, paper and radio and television and Internet, is Alive and Well. The ancient American belief of looking at the candidates and judging them is still very much in action.

There is no need to violate the Constitution and MAKE a candidate do anyhting except conform to decency and a generl morality.

Eventually, the American people will always choose what they want.

Learn more about this author, William Cobbs.
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