Its a litmus test for ALL the people stood in the primaries or the caucuses in Iowa or after - do they care about democracy for ALL the people stood in these elections.
The DEBATE is where the ideas get their "reality check" - for the media to exclude these two - from "opposite" wings of either party - is where the media fails that reality check, with the "democratic" litmus test that it represents.
The extent that the rest of the rest of those put forward as choices for the leadership of the people of America speak up, to protest these exclusions, to enquire about the "democratic" nature of this media, to include these "outside" voices in the rest of the campaign - or how much they do if/when the situations are the other way around - is the judge of the colour in all those flags - lasting, or "washout later".
Other people stood in these elections also have integrity in their own ways, but havent yet spoken out about this exclusion as they should, you might have thought.
Also . . . . the word "outsider" for these two has inverted commas around it for good reasons. Both these people opposed the Iraq war at the time, Paul sends the taxpayer back a bit of his pay, Kucinich takes a lot of flak - was "thrown out" by the community he worked for, once, for those same people to agree with what he did then, later, with gratitude, with honour.

Check their bio's, see what they say, see what they DID, despite the blocks, the "big bucks", the "opinion-influencers", then perhaps you might re-assess your idea of what the mainstream is. Wiser - at the time - is a GOOD thing.

If there is much good in "representation" in political systems, thats what you have it for.
The fact of the exclusion of these people from those debates is why those that are sceptical of "currently existing democracy". . . . ( "crazies" outside these two parties) are logical in their disgust at what often passes off as democracy these days. The luxury of abstention from all engagement is as stupid as a superior shrug is to the information that the dam over the town is breaking, but there are good reasons why people were "fed up". . . . thought they had seen the "trick question" in the ballot (or the computer tabulator!). So, in future, perhaps, the "what should we all do about it" debates should, in fact, re-include the people that seem to "disinclude" themselves - (the "margins" aint good enough - or free enough, these days ) but if people let this remain the situation, old soldiers, states "founders", old campaigners or predecessors of this people of America might ask what the heck it was all for. . . .
. . . . That goes for all the world, all the worlds cultures too. Its a local democratic debate - for the entire world. If Sweden had the worlds fallback currency, or its taxpayers coughed up for the biggest army in the world, in this sort of dysfunctional dystopic chaos of a global setup, perhaps Lunds local paper could screw things up for the world. Good if the rest of the world was watching THAT too. Cheers. Good luck all. . . . hope the "reminder" is taken in good spirit, as intended - you could pass it, by the wonder of the internet, to a few friends, as a "letter from london" back at you, you might say.
See You
X, etc. . . .