Washington ? Charles Jay is not participating in the 2004 presidential debates and there is a good reason for it.

Like independent candidate Ralph Nader, Jay, the presidential nominee of the Personal Choice Party and his vice-presidential running mate, porn star Marilyn Chambers Taylor, have not achieved the average 15 percent threshold computed from five pre-selected national polls to qualify for participation in the debates.

Nor have Nader and Jay gained access to the minimum number of state ballots to ensure either would have a mathematical chance of acquiring a majority of the electoral votes in the election.

By the time the planning was being completed for the presidential debates, Nader was not yet officially on the ballot in such states as California, New York, Illinois, Texas, Florida, Ohio, Louisiana, Oklahoma, North Carolina, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Colorado, Kentucky, Oregon, Utah, Tennessee, Arizona, Kansas, Hawaii, and Rhode Island.

With his national polling numbers far less than the 15 percent minimum and his August ballot access mathematically impossible for him to win a majority of the electoral votes, Nader was ineligible to participate in the debates.

However, if the egalitarian candidacy desires of Nader were the rule, Marilyn Chambers Taylor would be debating Nader’s running mate, Peter Camejo, as well as Sen. John Edwards and Vice President Dick Cheney at the single vice-presidential debate, scheduled for Oct. 5 in Cleveland.

Nader, a somewhat tragic Quixotic figure whose life has been reduced to chasing political windmills, is predictably crying foul over his not being included in the debates. Nader claims that the political duopoly of the Republicans and Democrats that control the Commission on Presidential Debates is unfair to third-party candidates.

Yet, on this point, Nader seems to have convenient amnesia. In 1992, third-party presidential candidate H. Ross Perot was very much part of the debates as was his vice-presidential candidate, retired Adm. James Stockdale.

That was because Perot played by the rules, and rules are anathema to Nader. Some of Perot’s poll numbers, in some cases more than 30 percent, were well in excess of the 15 percent requirement set forth by the debate commission.

And unlike Nader this year, Perot qualified for the ballot in all 50 states. In 1996, Perot’s poll numbers fell dramatically short of 15 percent and he was not invited to participate in the debates between President Clinton and Sen. Bob Dole.

Nader’s campaign is not only a fringe candidacy but its financial sources are also suspect. Nader feels that conservative Republican, corporate and anti-choice dollars are coming into his campaign because right-wing donors might actually vote for Nader in November. Nader fails to realize that Republican money is being showered on him in order to take votes away from Kerry and ensure the re-election of Bush and Cheney.

Sorry, Ralph, but this year you’re going to have to sit out the debates with other “off-Broadway” presidential candidates.

But you should have an interesting time commiserating with your fellow fringe candidates who include such players as fellow independent Joseph “Average Joe” Schriner of Ohio, the Light Party’s Da Vid of California, Party X hopeful Darren Karr of Oregon, and United Fascist Union standard-bearer Jack Grimes of Pennsylvania.

— Wayne Madsen is a senior fellow at the Electronic Privacy Information Center (www.epic.org). Readers may write to him at EPIC, 1718 Connecticut Ave. NW, Suite 200, Washington, D.C. 20009.