Video: Glenn Reynolds and Ana Marie Cox on the CNN YouTube debate
posted at 1:21 pm on July 22, 2007 by Allahpundit
They can go two ways with it — dry, serious queries on niche topics or self-consciously offbeat crap that showcases the “spirit of the Web.” Count on some of both. A teaser:
“There’s not going to be a foolish, gotcha question because we’re not out there to stump,” Bohrman said. “We’re out there to actually see how people who want to be president think and handle issues and questions and people that are slightly outside of their comfort zones.”
“There are questions that we, the journalists, we, the mainstream media, would never think to ask in the presidential debate,” Bohrman said.
It’ll be mighty interesting to see what sorts of questions qualify as ones CNN “would never think to ask.” It sounds like they’re setting it up to embarrass the candidates, which is exactly what they should do. The YouTube voice-of-the-people dynamic gives them perfect cover. They could float “I question the timing” questions about terror attacks, questions about whether the candidates are “troubled” by the extent of Israeli influence on the United States, etc etc, and shrug off the criticism on grounds that that’s what “the people” are interested it. Just one nutroots talking point after another, and if anyone calls them on it they’d simply point to the fact that YouTube skews hard left and call it a representative sample. Their one mistake was letting their own editors choose all of the questions instead of letting the ‘Tubers choose, say, a top ten. That would have let CNN have its cake by inserting some bona fide freak show material into the event and eat it too by disclaiming all responsibility for the choices of YouTube users. Call it an opportunity missed. After all, no one’s watching these things to hear the same canned policy answers they’ve heard before. It’s worthless political theater. Make them perform.
If they air a question from a Truther about 9/11, the whole experiment will have been worth it.
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Obama and McCain both seem itching for it, so that’s reason enough for the Administration. Bipartisanship, folks!
Liam on May 1, 2013 at 10:06 AM
Seems fairly obvious. Wonder why the Obama administration can’t seem to grasp that?
Cleombrotus on May 1, 2013 at 10:07 AM
Heh, “allow”.
This is all Hezbollah bluster. They know from Obama’s speech that he has no appetite for Syrian intervention. So they jump in as “saviors” to take credit, target audience is all middle eastern.
Difficultas_Est_Imperium on May 1, 2013 at 10:10 AM
Nice going, Mr. President.
thebrokenrattle on May 1, 2013 at 10:13 AM
Becasue he’s up for any excuse to arm as many of his Islamist brothers as possible?
tommyboy on May 1, 2013 at 10:16 AM
#FastnFurious2 Yeah, but……Chuck Todd says the Obama has been supplying weapons to Syrian Rebels covertly thru other nations.
Rovin on May 1, 2013 at 10:16 AM
What makes you think he doesn’t grasp that? America’s interests are irrelevant to Obama, so judging his actions based on that is mistaken.
Fenris on May 1, 2013 at 10:16 AM
.
They may not be able to stop that, but they could make the country ungovernable.
Like Detroit, but with more sand, and fewer liquor stores.
LincolntheHun on May 1, 2013 at 10:20 AM
Not sure I agree with you there, Ed. If Hezbollah jumps in on Assad’s side, and more AQ come in to fight against Assad, then there could be, in the end, a significant reduction in the total head count of Muslim extremist nutballs in the region. Let ‘em all kill each other. The only thing we would need to do is support the surrounding (friendly) countries in containing the fighting within Syria.
iurockhead on May 1, 2013 at 10:21 AM
Heh. Good ‘un.
iurockhead on May 1, 2013 at 10:22 AM
So effin what? Jordan is useless too.
abobo on May 1, 2013 at 10:24 AM
Trade conventional weapons to Assad for his chemical weapons. Then give just enough weapons to the rebels so that the civil war continues. I don’t want any winners here.
rbj on May 1, 2013 at 10:24 AM
I agree with you — which is another reason why we shouldn’t get in the middle of that fight. Let’s just stick with bolstering Iraq, Jordan, Turkey, and Israel.
Ed Morrissey on May 1, 2013 at 10:25 AM
Obama is arming al Qaeda in Syria:
Russia delivers new al-Qaida warning to U.S.
petefrt on May 1, 2013 at 10:26 AM
Wasn’t Totten claiming Hezbollah was dead just last week?
Blake on May 1, 2013 at 10:27 AM
We need to contain the fighting to Syria and let as many Shiites and Sunnis kill each other as possible.
Aren’t we better off if they spend their time fighting each other and not us?
Tater Salad on May 1, 2013 at 10:27 AM
Iran is a tiny little country, right Zero?
stvnscott on May 1, 2013 at 10:29 AM
Arm everybody, light the fuse and run like hell.
rhombus on May 1, 2013 at 10:29 AM
should take out Hezbollah instead…
equanimous on May 1, 2013 at 10:31 AM
Obama’s response should be, “There isn’t one American life worth giving if these nutjobs want to kill each other; so have at it and we will be watching with popcorn in hand for a winner”.
Tater Salad on May 1, 2013 at 10:32 AM
Carpet bombing? Or are you proposing BOTG (boots on the ground).
rhombus on May 1, 2013 at 10:32 AM
Sunni vs Shia.
Forget all the bs about dictators, rebels, groups and countries. Don’t concern yourself with borders, allies or intervention.
When you boil all that cr@p out, you’re left with this :
SUNNI vs SHIA.
They have been fighting for over 1,000 years. Modern terms are only fodder for the fight.
Jabberwock on May 1, 2013 at 10:33 AM
If Hezbollah is in Syria isn’t that a good thing? They won’t have time to bomb Israel.
Tater Salad on May 1, 2013 at 10:34 AM
Got that? “..amazement that the US would assist AQ affiliates in Syria while fighting them in Iraq.”
Stupid on steroids.
marybel on May 1, 2013 at 10:34 AM
Christians caught in the middle.
workingclass artist on May 1, 2013 at 10:35 AM
Can we send McCain to Syria with a one-way ticket? He seems to have figured all of this out.
Tater Salad on May 1, 2013 at 10:36 AM
What also galls me is that sequester brought an end to White House tours for American school children, but there’s plenty of money to send arms to Syria to kill their school children.
Liam on May 1, 2013 at 10:39 AM
But didn’t the Iraq Study Group say we should negotiate with Assad and have direct talks with Syria and Iran? Bwahahaha!
rhombus on May 1, 2013 at 10:41 AM
Unfortunately, yes. But in that neck of the woods, not many.
The West AND the Church should just sit this one out. We’ve no dog in the fight.
AQ and Hezb are just proxies for SA and Iran, repectfully. If they want to use Syria as a boxing ring, let ‘em.
Jabberwock on May 1, 2013 at 10:47 AM
Won’t allow? Hezbollah thinks they can “not allow” us?
Either they’ve decided we’re not doing anything anyway and are just posturing, or they’re actually trying to bait us into doing something.
There Goes the Neighborhood on May 1, 2013 at 10:56 AM
If we ramp up our drilling and flood the world with oil – these regimes will collapse. Including Russia and Iran.
America can then hold the rest of the world as hostage to our cheap oil…..
Of course this won’t happen until our tinstar dictator is gone.
You see – Obama thinks America is evil and needs to be cut down to size.
redguy on May 1, 2013 at 10:59 AM
Like nobody on Team Obama expected that…
Think Iran is gonna sit on the sidelines?
Obama doesn’t care how many he kills or gets killed…so long as he can grab a point of two in the polls…in some demographic…or strut his stuff, be representin’, in front of Beyonce and Jay-Z.
Putz.
coldwarrior on May 1, 2013 at 11:01 AM
Obama’spolicies will end in nuclear war. make no mistake about it.
unseen on May 1, 2013 at 11:18 AM
In one corner we have Hezlbollah and Iran. In the other corner we have al-Qaeda, Hamas, and the Muslim Brotherhood.
Just remember guys, there are no rules. Anything goes. Let the fight begin. Ding!
“Pity they can’t both lose” – Henry Kissinger.
farsighted on May 1, 2013 at 11:20 AM
10% of the overall population is Christian from Ancient Churches.
Most of the heavy fighting are in areas with sizable Christian populations.
As to the Church sitting this one out…Don’t think that will happen.
There are a lot of orders from both the Latin Rite and the Orthodox/Oriental Churches that have been there since apostolic times….Many of the orders established during the Byzantine – Medieval eras.
workingclass artist on May 1, 2013 at 11:21 AM
This is our only winning strategy.
What are the odds Dear Leader will screw it up?
farsighted on May 1, 2013 at 11:24 AM
I’ll take a red-line from hezblahblah a lot more seriously than one from the REB.
slickwillie2001 on May 1, 2013 at 11:35 AM
Syria is shaping up to become exactly what post-Saddam Iraq became within a year after he was toppled.
Only this time we are not in the middle of it. Hope it stays that way.
Hope Comrade O isn’t too stupid to remember his own anti-Iraq intervention rhetoric and his continuing harsh criticism. Or was that all just BS shoveled in front of war weary
sheeplevoters who wanted to hear it?farsighted on May 1, 2013 at 11:36 AM
Anyone in Syria would be better than Assad. I’m not saying this lightly as I have family in Israel and Assad being replaced by other groups technically increases the risk of confrontation on that border. While Assad’s replacements will not be peace-loving monks, their best feature is that they are not Assad. The logistical hub for Hizballah and Hamas will be broken. Hamas and Hizballah will be destabilized and severely weakened. With Iran’s strategic partner gone, they will have much less leverage in their nuclear negotiations or their bullying tactics of pro-Western Sunni Muslim Arab states. There could be a hug significant breakthrough in the Arab-Israeli peace talks.
Hizballah needs to get involved in Syria and have its reputation all over the Arab world take even further beating. They will slowly bleed out and be exposed as the Iranian agents and Arab killers that they are, rather than the heroic defenders of the “Palestinians”, which they are not.
I was apprehensive about the US sending in weapons to the Syrian rebels until this morning when I saw the former IDF chief of staff, Gabi Ashkenazi being interviewed on CNN, supporting this position. He also said there are other options available, such as a no-fly zone over some parts of Syria. In that context, by all means, arm away.
AlexB on May 1, 2013 at 12:05 PM
I posted many times that as soon as the jihadis are done with Syria they are heading straight for Jordan. I sure hope there are people in government smart enough to know this. We don’t want to lose our ally King Abdullah. The jihadis goal is Jerusalem.
OxyCon on May 1, 2013 at 12:06 PM
My primary physician is Jordanian. He took his family back to Jordan this year for Christmas. (He and his whole tribe back in Jordan are Christian.) I asked him about Jordan when he got back, and he claimed that Jordan was the most stable country aside from Israel in the Middle East.
I don’t know if he was sticking up for Jordan because he is Jordanian or if he genuinely believed his own words, but he was very emphatic about Jordan’s short-term and long-term stability.
catsandbooks on May 1, 2013 at 12:06 PM
It’s the least worst way to do it.
Who said they’ll be in charge? They’ll form some sort of rag-tag insurgency which will be put down within a year. This is not Libya or Somalia. The make up and uniqueness of Syria would make it easier to do.
Al-Qaeda has access to naval ports already. And Air ports as well. They’re individual people who don’t wear uniforms, remember?
—————
One thing that people don’t talk about is what do the countries neighbouring Syria want. We all know Israel would love to have Assad deposed, even via sending weapons to the rebels. What about the Arab states? Well, they’ve been sending weapons to the rebels from the very beginning.
The US should have sent weapons to the Syrian rebels from the very beginning as well. That would’ve gained much favour with them, saved tens of thousands of lives, enabled a quicker success and prevented AQ infiltration. There is still time to salvage those potential gains.
AlexB on May 1, 2013 at 12:16 PM
Just for the record…while the United States is nearly $17 TRILLION in debt, while our Preident/Congress inflicts self-inflicted Sequestration hardship on us, while we cut funding for our military/vets, while we don’t take care of our own homeless/hungry/abuse/elderly….This administration/Government continues to dole out tax-payer dollars to the following in the designated amounts:
Hamas – $351 M
Libya – $1.45 B
Egypt – $397 M (+$2 B for 24 F-16 fighters & 200 Tanks)
Mexico – $622 M
Russia – $380 M
Haiti – $1.4 B
Jordan – $463 M
Kenya – $816 M
Sudan – $870 M
Nigeria – $456 M
Uganda – $451 M
Congo – $359 M
Ethiopia – $981 M
Pakistan – $2 B
South Africa – $566 M
Senegal – $698 M
Mozambique – $404 M
Zambia – $331 M
Kazakhstan – $304 M
Iraq – $1.08 B
Tanzania – $554 M
(* M = Million // B = Billion)
easyt65 on May 1, 2013 at 1:01 PM
The numbers I provided are what is listed on the government’s own reports as having already given to or has been promised to be given to these nations in the future….
That total cost is a reported $15,165,000,000….which is OVER $15 TRILLION…
easyt65 on May 1, 2013 at 1:10 PM
So we could cut off aid to every single one of those places, most of which are utter cr@pholes, continue giving aid to the NeoCon’s favorite nation and STILL save enough money to pay off the national debt???
Ho. Lee. Crap.
MelonCollie on May 1, 2013 at 2:47 PM
Can you say Benghazi?
riddick on May 1, 2013 at 3:28 PM
Your physician is right. Although all bets may be off if Syria falls and religion of peace starts looking for another country to conquer.
riddick on May 1, 2013 at 3:44 PM
I can’t hear you Mr. Kerry.
diogenes on May 5, 2013 at 10:08 PM