Excellent diary.

keep talking about how they are asking the "hard questions".  No, they were asking the stupid questions and the inane questions, and "beating a dead horse" questions.

Hard questions would be things like pressing them for details about how we are going to deal with global warming, or details about how we are going to get out or Iraq.

These questions came from the likes of Hannity and other idiot, thug, demagogues who have controlled the debate through FOX and AM radio for the last decade.

The Obama-nation / netroots uprising that followed ABC's execrable debate performance should be an arrow through the heart of the age of Thugocrat pundit hegemony.

That age should pass into the bone heap of history with Americans. Decent Americans will dance on that grave.

"Set-up" and the entire hullabaloo over Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopolous and ABC miss the entire point.  Does the "character" of a candidate for the President of the United States make any difference?  Is "character" an issue that should be debated and discussed?  Repeatedly in past debates and in interviews we have been fully exposed to the positions of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton on the political, social and policy issues of the day.  It is old news to hear, once again, that he supported this before she did or she has taken a stronger stand than he did.  We know all of this and it is not going to persuade anyone.  What has not been fully explored is the "character" of the candidates?...what are their fundamental beliefs?...how would they react to a crisis?...who can I trust to implement their campaign promises?  These are legitimate questions that people need to know and not just what someone thinks they should know.

This entire hullabaloo has arisen because finally Barack Obama is being asked to expose his "character".  When Hillary Clinton and John McCain are asked similar questions,  it is the "public's right to know" that rules, but somehow it is unfair to ask Mr. Obama these questions.  Barack Obama was given the opportunity to close out any controversy over his association with various people and he failed.  That tells me a lot about his "character".        

does whether or not Barack Obama wheres a "flag pin" or knows someone in his neighborhood who was in the Weather Underground when Obama was 8 years old have anything to do with his "character?"  Right, it doesn't.  Now, if you want to talk about Charlie Gibson's and George Stephanopoulos' character, that could be an interesting discussion.

Isn't this the same crowd who told us there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? Look at who is paying these folks.

Yes, character is important.

The question is do questions like this really help illuminate the question of character for voters? I submit they do not. By their very nature, they simplify and sensationalize the matter at hand, and not only fail to tell us anything about an individuals character, but actually distort their character.

For example, with Ayers, the implication of the question is that Obama either lacks the judgment to know that terrorism is wrong or the character to care about terrorist acts.

I mean, neither of these are even close to the truth, and I would submit that if you think they are, then discussing the issue with you is a waste of time.

Human relationships of all kinds, from casual encounters in the street to family and choices we make with respect to spiritual advisors, are all complex. If you run for president, by all means, lets examine them for hints of what the reveal about the character of the person we will elect.

But questions like this merely trivialize and simplify complex issues that deserve deeper examination. As a result, they do more harm than good.

To put it in stark terms, well, okay, Obama had some dealing with this Ayers fellow. I'd bet my last dollar that Dick Cheney would never do so. How would you compare the character of those two?

The only thing these questions demonstrate is how will a candidate can cope with idiotic questions. Nothing more. Nothing less.  

"I would submit that if you think they are, then discussing the issue with you is a waste of time."

I also very much liked, "The only thing these questions demonstrate is how will a candidate can cope with idiotic questions."

Good job, Aznew. :)

then Hillary would have been asked why she has chosen Douglas Coe as her spiritual advisor. Coe is the head of a religio-political group appropriately called "The Family", or "The Fellowship". They are headquartered right here in DC. The group includes the most right wingers of the right, mostly people seeking a religious justification of their own lust for power. Coe's group supports many dictatorships across the world. Coe himself has praised Adolf Hitler. He advocates a type of Theocratic imperialism.

I think the Bosnia question to Clinton was just a screen to make it seem like they were being fair. There is enough dirt on Clinton to make mud pies for a month, yet it seems that most of the historical research has been done on Obama. Even with all the investigations done on the Clintons, some of the worst stuff has never come out.

I think this understates Hillary's problem.

Douglas Coe has done more than praise Hitler. He has actually channeled the spirit of Hitler at the same time Hillary Clinton was channeling the spirit of Eleanor Roosevelt. They then had sex, which was Hitler's way of getting revenge on FDR.

It's all well-documented.  

I'm not sure you are serious, but Hillary is on record as lavishing praise on Coe.

:)

We have now come full circle, and I agree with aznew.  (In fairness, that's not the same thing as saying that aznew agrees with me.)  The closest thing Hillary Clinton had to a spiritual adviser was her former pastor in Little Rock, Edward Matthews, or perhaps Philip Wogaman, a Methodist pastor at Foundry UMC in D.C.  Rev. Wogaman has the distinction of having been attacked as a fire-breathing radical by Cal Thomas many years ago.  (You know those Methodists, always leading the charge for the left-wing, radical fringe element.  Except when they're not.)  Clinton never transferred her UMC membership to D.C., and still belongs to the Methodist church in Little Rock, where she has not lived for 16 years.

By the way, both Rev. Wogaman's successor at Foundry and her former pastor in Little Rock have defended Rev. Jeremiah Wright, whom Hillary Clinton recently went out of her way to attack again.  You would have thought she had learned something from the Wogaman attack....

It seems to me that there are more important things to worry about than whether or not Clinton in fact attended church on Easter, exactly which sermons Obama did or did not hear, and why either of them did not get up and walk out of church or a prayer group the first time they disagreed with anything the pastor said.  Christian preachers routinely say things that people disagree with; that's their job.  They hang out with all kinds, too.  They can answer for their own words and beliefs; they do not need political candidates to explain them.  Both Clinton and Obama are adults whose views were fully formed before they ever met Coe, Wright, Matthews, or Wogaman.  These kinds of inquisitions are best left to Republicans, who have much more explaining to do.

You were able to find the words to state it intelligently, while all I could do was sputter in mocking indignation.

I was at an event recently where I heard a famous talking head talking about how much money the networks were making off this protracted conflict.  Ratings are through the roof for this timeframe as everyone tunes in for every gaffe.

The longer this conflict goes on, the more money the networks make.  They have a vested stake in perpetuating this conflict.

Consider that next time you watch the nightly news or MSNBC.

it builds more visibility for the talking heads, who can then get speaking gigs at thousands per pop.

That was the original purpose of the various roundtable shows like Agronsky and Company and the McLaughlin Group -  the regulars were able to portray themselves as experts on all kinds of stuff and then go get gigs an 5-10K a pop.  

There are conflicts all over the place.  And most people do not realize it.

controlled media events called debates.  Even more so after looking at who sponsored these events and what questions were not asked: specifically big energy (coal mostly) sponsoring and not much in the way of environment and energy questions.  Hmmmm.  Coincidence?  I don't think so.

And I would caution about completely buying into the LWV.  I'm sure most of their debates are well structured and fair, but after attending the Smyth/Hall primary debate in person last year I can say in no uncertain terms that the LWV is not necessarily the savior here.  They sponsored and ran that one and it was the worst sham of a debate I have ever seen - all due to the LWV representative in charge.

for president, and did a very even-handed job in those days... but it was so even-handed, not to say stilted, that the Republicans categorically refused to have anything more to do with them (and, as usual, began attacking the League the same way they have done with the ACLU and Amnesty International).  Therefore, I seriously doubt the League will be acceptable to the Republicans again. I personally believe it is in fact the Republican demands (full control of the debate on their terms, or no debate at all) that have brought us to the non-debate debates we now have, and is the same sort of manipulation or gaming of the system we see in re-districting, vote-counting, and voter suppression.

Therefore, who could run  the debates, any debates including intra-party primary debates? Negotiating the terms could be like bringing the Israelis and the Palestinians together.