Did You Get "Tubed"?!

Submitted to Who-TV, Des Moines Plog.

Did you get “Tubed” on Monday night, July 23, 2007?

I did.

It was inevitable that we would all get politically “Tubed” sooner or later. The YouTube debate in Charleston, South Carolina was a first.

When a “phenom” becomes huge, and it does not get more Gynormous than Google/YouTube, it is inevitable that we try it out on politics. More on this later.

The YouTube event was interesting and it was fun. It was colorful. It was not a debate.

“What you say!?”

That’s correct IT WAS NOT A DEBATE! (Can you hear me now that I’m shouting?).

A debate is “… a process of inquiry and advocacy seeking reasoned judgment on a proposition. Debate allows for two or more sides advocating their positions on a given issues under a set of rules with some kind of judgment to follow from a judge or audience.”

I did not see too many characteristics of a debate on Monday night.

Such as?!

Well, for example Mike Gravel spontaneously catching on fire as he flamed all of his opponents for selling out to big money. That was fun but he does need his medications adjusted.

Most of what happened was not because the questions were video recorded and posted on YouTube as opposed to having the same people ask the same questions in the Citadel auditorium where the event took place.

Most of the interesting stuff happened because when you stick a bunch of presidential wannabes on a stage, things will slip out in unexpected ways – both positive and helpful to candidates and not so good (see Gravel above).

One interesting incident was the question to Senator Clinton on how she would deal with governments where women are not accepted in positions of power and are oppressed such as Muslim countries.

Clinton deftly answered that she has met with many leaders in half of the countries in the world and that she would deal with this issue. The subtext was “If you want to meet me on the street corner tonight I’ll show you how I would deal with these people!”

A second interesting accident happened when a “Tuber” (that’s what we call them even when they are not “… a swollen region of an underground stem or root, usually modified for storing food, such as a potato) asked if Osama Obama would have direct talks with North Korea, Iran, Cuba, Chavez, etc.

Senator Obama said he would. Hillary said she would NOT unless the groundwork had been laid and something significant could come of talking to these Axes of Evil. Edwards said he agreed with Hillary.

That’s why they are ranked Hillary first, Edwards second, and Obama third.

Richardson did a nice job with why we can’t have Starbucks-like, standardized voting systems in every state – except that the real answer is that the US is a FEDERAL system of government so states have a lot of power and we don’t want the failed federal government (think FEMA, US Passport office, Iraq).

The one thing that is just intolerable are the air-heads on CNN who are, - “Oh my GOD, this was so cooeal, like, I LOVED it” – reporters especially the “Internet reporters” who stand in front of a huge plasma screen circling stuff we can’t wee at the receiving end and babbling endlessly about some “stuff” that’s on the new. I guarantee that this is NOT what my students want to see or hear; it is not what smart voters want to see or hear.

Well now that we have been “Tubed” I have some suggestions for CNN.

The next “debate” (NOT!) should be a FaceBook/MySpace debate. We will ask the candidates to post lots of pictures of themselves with their friends late on week end nights at bars and clubs in risqué poses preferably some of them showing their underwear peeking through.

After that I would highly recommend a “breakthrough” debate (NOT!) – a first ever – by having citizens text message (IM’ing) questions directly to each candidate, have CNN cameras hovering over each victim as they try to move their thumbs across the keys and answer in “Text Talk”, abbreviated English – Dennis Kucinich - “U R so rite. I wld pl out of IRQ by Jan. I know how to deal with those 4NR’s arnd the wlrd. Well, BB4N. LOL” (I hear that Apple is already planning an iPhone debate).

Finally, one of my students suggested that we have a “Pres. Candidate. CAN YOU DANCE?!” debate. Each candidate is allowed to choose a partner and do two dance routines – a Salsa/Merengue and a Waltz – and voters choose the winner by voting on-line. After all, these people are going to have to dance with the spouses of foreign leaders at White House receptions and soirees.

I give up!

Why not have “Reality Politics”? - Big Brother, House Guest, Pimp My Candidate (where do-over artists take each candidate and make them have a winning candidate look) and American Idol Candidate .

Oh yeah, by the way, Hillary Clinton won the YouTube show. Again. She can handle any format.