Barack Obama took questions via Twitter at an event yesterday. The queries they posed didn’t impress everyone– Michael Shear of the New York Times wrote:
Most of the Twitter queries were not very tough-minded and gave the president the opportunity to repeat his talking points.
Yeah– leave the question-asking to the professionals, who apparently know how to get politicians to stray from their talking points (anyone who’s ever watched a White House press conference might find this unusual).
The real difference, though, is in what issues are worth asking questions about. On that score, the Twitter users have different priorities than the Beltway media, as this chart published in the Boston Globe makes pretty clear:
As Matthew Yglesias put it, the press likes to ask “process” questions, that mean nothing to most people, who happen to pay closer attention to politiics
because they’re worried about jobs or the environment or energy prices or taxes or something. It’s never because they’re wondering how the president reacted to Steny Hoyer’s remarks about Eric Cantor’s characterization of the Treasury secretary’s statement about the debt ceiling.
But keep in mind that the questions were selected by the people twitter picked. This is the same kind of crap that Youtube pulls, they don’t simply allow the public’s most popular questions be the thing that selects the questions so it really is meaningless. http://youtu.be/sEJTd0oSB7k
I’d assume the truly “tough-minded” tweets were ignored by Dear Misleader.
As the corpress likewise excludes their perspectives, Shear’s remark is merely an exercise in extreme irony, isn’t it?
I think it’s also worth noting that it’s difficult to craft a “tough-minded” question in 140 characters…
Not a bad post, but I’d watch out for Yglesias. He is the shadiest of liberals. One step to the left of Thomas Friedman when times are good…
Here is a great question
Heritage posted a list of things sealed in your records. Unprecedented. Will you today release that list?
Hey TROLL, noone gives a F what you have to say.
Hey Dumbocrat(wastelandmechanic)…..I feel slighted.I care deeply about what YOU say.For instance my mercedes E-550 is making a slight tapping sound on the right front tire.Ever since I hit a pot hole last week.Any ideas? :)