Tonight's YouTube Debates More Of The Same?

Call it what you want – I call it "baby steps along the road to a more participatory democracy" – the Republican candidates for President of the United States will be duking it out tonight on CNN, answering questions submitted via YouTube. But don't expect a game of hardball.

What the questions lack in the gotcha factor, they may not make up for in, well, gravitas, either. Though CNN has called many of the questions "
So it loses a bit of sobriety in exchange for a chance at real, (filtered) public interaction outside of Iowa and New Hampshire. It's a start, in some direction, at least, as long as our potential leaders and facilitators know how to behave.

Which is debatable, too.

CNN's Anderson Cooper, the moderator of tonight's, well, show, was roundly criticized last time for not holding the candidates' feet to the fire when they dodged questions or gave their standard not-an-answer answers to some tough questions. But perhaps the criticism that stung the most was the after-the-fact revelation that CNN jellyfished on more positive note:

"The core concept behind these debates is to let real questions from real people drive the dialogue. The power of YouTube is that it lowers the barrier to entry to engage in the political process, and levels the platform for political discussion. It used to be that a voter had to live in Iowa, New Hampshire, or Florida to engage with the candidates at this stage of the campaign, but YouTube has broken down those barriers, and has brought more transparency and access to the political dialogue than ever before. We think that politics will never be the same (thankfully)."