Assessing The Obama Online Town Hall Meeting

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Mar 26 2009, 12:45 pm by Marc Ambinder

I've been critical of the White House New Media office before, but I think they deserve kudos today for instigating and executing the President's first online town hall meeting. (Macon Phillips, the new media director, and Jesse Lee, the online programs director, spent a long time putting this together.) One -- the White House says that Obama wasn't briefed about the questions in advance. Two -- several questions weren't softballs. Three -- the White House web servers had enough bandwith to accomodate the demand. (To test them, I pulled it up simultaneously on several computers without a program.) To the extent that the new media operation got off to a slow start -- not really their fault, for a variety of legal, structural and economic reasons, this event will go a long away toward building that team some institutional credibility within the White House. An administration offficial said that approximately 64,000 people tuned in -- not a huge amount, to be sure, but the multiplier effect of news coverage will expand the audience. MSNBC and Fox News broadcast part of it; CNN is sticking through the whole thing.

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It was an experiment that the White House reportedly liked and could well try again. President Barack Obama held his highly-anticipated online Town Hall and the response was big and positive — and also heavily weighted with people who had lots of... [Read More]

Comments (4)

mjwilstein March 26, 2009 1:02 PM

Glad he brought up the marijuana question, not thrilled with the answer. You can watch that clip here:
http://gotchamedia.blogspot.com/2009/03/obama-not-about-to-legalize-marijuana.html

maxpower March 26, 2009 3:18 PM

the marijuana question is rally a battle that the country may not be ready for. Between Enemy Combatants and Stem Cells, and the contnued nationalization of the Economy, the right has enough ammunition to continue to claim some liberal, socialist agenda.

My forecast is that in term 2, as the econmy is starting to show steady recovery, we'll see the pot tax taking us back into the surplus realm. Not to mention the green jobs from pot farming. Also that a hemp seed contains more energy than corn and sugar combined, which would have a huge impact on potential biodeiesel production and energy production, and renewable fabric and paper products..

Hopefully American society will get to the point of realizing the demonization of marijuana was an impulsive and irresponsible jugment.

24AheadDotCom March 26, 2009 3:23 PM

Good to know that the federal government has mastered keeping their servers functioning. Good news.

Meanwhile, since even members of the MSM or their online contingent are realizing the huge flaws in the voting system they used, Ambinder has clearance:

http://24ahead.com/obamas-open-questions-even-msm-notices-how-bad-it-was

Sunflower Pipes March 30, 2009 3:31 PM

I respect Obama he is a talented politician, President Obama seems to posse’s insightful, reasonable judgment on many issues, although in the case of marijuana prohibition laws I find Obama’s choice to answer with mocking humor to be lacking. Smoking marijuana is an easy thing to laugh about, it seems there is something about being stoned that brings a smile to people’s faces, however marijuana prohibition is not a joke. We should not be making jokes as millions of Americans are arrested for being caught on the wrong side of moral politicking, we should not laugh as we spend over 30 billion dollars a year going after Americans for smoking weed, we should not giggle and poke fun as we watch billions of dollars in tax revenue slip through our fingers each year, and should we not be jolly as thousands of people are murdered by cartels profiting from America’s moral hypocrisy. I believe there are profound latent consequences in prohibition that are not even factored in to our assessments of the effects of illegality, such as how we view the rule of law and the role of law enforcement in the community, the divisiveness between users and non users, the stigma of mental shock of incarceration. I say pot prohibition is no joke it has real costs paid for in real lives. Freedom is achieved in a country by placing responsibility in the hands of the citizen and not by the state legally enforcing morality.

http://SunflowerPipes.com