the whole "youtube debate" is stupid. the cnn editors just weed through the questions and cherry-pick the ones they wanted asked. it is no more "questions from the people" than if dan rather was moderating the debate.

now, if the youtube community could vote for their top 100 questions and then CNN would pick from there, it would actually mean something

otherwise its nothing more than blatant marketing for youtube

8/8/2007 7:31:20 AM

i would agree that youtube users should be able to select the questions.
but the way it is is no worse than CNN picking the questions for a normal debate, and you'll still get more variety because the pool of questions is so much larger than if CNN editors made some up

8/8/2007 7:38:43 AM

“Historic Democratic Presidential Forum”

Quote :

"The forum, to be held in Los Angeles, is co-sponsored by the Human Rights Campaign, a gay-rights group that has become increasingly influential in Democratic politics, and by Logo, the gay-oriented cable channel that will provide a live telecast and Internet simulcast. Every Democratic candidate except Joe Biden and Chris Dodd plans to participate. Human Rights Campaign president Joe Solmonese will serve as a panelist, along with singer Melissa Etheridge and Washington Post editorial writer Jonathan Capehart."

Quote :

"Logo, available in about 27 million homes, offered to hold a second forum for Republican candidates, but the GOP front-runners — less supportive of gay-rights initiatives than the Democrats — showed no interest, said Logo general manager Lisa Sherman. The Democrats will appear sequentially at 15-minute intervals during the two-hour forum, never sharing the stage with one another. All of them support a federal ban on anti-gay job discrimination, favor repeal of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy barring gays from serving openly in the military and support civil unions that would extend marriage-like rights to same-sex couples. But thus far, only two longshots — Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio and former Alaska Sen. Mike Gravel — have endorsed nationwide recognition of same-sex marriage, which a majority of Americans oppose. "No viable mainstream contender for president is going to support gay marriage in this election cycle," said Ethan Geto, an adviser to Hillary Rodham Clinton on gay-rights issues. "I hope that's going to change in the next couple of elections." Geto suggested that Clinton's hesitancy on same-sex marriage stemmed from her religious upbringing. Yet he also described her as a passionate supporter of other gay-rights causes who is willing to raise those issues even before non-gay audiences. One of Clinton's chief rivals, John Edwards, has acknowledged wrestling with his stance on gay marriage. "I feel enormous conflict about it," he said in a televised debate in July. "This is a very, very difficult issue for me." He noted that his wife, Elizabeth, broke ranks with him in June and publicly endorsed same-sex marriage. The third Democratic front-runner, Sen. Barack Obama, belongs to the United Church of Christ, which supports gay marriage, but Obama has yet to go that far."

Quote :

"Many gays and lesbians have submitted questions they would like posed at the forum; Charlene Strong of Seattle said she'd like to be there in person. Her longtime partner, Kathryn Fleming, died in December after being trapped by floodwaters, and Strong was initially barred from the hospital room because she was not considered immediate family. "I'd like the candidates to spell it out — what would you do to be sure that doesn't happen," Strong said. "How do you get to full equality?”"

Quote :

"However, Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., one of two openly gay members of Congress, said he understood the candidates' caution. "It's not wrong for people trying to become president to take political considerations into account," Frank said. "I don't want a bunch of martyrs on my side." Among the Republicans, none of the candidates favor repeal of "don't ask, don't tell" and only former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani has supported limited legal recognition for same-sex couples. "

It can be watched here online at 9
http://visiblevote08.logoonline.com/

Here’s the very long yahoo news article I quoted from.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070808/ap_on_re_us/politics_gays;_ylt=Akgn6vRQgNzqMcOap_sqRpCyFz4D

A much shorter article on cnn b/c its just part of the political ticker. The CNN articles link is entitled “Ticker: Gay forum: Dems are here, get used to it”
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2007/08/09/dems-set-for-gay-forum/

I think its interesting that Obama is being more conservative than his church on the issue. Although I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s because, like Rep. Barney Frank says, you don’t want your only allies losing the elections. I wonder if, as the CNN article title suggests, we’ll start seeing these as a part of the debate scene every 4 years?

[Edited on August 9, 2007 at 11:21 AM. Reason : .]

8/9/2007 11:11:08 AM

Almost all republicans anti-gay.

Giuliani limited support.

Most of the dems. Civil unions yes, Marriage no. I think Hillary is here too. Others say don’t ask don’t tell was always wrong, she says it was right when her husband introduced it, but its run its course and its now time to remove it. I wonder if she’ll say anything new tonight? I’m not going to stay up long enough to find out since I have work tomorrow, but maybe someone will summarize it for me.

Edwards & Obama both also specifically talked about a number of other gay issues, hospital visitation, adoption, and what have you in addition to Unions yes, marriage no. Edwards added the stipulation that he wouldn't impose his religious beliefs on the nation.

(I like him b/c he's been moving left on the issue, he was originally opposed to unions & isn’t anymore, I think he's in an electable spot now, and will go farther left when pres. His wife is for full gay marriage support

"However, Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., one of two openly gay members of Congress, said he understood the candidates' caution.
"It's not wrong for people trying to become president to take political considerations into account," Frank said. "I don't want a bunch of martyrs on my side.").


Kucinich & Gravel. Full gay marriage support, full support on all the other issues.

I’m glad that hospital visitation, and kicking Arabic linguists out of the military, and other such issues are now in the kind of public light that they’ve never been before.

8/9/2007 10:32:27 PM

Look, I'm setting politics aside here--seriously. John Edwards is one of the biggest fucking phonies to ever come down the pike. And I mean that.

8/10/2007 12:37:15 AM

no offense to supplanter, but you are a gay, and you like edwards too much...like maybe you think hes hot for a 50 year old...idk...but you like him too much...hes not going to win...give it up

8/10/2007 2:37:09 AM