Fucking awesome. This needs to happen here.

10/31/2010 9:33:08 PM

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/01/obama-does-question-time-with-the-house-gop.php

Quote :

"Obama Does Question Time With The House GOP President Obama spoke this afternoon to the House Republican retreat in Baltimore, turning the occasion into a lively debate, on national television, between a sitting president and the entire House caucus of the opposition party. Obama opened by thanking House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) for the invitation: "You know what they say, keep your friends close, but visit the Republican Caucus every few months.""

Quote :

"Then came the really interesting part. Obama began taking questions from Republican members of Congress, a sight that isn't normally seen on television in American politics. There were some similarities to the British Parliamentary tradition of Prime Minister's Question Time -- minus the cheering and booing -- with a sense of political jousting between an incumbent president and the opposition, who for their part pitched one tough question after another. "

http://www.newsweek.com/blogs/the-gaggle/2010/01/29/obama-does-question-time-it-rocked.html

Quote :

"In the original plan, only the president's opening remarks were going to be televised, but the White House later negotiated for cameras to be present for the entire event. (Evidently a smart move on their part...) Republicans appear to be regretting this decision, telling NBC's Luke Russert that allowing cameras for the Q&A was a mistake."

I don't think he's been invited back since.

But he did do another event that some were calling "Youtube Question Time"

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2010/02/obamas-youtube-question-and-an.html

Quote :

"Obama's YouTube question and answer session President Obama on Monday took questions submitted by the public through YouTube's CitizenTube in a chat broadcast live online from the White House and on YouTube. More than 11,000 questions were submitted and received more than 630,000 votes; Obama addressed the questions that won the greatest number of votes."

11/1/2010 6:18:16 AM

the only reason why you can have Speaker's Questions is due to the fact that the Prime Minister is a member of Parliament and is merely the head of government.

it would be unconstitutional to force the President to engage in such frivolities. not only is he head of government, but he is head of state and in a completely different branch of government.

11/1/2010 9:07:35 AM

A lot of work goes into Prime Minister's Question Time. As I recall, the republicans at that meeting did as well as can be expected, given no experience whatsoever. While I think PMQT would be far better than the press-centric system we have here, it would take quite awhile for Congress to be reorganized to handle it. In Congress, the inclination would be to send the party leaders, where-as in Parliament the party leadership was chosen specifically for their ability to handle such Parliamentary debates.

11/1/2010 9:12:54 AM

Looks like another iteration of the youtube version will be happening again soon:

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2011/01/21/president-obama-is-taking-your-questions/

Quote :

"President Obama is taking your questions Washington (CNN) - If you have lingering questions after hearing President Obama's State of the Union address on Tuesday, you may get the chance to ask them. The president will participate in a live streamed YouTube interview on Thursday January 27th, taking questions posted by members of the YouTube community. According to a statement from the site, the posed questions "should be about 20 seconds long", and users will be able to vote for their favorites. The top choices will be submitted for the president to answer. This is not the first time President Obama has used YouTube. The White House has its own YouTube channel, which currently has more than 120,000 subscribers."

1/21/2011 2:06:04 PM

If I remember, Senator McCain had offered to do this monthly with the Democratic Congress had he been elected President. I'm glad to see that the White House is unafraid to face off with Republicans.

It would be fun to watch this on a regular basis: I think both sides would be much better prepared in terms of both the questions asked and the answers given.

1/21/2011 3:08:00 PM