The presidential primary debate calendar just got a virtual boost with the addition of the first online-only candidate forums. The events will be sponsored by the Huffington Post, Yahoo, and Slate, and will be held this fall. There will be debates for both the Democratic and Republican parties.

To say that this was inevitable would be an extraordinary understatement. The Internet has become an inescapable component of modern politics. In many ways it is supplanting the conventional media. Whereas past campaigns kicked off with televised speeches before a cheering hometown throng, many of today’s leading candidates opted to announce their entry into the race via their web sites. Television and newspapers used to be the exclusive outlet for candidate alerts, attacks, and adorations, but now YouTube has emerged as an unparalleled cyber-promotions vehicle. And fund raising, for which conventional media was no more than a perch from which to beg for change, has been forever transformed by the Internet’s ability to act as a real-time ATM that collects donations 24/7.

The Internet is also the home of tens of millions of the most engaged citizens and activists. In these early days of Campaign ’08, while most Americans are oblivious to the nascent electioneering, the netroots are abuzz with a vibrant dialogue. So where better to hold the early debates? It allows the candidates to address what is perhaps the most active and well informed constituency amongst voters. These are the people who, once taking sides, will be the volunteers, contributors, advocates, and foot soldiers of the campaigns as they mature.

Credit must be given to the debate’s sponsors for stepping forward with this initial effort. Whether or not it meets expectations rests with the execution. The candidates will be appearing from remote locations, which leverages one of several unique characteristics of online communications. Another is the ability for viewers to participate by asking questions and blogging the answers as quickly as they come.

But will the sponsors introduce any innovations that exploit the revolutionary advantages of new media? For instance, a connected community can produce instant reactions to candidate statements. The conventional media might use such a facility as another in a series of trivial insta-polls. But new media could have this information displayed for candidates who could then be called upon to react to the real-time pulse of the audience. Also, questions submitted online could be analyzed and sorted so that the subjects of most interest to the audience are addressed. If the subjects that rank highest are displayed for the candidates, they could provide answers even if the host fails to introduce the question. In effect, the universe of viewers usurps the role of a unitary host.

This may not be desirable in all circumstances. There are certainly occasions when a talented journalist can construct a probing question that elicits more candid and revealing responses. I’m not sure the host selected for these debates, Charlie Rose, fills that description. My personal opinion of Rose is that he asks overly long questions that seem designed to showcase himself rather than his guest. But effective interviewers do exist and there will be plenty of opportunities for that sort of encounter when the conventional media holds their debates.

Overall, the debut of new media as a player in the debate debate is positive, encouraging, and timely. But it must also be viewed as an experiment. Whether it is looked back upon as a success, a failure, or something in between, should not be a hard-coded judgment, but a set of observations that can be employed when modeling the next phase of the experiment. I look forward to the research, and I hope that the sponsors open up the process to the blogiverse and incorporate our interests and creativity.

The White House Correspondents Association held their annual gala this evening and it was an affair to remember. Following on last year’s uneventful snoozefest with that Colbert guy, the WHCA scored a coup lassoing comedy legend Rich Little to headline the evening’s fare.

In his introduction, George Bush somberly stated that, due to the tragedy at Virginia Tech, he would not try to be funny. Little misunderstood and assumed the pledge applied to him as well. After thoughtfully warning the audience that he was just a “nightclub performer who does a lot of dumb, stupid jokes,” he wasted no time proving that. He was, however, generous in explaining each punch line for the often bewildered crowd. There was an abundance of opportunity to do so in the space where other performers would have been waiting for the audience’s laughter to subside. Little didn’t have that problem.

But the big treat of the evening was the star-studded guest list that included Morgan Fairchild, Teri Hatcher and at least two American Idol rejects. You know that a professional journalist’s organization has come of age when it can bring together such luminaries as George W. Bush and Sanjaya Malakar. If you wonder what these two celebrated talents have in common, just think about it for a moment and it will all become clear.

These are the headlines from Google News the evening after Alberto Gonzales testified before the U. S. Senate to explain the firing of U. S. Attorneys:

GOP Senator Calls for Gonzales to Resign – Forbes, NY
GOP Senator Calls for Gonzales to Resign – FOX News
Gonzales losing GOP support – Dallas Morning News
On a very hot seat with little cover and less support – Int’l Herald Tribune
Gonzales Endures Harsh Session With Senate Panel – New York Times
Gop Senator Calls For Gonzales To Resign – Guardian Unlimited
Gonzales losing GOP support – Houston Chronicle
Gonzales Rejects Call For His Ouster – Guardian Unlimited
White House says attorney gen’l has Bush’s ‘full confidence’ – MarketWatch
Gonzales Struggles to Sway Skeptics – ABC News
Gonzales rejects call for his ouster – Boston Globe
Gonzales’s Candor, Judgment Questioned by Senators – Bloomberg
Gonzales can’t sway skeptical senators – San Diego Union Tribune

Which of these things is not like the other? And how long will it be before Bush tells Gonzales that he’s doing, “a heckuva job?”

While America is struggling with the disbelief and sympathy provoked by the Virginia Tech massacre, some in the media are trying to salve the wounds in a most peculiar way.

Brian Williams of NBC went on air yesterday peddling his view of President Bush as the empathetic vessel for the nation’s grief, saying that Bush…

“has been effective as a mourner-in-chief. He is quite good at it, quite soothing at it.”

I might have excused this delusional analysis had Williams himself been a grief-stricken victim of this crime. But as he is not, it is simply an insensitive misrepresentation of reality.

This is the same Bush that has not attended a single funeral for the 3,200 Americans killed in Iraq. In fact, he prohibits the rest of the country from mourning by forbidding news coverage of funerals or returning caskets even when the families prefer it. And that’s to say nothing of the tens (hundreds?) of thousands of Iraqis who lost their lives.

This is the same Bush that took six days to acknowledge the loss of over 1,800 Americans due to Hurricane Katrina. In fact, Bush was celebrating John McCain’s birthday as the levees breached, despite having been warned of the danger. In his first stumbling attempts at consolation, he praised his incompetent FEMA director and assured victims that they would be cared for and the region would be restored. That was almost two years ago.

This is the same Bush under whose direction the Attorney General mocked the Geneva Convention and justified torture.

This is the same Bush that set records for executions as governor of Texas.

This is the same Bush that ignored warnings from the CIA saying “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.” In fact, the warning came while he vacationed at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, but he didn’t even consider it necessary to interrupt his recreation to perhaps prevent a massive terrorist attack.

This is the same Bush that smirks when hailing the “haves and haves more” that he refers to as his “base” and scowls while insisting that senior citizens should happily exchange the dependability of Social Security for the vagaries of the stock market; the same Bush that trusts pharmaceutical conglomerates to attend to the interests of patients instead of their bottom line; the same Bush that defiantly rejects the world’s climate experts’ proof of global warming.

He clearly doesn’t expect to be around to console the future victims of his destructive and short-sighted policies. And he has certainly not been there for the victims of the past. Even his signature issue, which he exploits endlessly, the terrorist attacks on 9/11, demonstrates a callousness that is revolting. When informed that the nation was under attack, he sat paralyzed before a group of school children, unable respond. When he eventually did respond, it was to stand atop a pile of rubble (that likely contained human remains) and issue empty threats to the perpetrators. He did not use that “megaphone moment” to bring comfort to a stunned nation. He used it to display a bravado that he knew he would not have to back up personally. And it should be noted that he did not even apprehend “the people who knocked down these buildings,” as he pompously promised.

Brian Williams’ depiction of Bush as “quite soothing” can only be described as a severe hallucination. Bush is the last person I would turn to for solace in a time of grief. And the only plausible context for designating him “mourner-in-chief,” would be because he is such a productive supplier of the world’s death and misery.

Update: Ann Compton of ABC News has also joined the chorus saying:

“When the nation mourns, the president kind of has to be the mourner in chief.”

David Bauder of the Associated Press attempts to unravel the knotted complexities of the Democratic Party’s objection to Fox News hosting their presidential primary debates.

Note to David Bauder: It’s not complicated, and you’ve still missed point.

Bauder begins his exercise by asserting that Democrats are engaged in this dispute in order to “target” Fox, just as they do President Bush. So right off the bat he has reduced the dispute to a partisan triviality and is dismissing the genuine concerns that the network is verifiably unfriendly territory for Democrats. Worse than that, however, he perpetuates the utterly false and shallow accusation that by ditching Fox, Democrats are afraid to face the psuedo-news network:

“The risk to this strategy is it could make the candidates look like, well, weenies.”

Note to David Bauder: On the contrary, it makes them look stronger.

There is nothing about standing up for yourself, refusing to let known enemies exploit you, and challenging liars and propagandists, that can reasonably be construed as weakness. Fox’ own Bill O’Reilly pulls this stunt all the time, calling those who decline to appear on his program cowards. The real reason people turn down O’Reilly, and Fox News debates, is that they don’t want to dirty themselves with the biased, low-brow, anti-intellectual, sensationalism that Fox dispenses by the truckload. What’s more, poking a finger in the eye of the biggest bully on the cable news block is not the act of a coward.

The ludicrous notion that assertively rejecting Fox suggests an inability to face hostile foreign leaders, as Bauder reports, fails on two grounds: As previously noted, it is strength, not weakness, that is displayed by the shunning of Fox; and Fox is not the equivalent of a sovereign state that might have an impact on U. S. national security and it’s just plain silly to elevate them to such status.

While there has been voluminous documentation that Fox operates as a virtual arm of the Republican PR machine, Bauder obliging illustrates the problem in his own article, so we don’t even have to turn the page for corroborating evidence of Fox bias:

“A feud against Fox might not be the best long-term plan, either. People there have been known to hold a grudge.”

This ironic, and apparently inadvertent, admission really tells the whole story. Fox is not an impartial observer. If you cross them, they will “hold a grudge.” And Bauder acknowledges that they “have been known” to do so in the past.

Note to David Bauder: A reputable news organization does not hold grudges. And Democrats who refuse to certify Fox as a legitimate journalistic enterprise deserve praise for their integrity and their courage.