This debate is a complete fiasco, simply because I cannot even find it. As a person who does not watch TV, I do occasionally view Youtube, so am familiar with the set up. However after doing several searches using terms like CNN/Youtube Republican debate, I can find nothing but spoofs and previews.

So I imagine that the audience reached will be almost zero.

However based on the review provided by Salon, especially the point about all the questions about religion. I agree with posters who say that although there is no religious test for office, religious questions are of great interest to prospective Republican voters.

In fact, in the spirit of good-hearted Swiftboatian politics, it would be entirely fair for the Democratic candidates to dub the Republican Party the American Hezbollah (Party of God). I t has a great ring to it.

On another point a writer says:

Russert, apropos of nothing, asked the Democratic candidates what their favorite bible verse was.

http://margalis.blogspot.com/2007/09/what-is-your-favorite-bible-verse.html

I believe that the real purpose of such questions is simply to suss out those who are both religious fakes and illiterates who cannot even think of a single verse from the Bible.

I am a complete nonbeliever, yet I would have no difficulty citing a number of favorite Bible verses off the top of my head.

My top ten, in reverse order:

10. The kingdom of heaven is within you.

9. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's ox.

8. Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.

7. Remember Lot's wife.

6.Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.

5. Man is born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward.

4. Absent in body, but present in spirit.

3. O death where is thy sting? O grave where is thy victory.

2. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.

1. Let there be light.

I dash off quite a few letters to Salon, and admittedly some of them are flippant, though the intention even when I am flippant is usually to challenge people's conventional thinking--but this one is different.

Here we have a debate that is not a debate. Clearly there is no real dialogue about nuances of policy positions going on so that roots level Republicans can make a better informed choice of a presidential candidate.

One letter writer asks what the candidates think of the intelligence of the American people. Well, the sad truth is that at least half of the population is at or below average intelligence, and that a large number of undecided voters of both parties must lie within that demographic.

Here we have a group of men who are clearly substantially above average intelligence, multimillionaire businessmen, successful attorneys, senators, governors all of whom appear, if this group press conference is any guide, to be dummies and compleat idiots.

But I don't believe for a minute that is what they are in real life. So actually all of them are presenting a false front, presumably because the real Romney, McCain, Paul etc. would actually be unpalatable to voters.

But it really does not matter what a candidate does, people will always believe bullshit. Take the swiftboating of John Kerry. I have no idea of the details of his service. I would imagine that in war everyone who serves is shitting themselves and praying for survival. Some people do incredibly heroic things and others incredibly cowardly things. But they all serve. To run away from war and criticize the reasons for the war is one thing, to serve and put your life at risk, and THEN criticize the war is quite another.

This desire to hide the real person from the electorate does not seem to be anywhere near as well developed in any other industrialized democracy as in the US. Why is that? Why are American politicians not willing to reveal their real selves. They will be pilloried even if they have won the Nobel Peace Prize, so they might just as well be themselves. The worst that can happen is that they get to spend more time with their families.

But then maybe they don't want to!

Yes, Cary's advice is questionable, but such is the strength of this interactive format that within an hour or two of the article being posted, the LW has also received a wealth of replies from people who are child protection workers, married to child protection workers, or who are mandated reporters explaining how the system works and how unlikely it is that she has anything to worry about--assuming the information in the LW's letter is accurate.

The most important fact, perhaps, is that child protection workers are perfectly well aware that many anonymous complaints are malevolent or vindictive.

The Internet makes such rapid collation of expertise possible, whereas not so long ago such a thing was impossible. I think what we are now seeing in the Internet age is that respect for authority figures is very quickly undermined if they don't actually have expert knowledge. This becomes very apparent in presidential debates, for example, and when we get a Internet Age politician on the national scene who actually listens to what the people who live in the real world have to say, then he or she will probably clean up and wipe the floor with his/her opponents.