Obama at a town hall meeting without a screened handpicked audience, where he took questions at random. It was a huge change from the last eight years, and very refreshing. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/02/10/henrietta-hughes-obama-as_n_165670.html
might have been refreshing for you but it was pretty hard to watch. to be honest I prefer filtered questioners. like filter out the ones that make no sense when they speak.
From a press conference I expect everyone to make some sense and have an idea of what they are talking about. But when town hall meetings are like those from Bush it might as well just be a speech. It's all screened, acceptable only to allow the President to present what he wants in a way that seems organic but isn't. This was real people and a way for the President to connect with real people in a real way. Which is the whole idea behind the town hall. So I thought it was refreshing. One guy was totally crazy, and it was pretty humorous.
we are probably talking about the same guy and I would say he was not so much humorous as he was painful to watch.
Not sure if this was posted but thought it fit here. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123431418276770899.html About half-way through President Obama's press conference Monday night, he had an unscripted question of his own. "All, Chuck Todd," the President said, referring to NBC's White House correspondent. "Where's Chuck?" He had the same strange question about Fox News's Major Garrett: "Where's Major?" The problem wasn't the lighting in the East Room. The President was running down a list of reporters preselected to ask questions. The White House had decided in advance who would be allowed to question the President and who was left out. Presidents are free to conduct press conferences however they like, but the decision to preselect questioners is an odd one, especially for a White House famously pledged to openness. We doubt that President Bush, who was notorious for being parsimonious with follow-ups, would have gotten away with prescreening his interlocutors. Mr. Obama can more than handle his own, so our guess is that this is an attempt to discipline reporters who aren't White House favorites. Few accounts of Monday night's event even mentioned the curious fact that the White House had picked its speakers in advance. We hope that omission wasn't out of fear of being left off the list the next time.
MAJOR GARRETT! (salutes) probably trying to make sure gay p*rn actors don't end up with a question. however, i don't like this if true. i don't see much evidence of that being true from that piece though (i'm not saying it isn't though).
But Bush did call on Jeff Gannon. They are making a stink about Huffington Post getting in there, but didn't seem troubled by male escort Jeff Gannon from Talon news getting called on? Talon news folded a few weeks after it came out who Gannon was.
