If you had the ability to attend a presidential debate, and ask a question of the candidates that each or at least most of them would have to respond to, what would it be? Caveat: please try to make your question something that you would actually want to know about the candidates that you don’t know already. To make it just that much more interesting, let’s assume that the question gets asked to both the Republican and Democratic candidates.
Here’s mine. It is kind of a departure from my usual concern about maximizing congruence between my own policy preferences and a candidate’s platform:
Richard Nixon was swallowed by the Presidency. Whatever good might once have been in the man, it got lost in the pursuit of the Presidency and the trappings and the power of the White House. When you are President, the most stressful, demanding, and intensely political office in the world, what will you do to keep yourself human, to keep your moral compass functioning — to keep yourself from becoming the kind of person that Richard Nixon became?
I’d expect most of the candidates to give boring answers, some vague, eye-roll inducing blather about their families and prayer. Insert the talking-through-a-trombone sound of the teacher from the Peanuts cartoons here. Such a response would tell me that they had no actual answer to the question at all.
Were one of them to offer something more insightful and plausibly useful — a deeper-than-pat-sound-bite answer — that would indicate to me a sincere concern about doing the right thing, and having given some sober thought to what it will be like to actually do the job. Even if I didn’t agree with that candidate on policy issues, I’d be more inclined to support that candidate because such an answer would reflect the sort of temperament and character I’d prefer to see in a President.
I frame the question as I do because I see a healthy dose of Richard Nixon in quite a lot of this crop of candidates. Most of all in Donald Trump: he already is the man that Richard Nixon became, and it’s frustrating that at least 30% of Republican voters apparently either can’t see that, or don’t think it’s a particularly bad thing. But I see ample potential for a President Hillary Clinton or a President Ted Cruz to become a twenty-first century Nixon, too.
Or, maybe I’m missing the boat here. If you don’t think my question would elicit any useful information, then pose a better one of your own!
Image by Seattle City Council
First, “Have you ever been blackmailed? If so, how did you respond? What will you respond if someone finds some dirt on you as POTUS?”
Second, “You are entertaining the thought of becoming POTUS, a position that has historically led to the deaths of many who chose to serve, often at a particular group’s instigation. Will you name that group, and will you go against them if chosen to serve?”
These… are not-nice questions. Luv to know the answers though.Report
Keeping in mind the likely makeup of the Congress, what is your top legislative priority and why?
What will you do if govt revenues fall way below expenditures? Will you run a deficit or cut programs? If the latter, where do you see making major cuts?Report
If elected Preznit, would you set up your official email account thru a server privately maintained in your current home or would you use the already set-up .gov site?Report
Can I see your long-form birth certificate?Report
“Which journalists do you already have in your pocket?”
“Can you provide the short list of people (non-heads of state) who know that you will call them back as quickly as humanly possible if you get a memo saying that they called you?”Report
“Which particular Wall Street speaking gigs would you recommend to ex-Obama officials on the assumption they just take the fee offered?”Report
Did you see the Marc Ambinder mess?
Ugly, ugly, ugly.Report
I hadn’t read that specific article, but yeah, I was aware of it. Ugly is right.Report
I’ve heard that Ambinder is about to go nuclear and name names of everyone who’s done the same.
A part of me hopes it’s true.
The other part of me says that Ambinder always struck me as a kind and decent guy who would regret doing such a thing.Report
That action would go well to right the kilter of his current karma. He should do it and expose the rest of the media whores.Report
You watched the lead-up to Iraq 2.0, right? There ain’t many politicians — and exactly zero major media outlets — that won’t whore themselves out for an ‘exclusive’ interview, or an interesting tidbit, or just some juicy insider access.
And god help the politician that doesn’t treat reporters like kings, or deny them that cushy access.
24-7 news. Even the papers have to do it — online, you know. No time for fact checking. No time for spell checking. They’ll report anything juicy, repeat press releases verbatim as investigative reporting….Report
Indeed, sadly.Report
How do you define freedom and liberty?Report
That’s an extremely good question. (Though @dick_nixon would surely disapprove)Report
If it turns out that your policy choices are not working the way you want them to, will you reverse course?Report
“And I promise that, if elected, I’ll flip flop on policy till I get one right!!” {{wild cheering from crowd}}Report
Oooooh, I really like that one. I would never trust the given answer, though.Report
Late at night, when you get hungry and want the WH chef to make you something, what will it be?Report
…And if not a peanut butter and banana sandwich, then why not? What’s wrong with you?Report
For President Elvis maybe. I’m thinking grilled swiss on a nice marbled rye. I’d order that up on the regular.Report
How does people throwing shoes at your head make you feel?Report
“What was the proudest you’ve ever felt? Why? What other emotions did you feel during the experience?”
I’d shake my ahead at any pat answer about “serving the people of this fine nation”; I considered including a disclaimer about leaving aside professional/political life, but I’d actually want to see if they go with the BS answer. I think the next most likely answer would have to do with the birth of a child(ren), hence the follow up questions which would indicate the degree of actual humanity they possess. Anything other than those two would be a wild card of sorts and likely informative one way or another.Report
If you saw delicious candy in the hands of a baby, would you seize and consume it?Report
Do you run an ad blocker?Report
[Note: My question is played out here for GOP candidates. However, it can easily be mirrored for the DNC brood. And obviously, it would obviously not worked universally had Rand Paul not dropped out of the race at this point.]
During the Bush administration, the Democrats were critical of the President’s use of executive order to essentially avoid or even draft legislation. They referred to this practice as unconstitutional and an abuse of executive power. At the time, your party and you individually supported those actions by that administration. Now, during a Presidential administration run by the other party, you have been frequently been quoted saying that the exact same action of executive order is unconstitutional and an abuse of power. In fact, you now claim using this tactic is “tyranny.”
Senator/Governor/Doctor/ ____________, how do you square that circle, and what would you say tonight to those voters that see these kinds of antics as proof you are merely saying whatever you think will get you elected?
And as a follow up, would you be willing to make a promise to voters now, on this stage, that you will sign no executive orders as Commander in Chief? And if not, since you claim they are tyrannical, why not?Report
For clarification, is the use of “Commander in Chief” supposed to be a subject-matter limitation? Many of the executive orders are minor matters of agency organization or the details of instructions provided by Congress. Eg, Congress says the USDA shall manage some function; the President, by executive order, creates a sub-department with some organization somewhere within the USDA to execute that management. Even many of the orders done in the role of Commander in Chief are routine, related to promotions, assignment of general officers to specific jobs, etc.Report
A candidate who pledges to not sign ANY executive orders demonstrates that he has not undertaken even a casual study of how the President actually gets the job done and therefore that he is not to be taken seriously.
A candidate who pledges not to sign any MAJOR executive orders sounds like he’s waffling and is therefore not to be trusted.
A candidate who pledge to be mindful of his role within a divided government when issuing executive orders might be granted the benefit of the doubt, if the candidate is otherwise relatively trustworthy and apparently intelligent.Report
*shrug*. A candidate who says “Congress — and even the Courts — will provide the appropriate oversight of my use of executive orders, just as my use of executive orders is one such check against both of them” is one who, you know, understands it.
Then again, my beef with executive orders is generally over the content, not the existence, of.Report
Would an executive order that says “Executive Order #N is hereby rescinded” (where Executive Order #N is one of the previously criticized executive orders) be considered hypocritical?Report
If you are the person responsible for rescheduling Marijuana away from Schedule 1, will you do so?
If it turns out that it is Congress, will you entreat Congress to do so?
If it turns out that it is the Attorney General, will you ask for the Attorney General’s resignation if zhe does not do so?Report
Technically, that’s at the sole discretion of the Administrator of the DEA, who is nominated by the President and approved by the Senate. Or Congress can do it by statute, signed by the President.Report
I got my info from this.
Freakin’ Wikipedia.Report
Oops. I should have said “effectively at the sole discretion of the Administrator.” Any executive-branch request has to go through the Administrator, and the courts have held (up til now, at least) that zhe can deny the request arbitrarily.Report
What was the last book you read that changed your view on the subject? What did you read afterwords and how did that effect the view change from the former book?
What do you have in your pockets?Report
Guaranteed answer would be the bible, then i reread the bible and i have a pocket bible in my pocket.Report
Hadn’t even thought about that, so I guess a rider “other than the bible?”Report
I’d resist that. If the answer were “the Bible,” then I’d know right away, “Pandering for religious vote.” Tells me something maybe I didn’t know beforehand.
And the follow-up — “So what was it that you changed your mind about after reading the Bible?” — could be revealing too.Report
Point.
That had crossed my mind, but even if they are RFers, I want to know what they are reading, outside the bible.Report
“President Obama… what do you keep in the pocket that you don’t carry your Koran in?”Report
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“If God had read my book, the Devil would be making deals with HIM!”Report
“It’s a great, great book. People all over America love that book. It’s called the Art of the Deal, and let me tell you, I make great deals. All over the country I’ve made great deals. People love the deals I’ve made. They’re great great deals. Just tremendous….”Report
This is so dead on I’m frightened. Heavy use of mono- and di-syllabic words, frequent use of superlatives, sentence endlessly running on and shifting focus halfway through, the bald aggrandizing lie about the book’s sales performance, use of the favorite word (“huge”) and half-remembering the Bible at the last second.
We should have a contest with half actual Trump quotes and half fake quotes written by Tod like this, and see if anyone can tell the difference.Report
The pocket question is supposed to come at the end of the riddle game, not the beginning.Report