Tuesday, 3 November 2015

Using Tech to Fix the Horrid US Political Debates

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I Watched with interest last week's Republican debate and realized very quickly that whatever that was on my TV, it sure as hell wasn't an actual debate. The idea is for us to be able to compare the qualifications and positions of a variety of candidates and then make a more informed choice -- but if every candidate is asked a different question, then how do we compare the answers?

Also, wouldn't the best debate require having all of the candidates on stage? It often seems that the candidates are all debating folks from the other party who aren't in the same room they are.

Seriously, wouldn't this work better if it were more like a good job interview? First you have a set of focused events, during which you ask pointed questions about individual backgrounds. Then you put the folks who survive that process on stage, and ask about how they'd apply their skills to real problems. From that group, you choose the best.

It seems strange that Americans likely put more rigor into hiring a gardener than in selecting the next leader of the free world. Tech could fix that.

I'll close with my product of the week: the TiVo Bolt, which is clearly the best DVR ever built -- and it has to be to compete with the cord-cutter solutions

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