TVSquad

By now many of you have probably heard about the upcoming presidential debates put on by CNN and YouTube. The first one is on Monday night, where the democratic presidential candidates will debate in South Carolina. CNN is soliciting questions and asking people to upload their questions to YouTube. So far, CNN has received 1,400 questions via YouTube.

I think this is a spectacular idea for several reasons. First of all, it is meant to generate interest in the presidential election among younger people... the people who use YouTube a lot. The candidates benefit because they reach out to a very hard-to-get crowd of American voters, and CNN benefits because it grabs new and younger viewers. Hopefully the viewers will also benefit from the questions selected by CNN producers for the candidates.

I'm mainly interested in this upcoming debate because I want to see different questions asked of candidates-- instead of the typical questions about the Iraq war and terrorism. There are other things happening in this country that are of particular interest to young people, such as the price of college and real estate for first-time home buyers. Also? I'd love to see a question slipped in about pop culture, such as "What is your theory about Lost?" Or, "Mac or PC?"

The deadline to enter a question in the next Democrats' debate is this Sunday (the Republican version of this debate style happens in mid-September). You can find out more about it here.