In an apparent effort to prevent marijuana legalization from again dominating the discussion, Obama's next online townhall event will not allow participants to vote on their favorite questions for the president. But what does that say about the politics of social media? And will it even work?
It started with a simple and promising idea. The young voters who helped put Obama in office congregate on the Internet, and the best way to keep them involved in the political process is to meet them on their own turf. The incoming Obama Administration planned online forums mimicking the "thumbs up, thumbs down" voting systems that help rank the best content on popular viral sites like YouTube, Reddit and Digg. The President would solicit questions from the public and see what people cared about the most.
What no one anticipated was that the legalization of marijuana would emerge as the most popular political topic among the online public. Despite being initially chastised as "Internet trolls," supporters of marijuana reform repeatedly demonstrated their momentum in an open exercise of online democracy.
As startling as it was to see marijuana legalization taking a front row seat in mainstream politics, the outcome couldn't be ignored without defeating the purpose of the exercise entirely. Obama was forced to respond, and after an unfortunate first attempt to brush the issue aside, he eventually conceded just months ago that legalization is "an entirely legitimate topic of debate," but rejected it without explanation nevertheless.
It had become clear that as long as Obama's forums allowed the public to vote on topics for the president to address, the top-ranked questions would be about legalizing marijuana or even ending the War on Drugs altogether. Reluctant to confront the issue further, the White House recently changed its approach and announced an April 20, 2011 event on Facebook in which participants will not be allowed to vote at all. Questions can be sent in by email or posted on the Facebook page, but Obama's staff will make selections without any public input.
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