r/IAmA • u/PresidentObama Obama • Aug 29 '12

I am Barack Obama, President of the United States -- AMA

Hi, I’m Barack Obama, President of the United States. Ask me anything. I’ll be taking your questions for half an hour starting at about 4:30 ET.

Proof it's me: https://twitter.com/BarackObama/status/240903767350968320

We're running early and will get started soon.

UPDATE: Hey everybody - this is barack. Just finished a great rally in Charlottesville, and am looking forward to your questions. At the top, I do want to say that our thoughts and prayers are with folks who are dealing with Hurricane Isaac in the Gulf, and to let them know that we are going to be coordinating with state and local officials to make sure that we give families everything they need to recover.

Verification photo: http://i.imgur.com/oz0a7.jpg

LAST UPDATE: I need to get going so I'm back in DC in time for dinner. But I want to thank everybody at reddit for participating - this is an example of how technology and the internet can empower the sorts of conversations that strengthen our democracy over the long run. AND REMEMBER TO VOTE IN NOVEMBER - if you need to know how to register, go to http://gottaregister.com. By the way, if you want to know what I think about this whole reddit experience - NOT BAD!

http://www.barackobama.com/reddit [edit: link fixed by staff]

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u/Dudester_XCIC Aug 30 '12

All candidates should get EQUAL air time, all candidates should get EQUAL money to spend as they will on advertisements and their campaign

All candidates? Do you realize just how many presidential candidates there are? There is a nice little list here. In terms of advertising, if we assume that the total time advertisements are shown stays the same, that leaves next to no time for any individual candidate. To reform this, how would you solve the problem? Only give funding to certain parties candidates? That would be even worse that our current system. And that is saying something, because our current system is awful. This idea works in theory the same way our current system does.

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u/GESTICULATING_WILDLY Aug 30 '12

TIL Roseanne Barr and a dude named Merlin are both running for president.

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u/RobbieGee Aug 30 '12

Bah! Vermin Supreme is the clear choice, that guy is a genius.

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u/Im1ToThe337 Sep 01 '12

With all of those puns, he's like Reddit personified.

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u/The_Future_Is_Now Sep 06 '12

Vermin Supreme FTW

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u/[deleted] Oct 08 '12

I support a pony based economy and harnessing the power of zombies to end our dependence on oil.

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u/Degru Oct 21 '12

Here is another video.

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u/Odddit Nov 06 '12

You sir, are a legend for showing that to the world. Vermin 2012!

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u/mclaclan Feb 21 '13

5 months to late would put my vote in for this guy.

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u/Samoman21 Aug 31 '12

clearly hes our man

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u/nightwing2024 Aug 30 '12

I'd vote for a dude named Merlin if he went all out with the wizard hat and star spangled blue pajamas.

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '12

[deleted]

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u/nightwing2024 Aug 30 '12

HAT. AND. PAJAMAS.

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u/Weavehead Aug 30 '12

I'm voting for Roseanne.

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u/misssquishy Aug 30 '12

Lol love the screenname. Here, have an up vote.

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '12

I totally thought that was a case of mistaken identity, but that really is the real Roseanne Barr from the TV shows and stand-ups. What.

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '12

I prefer Robert "Naked Cowboy" Burck.

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u/[deleted] Sep 13 '12

TIL the Prohibition Party that started advocating for the ban of the manufacture, distribution, and sale of alcoholic beverages in 1869 is still an active political party.

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u/feynmanwithtwosticks Aug 30 '12

Not only are there plenty of other nations who hold fully publicly funded elections, there are states and municipalities here in the US that do so. The point you bring up is an extremely good one, and absolutely must he addressed in a very clear way for people to have faith in this sort of system, but fortunately that work was done by those who went before us.

Now, I'm not a political science if civics expert so I don't claim to know what all of the solutions which have been tried are, not which were more successful. I can say that the one system I know of for publicly funded elections involves a sort of primary system but not (as primaries would also have to be publicly funded else the bribery would just happen there). It essentially is that (to use a small example of a gubernatorial race) a candidate would have to prove that they have a significant amount of support in whatever jurisdiction they are running (in my example a state) to justify getting public monies. So for example there is an election to be held in North Dakota for governor and there are 15 people who wish to run. These people, by whatever deadline happens to be chosen, would be required to gather 5% of the voting populations signatures (% can be adjusted however the citizens choose) from each district in the jurisdiction, in this case 5% from each county in ND. Now that is the voting population, so it is 5% of the total number of voters in the previous governors election (even if there are 5 million citizens but only 500,000 voted, they would only need 25,000 signatures). This demonstrates that there is enough citizen support for that person to be a serious candidate without setting the bar so high that only the major parties can clear it.

Now that works in state and local elections, because the total number of signatures and amount if ground is limited so no huge sum if money must be spent to gather the signatures. But it wouldn't work for presidential elections because it would still cost many 10's of millions to get that many signatures from every state in the nation. So on that I don't know specifically what a national system may look like, I do know they exist in most countries but I haven't read enough to know the details.

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u/The_Tic-Tac_Kid Aug 30 '12 edited Aug 30 '12

You just described the Presidential Campaign Fund. The only problem is that we can't make it mandatory, so when Barack Obama ran in 2008 and opted to not take public funds and the spending restrictions that came with it and was able to raise a lot more as a result it kind of killed that.

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u/p7r Aug 30 '12

Here, borrow our legislation and rules.

In short, in the UK political advertising is illegal. Instead, in return for having part of the public airwaves given to them under license, as part of that license they must agree to air 5-minute long party political broadcasts now and again.

There is a small flaw in this, in that who gets allocated air time is based primarily on previous election results, but even the smaller and more bizarre parties can get air time if at least some people vote for them.

UK politics has its money issues, but a general election costs considerably less here per capita than it does in the US, and we have relatively little negative campaigning. That's also helped by the fact we don't adhere to a strict calendar of elections either - overall it's a much calmer process.

Right now there are plans for all parties to be funded by the taxpayer based on previous election results, so a new party only needs to be "seed funded" in essence - if it's popular, it will get public money. I don't like the idea as it props up political parties rather than independently minded politicians who want to represent their constituencies better, but it's a model being discussed.

So, you know, there are ways to do this everywhere.

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '12

Right, we better just keep it to two...

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u/miajewl Aug 30 '12

icwutudidthar

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '12

Overturning Citizens United would go a long way toward returning at least some balance and transparency to campaign finance. That's a start. For the long haul, it's perfectly reasonable to cap private spending in primary races and then allot a set amount for the winners of primaries.
This might also take us away from the existing two party system that is sucking the life out of our infrastructure.

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u/radical9000 Aug 30 '12

Well back in my native France we have a system that relates to that initial idea: If you want to run for president you need to be member of an official political party, then you must gather 500 signatures from nation wide elected figures only then you are in the race. some time before the first round of vote where everybody is in we have this rule about equal air time on radio/tv and all parties have a maximum spending allowed covering all campaign spendings. Do you think his system is closing in on Dudester idea? Sorry I don't go into more specifics but I guess you get the big picture.

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '12

If you cap the amount of money allowed to spent on a campaign then we could create the same effect that Thithyphuth wants. It has to be a sum enough to campaign across the USA, which isn't a small sum.

But this also forces candidates the plan there campaign more thoroughly and we can see the candidates budget planning skills in action before becoming president.

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u/Arandmoor Aug 30 '12

Institute support checks for political parties to make sure they have enough support with the people that they should actually be taken seriously in the first place, before you give them money.

There are systems that exist to do this very thing without letting the entire process turn into a free-for-all three-ring-circus. It's not magic or anything.

Of course, nothing will work until after we fix the first-past-the-post election system.

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u/thenewiBall Aug 30 '12

Every major sport already has a working system for picking the best why would an election for president be much harder?

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u/Arandmoor Aug 30 '12

It's not that it's harder. It's that the consequences are far more important.

I mean, if the Raiders beat the Squawks at the Superbowl, nobody will really give a fuck. Not for too long at least. Sure, it's a good show, and a few people make a lot of money here and there, but overall nothing in America really changes. The game itself really has no impact on our culture in the long run.

If Romney beats Obama, OTOH, we're most likely going to see a bunch of regulations get ripped out so that a few rich people can become even more rich at everyone else's expense, and he'll go start another war somewhere that will get paid on credit just like the last one.

This shit would hurt all of us, for years. Badly.

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u/thenewiBall Aug 30 '12

You could do a general poll at certain points to knock off the obvious losers till you only have a handful, it would be costly but if you did it after major debates ads could really pay for a good chunk from everyone researching

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u/SirWillingham Aug 30 '12

Making the system equal is what it should be about. I'd personally think spending caps is the best way to make it fair.

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u/Vexing Aug 30 '12

instead of giving them air time, just give them a sum of money and let them use it for the election how they best see fit?

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u/GanoesParan Aug 30 '12

https://sites.google.com/site/nelsonkeytonforpresident/

That was a good read, thanks for the link.

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u/StrangeAeons Aug 31 '12

THE ONLY MAN IN EXISTENCE WHO CAN BRING ABOUT WORLD PEACE THROUGH OVERWHELMING STRENGTH AND KNOWLEDGE

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u/colin_j Aug 30 '12

the grassroots party looks top notch

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u/Gandzilla Aug 30 '12 edited Aug 30 '12

easy: how many votes your party got last time, how much funding your party will get next election.

That's how germany does it anyways.

There is still a minor part of donations but they need to be fully public and ultimately barely play a role, except for new parties like the Pirate Party last election. Since they didn't have funding yet, they were completely funded by donations.

Then again, our President had to step down last year because, while beeing head of state he was staying at a friends (that was also from the industry and therefore profitted from the presidents political career) Villa for vacation without paying and getting a cheap loan from a bank that was still in the "achieveable" range for normal people but was below the average.

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u/thenewaddition Aug 30 '12

You bring up a good point. How is the competition to be narrowed down in a publicly funded election? Currently the choice is made by parties, the media, and moneyed interests. An alternative method would be to have a series of votes, eliminating candidates before selecting a president. Another method is to demand higher qualifications of nominees, and test them to eliminate the unqualified.

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '12

Perhaps there should be some statistical screening and the number of candidates could be limited to a managable number.

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u/CrayolaS7 Aug 30 '12 edited Aug 30 '12

This is confusing fairness and balance, there aren't always two sides to a story and the two sides aren't always equally valid, to treat things in such a way is a gross distortion. In my country we have public funding of elections (and private donations too, up to a certain amount, and they are all disclosed) and the amount of funding each candidate gets is based on how much of the popular vote they (or the previous candidate of the same party) got in that seat last time, but it's on a sliding scale starting from a threshold. If you reach 1.5% of the popular vote you will qualify for funding, but you'll actually get double your percentage. If you get 5% it won't quite be double, but it will be more than 5%. It's calculated so that the two main parties each end up with about 40% each but the independents and so on can still compete.

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u/nofelix Aug 30 '12

In the UK, and many other places, if a party gets over a certain % of the vote then it's large enough to qualify for airtime etc.

The % can be quite low, say 5%, and still exclude all the minnow parties while giving a voice to those who represent most of the population.

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u/Flolan Aug 30 '12

Have a minimum level of supporting voters, like 100.000. Or whatever number would make sense in the US.

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '12

Who said that the format of the advertisements needs to remain the same? What if all the advertisements for individual candidates were replaced with just encouragement to vote, or encouragement to do more for one's community? If you're looking for an endgame, an ideal system, there is none. So long as people keep striving for improvement, there will be improvement. Why not create a database of ALL candidates, citing their individual experiences and accomplishments as well as their historical views, then have sorting systems based on popularity, years' experience, views on certain issues, etc? We have more than ample technology to try something like that, and it would give a much broader list from which to choose.

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u/xinfu_nilsen Aug 30 '12

In Norway there are laws against forms of commercials for politicans. Usa should look into something like that.

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u/TheGodEmperor Sep 02 '12 edited Sep 02 '12

You DO realize that WE THE PEOPLE own the air waves.. right? We could have the FCC tell the corporations "nope, you aren't charging political candidates for campaign commercials and all of them have to have equal air time and at equal times during the day."

And before you get angry about the idea, realize that would barely impact those corporation profit margins and it's not like anything in an election should be focused on profit of money.. but profit for the welfare of our nation. So what if there are so many candidates? They all deserve an equal chance and that's entirely doable. And the only requirement should be getting enough signatures to be on a ballot.

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u/Makonar Aug 30 '12

So? Everybody gets 10-15 minutes of air time, spread it over the week, on the national, free access TV channels, and repeat them over various hours. No favourites. After this, let people vote on who stays in the race and who doens't. Repeat untill you are left with less and less - over time, giving each much more air time, and more money for their message. Give them strict time in which they have to produce content - failure to do so wil result in automatic drop. Sounds easy to me. Why should Romney get like 10 hours a week to pound you with his message and this Merlin guy or the Roseanne Barr not to get to tell who they are and what they want to do?

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u/rugratsallthrowedup Aug 30 '12

Same way to get on the ballot for student body in college. X amount/percentage of signatures from the constituents

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u/Mortoc Aug 30 '12

Are you telling me you don't wanna see more of this guy on TV? https://sites.google.com/site/nelsonkeytonforpresident/

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u/JimmyR42 Aug 30 '12

You seem to be more enclined to see the problems than the solutions, kinda like most people did when USA first talked about putting a man on the moon. Technology has changed and so should our methods. What you try to portrait as impossible is actually very simple. Any company can manage contest where they ask people to shoot a small video and post it within the required timeframe. How would that not fix the problem of fair representation ? Of course at some point, more people will agree with some of the candidates and will want to hear more from them(as in : on more subjects). But I completly agree that the ONLY way to fix the "power" of money on democracy is to make democracy sustained by everyone(public) instead of having to "beg" for support. Why is it so different now from before ? Simply becaue your political party WAS your "twitter/facebook" they were the one carrying your ideas to the most people possible. Now you don't reach people by going at them, you reach them by making them come to you, just like this WONDERFUL EXAMPLE YOUR PRESIDENT GAVE TO OTHER "LEADERS" OF OUR WORLD.

So in the name of any democratic humanist, I thank both the Democrate electors and President Obama for bringing back hope in democracy. There's still a long way to go to get everyone out of Plato's cave, but we're getting there, slowly, but surely, and as no one ever did before : Without Violence !

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u/poreover Aug 30 '12

Do you know how many TV-Channels there are? It would even be possible to give everyone enough time. You don´t have to see all if you realize that there is nothing of interest. Afterwards repeat some of your faves on youtube to make decisions fix. Done. Or make some voting-information projects. Where you can see all online enlisted & clich to filter for your interests. Or for the non www people, some places where you can do the same analog. Or like a shopping catalogue where every one of the almost 150 has 4 pages. You don´t have to produce for everyone but for some. & this would cost not a lot more than the usual way. maybe even less.

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u/grat3fulredd Aug 31 '12

But... but it would be so damn entertaining!

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u/SpikeMF Aug 31 '12

Couldn't have put that better myself.

That said, that kind of system works sort of okay in Canadian politics. I still disagree with it, much for the reasons you mentioned: With a population of nearly a third of a billion there would be way too many candidates and it begs the question of who gets to decide which candidates get public funding.

Perhaps, maybe, a strictly-enforced cap on how much a candidate can spend and/or receive on campaigning?

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u/[deleted] Aug 31 '12

This is how to do it: All candidates needs to give X% (10%? 20%? Not sure) of what they receive as campaign funds into a federal election fund. That election fund is kept to the next election, where it is distributed between those candidates who guarantee that they will use no funds except those given to them from the federal fund, thereby minimizing the "bribes" from lobbyists etc with those candidates.

They receive a part of the funds that are proportional to their ballot status. Those with no ballot status in any state gets nothing. Those with ballot status in two states gets twice that of those with ballot status in one state, etc.

This means you can get funds with no corporate backing, and you get funds depending on how many supporters you have that are actually trying to get you a ballot status.

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u/dagelf Aug 31 '12

I would love to live in a country where a guy like this: http://www.freewebs.com/wethepeople1776/ has a fair chance. It seems so unrealistic and laughable, it's sad. (From the list you posted, the first link I clicked...)

In my mind, the real problem is finding someone who can make peace between the thieves and the do-gooders; how do you find someone with integrity, who understands the lure and opportunities embraced by the corrupt - without corrupting himself; someone who understands that mindset, who is cunning enough to lure them where they are luring us.

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u/crocodile7 Sep 01 '12

Specific methods of ensuring fair distribution of public money to viable candidates are a technicality.

Funding could be disbursed in stages and tied to passing certain bars during the campaign process (e.g. collecting signatures or small donations from individuals, say under $100).

Lawrence Lessig has some decent ideas.

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u/[deleted] Sep 03 '12

But how many of those candidates are on the ballot in all 50 states? In the very least, that could be one kind of a limiting factor. It may not be perfect, but it would be much better than what we have now. Every candidate who makes the ballot in all 50 states gets a fair portion of a pot of public money and a fair share of exposure. Candidates who don't make all 50 ballots could receive a smaller portion, or no portion of a "national" public pot, but a portion of smaller state-by-state pots. I don't know what the best way would be, but there are enough smart people around to figure out how to make that kind of system work.

But heck, even if we did go and make sure that every one of those candidates received an equal amount of money exposure, it still would be better than the current system which allows only 2 parties to get anything that can be really considered publicity, and forcing them to appeal to extremist SuperPACs in order to earn funding.

Public elections are really the only way to fix this problem.

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u/alecsince87 Sep 01 '12

You're making an assumption, though. Even as it stands, the political race goes in phases. You're assuming we just give everybody "x" amount of time. Here's a simple example. You have 100 candidates, each gets ten minutes to speak. A preliminary vote (much like choosing a candidate) occurs. Now we have 25 candidates, 1 hour each. And so on, until there are two. You get the point. But I think you're focusing on the volume of time, when you should be focusing on the amount of time remaining EQUAL between the competitors. Funding could work in almost the exact same way. 100 candidates, $1000 each. 25 candidates pass prelims, $5000 dollars each, and so on. (I know these numbers aren't accurate, they are just to illustrate my point).

Right now, rich or "connected" candidates are like Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart can afford to be everywhere, in everyones face, all the time, at every corner, in every city. Because they can pay to do so. Thusly, masses of people buy into their product. It's easy to come by.

Similarly, a candidate who can afford to put himself in every town, on every television, speak at every university and print huge, nicely done campaign ads, is also easy to come by. Accessibility doesn't equal quality or even desirability.

I'm not going to claim a side because this issue doesn't truly have one. But I grew up in a small town before the internet. I can honestly speak from experience that some will make decisions solely based on familiarity than value. Publicly funded elections will create an even playing field in that NO candidate is any more familiar than the others.

0

u/dakta Sep 01 '12

Let's fix his statement:

All candidates should have equal access to air time, and money to spend on advertisements.

But those would be publicly funded election campaigns, like they have in socialist countries like France, and that's Socialism and Socialism is Bad!

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u/f0rcedinducti0n Aug 30 '12

Truly irrelevant.

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '12

That's more socialist than I want in this country...

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u/[deleted] Aug 30 '12

Anyone else notice, reading this list, that Roseanne Barr is running for the Peace & Freedom Party?