It’s no surprise that Barack Obama’s State of the Union was a snooze: The speech has long been a dull and pompous ritual. But no one was bored two days later when the president showed up to a House Republican confab in Baltimore for a lively, unscripted tussle with his opponents.
Inspired by that exchange, a diverse coalition of political luminaries set up demandquestiontime.com, a petition drive aimed at starting “a new American political tradition.” The group, which includes lefties David Corn and Katrina vanden Heuvel, and right-wingers Grover Norquist and Glenn Reynolds, wants the parliamentary practice of Prime Minister’s Questions — in which the chief executive is regularly grilled by his opponents — brought to the United States.
They’re on to something. An American Question Time might knock our presidents off their pedestals and force them to grapple with alternative viewpoints.
Left to their own devices, presidents can isolate themselves in a cocoon of sycophants, even putting protesters in “Free-Speech Zones,” where their signs can’t offend the liege. The regal atmosphere of the office shields POTUS from necessary feedback. As accidental president Gerald Ford put it in his autobiography, “Few people, with the possible exception of his wife, will ever tell a president that he is a fool.”
That’s dangerous, political scientist Bruce Buchanan argued in his underrecognized 1978 classic, “The Presidential Experience,” because it feeds the arrogance of power and warps presidential decision making.
One possible solution, Buchanan argued, was to demand Question Time. Adopting the practice “would force the president to expose himself in a setting he did not control” and where “he could not count on gentle or respectful treatment.”
Obama got fairly gentle treatment in Baltimore, handling his questioners ably and shocking anyone who expected him to be at sea without a teleprompter. The session was generally scored as a win for the president, and maybe that’s why so many liberals have signed the petition.
Obama got fairly gentle treatment in Baltimore, handling his questioners ably and shocking anyone who expected him to be at sea without a teleprompter. The session was generally scored as a win for the president, and maybe that’s why so many liberals have signed the petition.
But when Question Time’s done right, it’s done rude. An American version will only be worth having if it’s conducted in the irreverent spirit the Brits bring to it. As a nerdy child, I was mesmerized when C-SPAN used to show Margaret Thatcher getting berated by backbenchers in gangrene-colored ties (and matching teeth).
Though the Iron Lady gave as good as she got, the entire spectacle repudiated the idea that the executive floated on a higher plane.
Harold Macmillan, British prime minister from ’57 to ’63, once acknowledged that the pressure of Question Time used to make him vomit as he waited to face the music. Little wonder: Last May, the New York Times described a session of Prime Minister’s Questions that made Gordon Brown seem “more pinata than politician.”
“We’ve got a wasted year with an utterly busted government,” Conservative leader David Cameron gleefully declared to Brown’s face. “Isn’t it clear you’re just not up to the job?”
Our presidents rarely get handled that roughly. Maybe that’s why George W. Bush seemed to be the last American to realize that the Iraq war wasn’t going swimmingly, and why Obama has been painfully slow to appreciate that Obamacare has become his Iraq.
Indeed, for all his media ubiquity, Obama prefers venues he controls: He hasn’t held a news conference in seven months and rarely takes questions from reporters at public appearances.
If the Demanders succeed, presidents won’t be able to get away with insulating themselves. Done right, Question Time could force presidents off script, puncture their air of majesty and force them to listen.
It’s worth a shot. Besides, what have we got to lose?
