On Question Time Across The Pond

I know there's a fairly broad group of folks out there trying to bring question-time to America. Axelrod evidently shot it down:

POLITICO asked White House senior adviser David Axelrod about the possibility of regular question time on Monday, before the online campaign was announced, and he said the president's aides were more likely to look for one-shot opportunities for Obama to engage with Republicans.

"The thing that made Friday interesting was the spontaneity," Axelrod said. "If you slip into a kind of convention, then conventionality will overtake the freshness of that."

I think that's basically true. As much as I liked last week, I could see this thing quickly becoming a racket. I'm convinced that a lot of the questions asked last week, were basically attempt to score points. Frankly, even watching the Democrats yesterday I didn't feel much different. (Did Blanche Lincoln have an actual, real question?) 

I guess I could be wrong, but I deeply suspect that what's wrong with our national conversation is about more than a lack of information. This is the most information-rich era in American history. I'm not convinced that the problem is a simple matter of better outlets. I think it's probably deeper than that and has something to do with us as Americans, and what we want out our politicians. I'd like it to be so, but I'm not convinced that what Americans want out of their politicians is more wonkery.