The Invisible Hand

The Oxford Union it Ain’t.

Is the combining of amateurish YouTube videos with presidential debates an advancement for our national dialogue or the equivalent of a Jimmy Carter cameo appearance on Joanie Loves Chachi?

I had a lot of faith in YouTube as a genuinely new development in communications technology and custom until this. Now I’m beginning to think of CB radio. Once what was underground becomes mainstream it loses all its mystery and the baffling intrinsic value it once had as an insider thing evaporates. CB, vblogging, it’s nothing new . . . just regular Joes talking to each other again.

The sad thing about the debates is that the YouTubers came off as far more human and authentic than the candidates themselves . . . with the exception of Mike Gravel who really belongs among the unhinged in unregulated cyberspace rather than among the coiffed and scripted in actual physical space. You want dignity and gravitas? Watch Letterman instead.

Thankfully, the hive wisdom of YouTube will always have the upper hand in any encounter with ersatz “leaders”