Google Moderator finds its level: choosing questions for a puppet

One of the main goals of this site is to hold politicians accountable. Google Moderator and similar systems go in the opposite direction: they've let a long series of politicians off the hook and in most cases they've even made it easier for politicians to mislead.

Google Moderator is a web application that lets users submit questions and then vote questions up or down. The politician or other who's agreed to answer questions then knows which are the "best". Except, that's not how it works: the questions that rise to the top are invariably weak. See the popular voting systems page for a longer description and examples stretching back years. No Google Moderator-style system has ever held a politician accountable or forced them to answer the tough questions that the media refuses to ask. Instead, all of those systems have just resulted in questions one or two small steps up from "boxers or briefs?" If you want to hold politicians accountable, Google Moderator - and Google corporate and Youtube corporate - are not at all on your side.

That said, Moderator has finally found its level. Namely, selecting questions for a puppet: peekURL.com/vpqhtdu

"I was just wondering what your favorite thing to do is" is great for Elmo, not at all great for Barack Obama.