From Balloon Juice, a reader asks the question, "Why can’t we have a nationally televised debate about HCR and stimulus?" John Cole responds:

First off, Democrats already tried to do this over the summer- they were called town hall meetings, and basically they were freeped by a coalition of corporate backed teabaggers, spooked blue hairs who wanted to keep government out of their medicare, shameless Republicans interested in political advantage, and, in no small part, the mainstream media who simply regurgitated all of their bullshit.

I have seen nothing that would suggest that a national town hall meeting would lead to anything different. As entertaining as it was watch Obama make the Republicans look like the idiots that they are at their retreat last week, what really changed? They still believe all their talking points, as do their teabagging base, because this isn’t about facts or logic or reason, this shit is religion to these folks. And it wasn’t more than a few hours that our Politico inspired media was offering “equal time” for the Republicans to edit their remarks and inject more bullshit into the debate. Jeb Hensarling was given multiple opportunities for a do-over immediately after being depantsed, and guess what the media did?

That’s right- they just wrote down what he said and didn’t bother to fact check it or point out he is full of shit. And so it goes.