I'm trying to lay out what I think are the reasonable expectations from this AMA, and how they differ from what a lot of people will want. I'm sorry if this somehow offends you. In the future I'll try my best to be unrelentingly positive about everything, despite the evidence presented to me.

Don't get me wrong, it's a bold and somewhat brave move by the Obama team to do this- there are myriad ways it can blow up in their faces (Rampart, anyone?). But as a consequence of that, they're going to be playing it very safe, I'm sure.

"In all honestly, no-one should expect anything else- the POTUS is not going to unveil new thoughts and strategies through Reddit." <-- cold, hard common sense

If understanding how the world works and telling others makes you a hater, then sign me up.

This reminds me, in Chris Hedges' book War Is A Force That Gives Us Meaning, there is a great section on why everyone always hates reality-based thinkers.

Essentially before and during when the war crimes (or whatever) are being committed, everyone hates the truth-tellers because they think they are wrong and they are challenging their worldview or whatever. And then afterwards, everyone hates the truth-tellers because they remind them that they were wrong. That's why you will never read an article about prominent Republicans coming forward and apologizing to Michael Moore or whatever.

Michael Moore, truth teller? Ha.

Don't worry, I'm sure we'll find those WMDs any day now.

Maybe you're right, but I think I'm done with this site.

Just want to chime in, it looks like Obama is heading out[1] after answering only ten questions. I think it's fair to call that disappointing when the thread had more than 12,000 comments.

[1] http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/z1c9z/i_am_barack_obam...

Is it? It appears that his AMA was online for maybe 45 minutes. How long should we expect the President of the United States to stay on the site for? Presumably has has other things to do.

He answered questions on these topics:

  1. Space Race
  2. Internet Freedom
  3. Favorite Basketball Player
  4. Small-Business tax breaks
  5. First Activity on Nov 7
  6. Most Difficult Decision
  7. Money in Politics
  8. White House Beer Recipe
  9. Jobs
  10. Work/Life Balance

Hard hitting stuff there

What would you have asked? Those are all pretty topical this particular election season. Any 10 questions seem inadequate for a president, no?

Also, he brought up Afghanistan on his own in response to the 'hardest decision' question. That's not exactly a fluff answer.

They are largely boilerplate answers to softball questions. Nothing you couldn't get from listening to a White House press conference.

Questions about the state of Iraq, Syria, Libya, Iran, Egypt, et al would have been more interesting. Characterizing sending more troops as a hard decision is not too surprising.

Ok, but all you're gonna get from him on foreign relations ESPECIALLY is the exact boilerplate that comes out of the state department. There are actually policy reasons to stay boilerplate on that stuff, above and beyond political considerations.

That said, he did come about as close as he could to acknowledging the surge in Afghanistan didn't accomplish much. And he called for a constitutional amendment on Citizen's United, which he apparently hadn't done in public before (according to news outlets trumpeting it).

Bradley Fucking Manning?

> Presumably has has other things to do.

I also have things to do and manage to fit in at least a couple of hours a day on reddit

Presumably, what you have to do isn't as important nor as time demanding as what the president has to do.

That's 3 minutes per question, given the half hour he allotted. I don't think that's too disappointing. Did you really expect him to answer 12,000 questions?

For perspective: I read a bit in the most recent New Yorker describing a fund-raiser dinner with the president; it was $50,000 a plate and the president had one hour which equated to 1 minute per person. His staff knew he wouldn't have time to eat so he was prepared a meal he ate quickly in the kitchen beforehand. A staffer with a watch would tap him on the shoulder every 5 minutes when he needed to move onto the next table.

And 3 times as long seems perfectly reasonable to me when you're giving answers in writing compared to talking...

Is there actually some video proof that he is actually there?

Or is it just some assistant yelling from the other room "should I rephrase our standard answer on campaign reform" and his answer is "yes".

there was a jpg of BO with a mac in a windowless room

edit: link Verification photo: http://i.imgur.com/oz0a7.jpg

I expect the staffers answering the questions to put in some more time, but then that'd ruin the facade.

Quite possible he simply wasn't able to access the site like everyone else!

Do you think there will be actual answers in the spirit of an AMA?

I don't see how anyone could truthfully expect that.

Well, he is a politician, it's not like he's going to say anything he wouldn't say on T.V. just because it's an internet forum.

I still hope that something interesting will come out of it, but 99% of the people who do AMAs just answer the questions that they want to.

This.

People can be so cynical and unappreciative. It's easy to get caught up in the now and take the little things for granted.

President Obama's predecessor didn't use EMAIL!!!!

Now Obama is taking questions on Reddit.

It's all about perspective. His use of technology is completely different than yours. There are so many ramifications for everything he says and does. You can't imagine living in a world like that - very few can, because very few will.

So just take a deep breath and enjoy the entertainment.

This is just a cool way to suck the air out of the RNC convention news cycle.

Stroke of (political) genius, if you asked me.

It was a perfectly valid prediction, one that I also made, and it came true. The answers were only a handful and they were very fluffy.

If he was right, it just shows that he understands how these things work.

If he was wrong, he would be pleasantly surprised that the expected lack of substance was averted.

One can hold a pessimistic opinion and be realistic at the same time.

The typical politician will avoid giving real answers whenever possible, and respond to any questions with canned answers that carry as little meaning as is humanly possible. Obama has shown no sign of being any different from the usual in this respect. And why should he? The current US political environment punishes deviations incredibly harshly.

Just because being right implies disappointment doesn't mean it's not worth saying.