Don't you wish Congress had a version of the UK's "Question Time?"

[chaplainM]

M.P. William Hague posed this to Mr. Blair:

"Is not it the case that proper enforcement of existing laws and careful consideration of new ones would be better than the current brand of ineffective authoritarianism?"

I'd love to hear Mr. Bush respond to THAT one...

[niyad]

1. you are assuming he could understand the big words?

[Roland99]

2. Every. Damn. Day.

[napi21]

3. YES! I also wish congress would act more like the Parliment!

If you've ever listened to one of their sessions on cspan, you know what I mean! They're absolutely brutal!

[FreedomAngel82]

4. I wish!

I like to watch Blair getting grilled. Bush could never handle it.

[NanceGreggs]

5. If we had this system in place ...

... the Neo-Cons never would have proferred Bush as a candidate to begin with. They would have had to go with someone who could actually speak coherently, and think on his feet.

[Broadslidin]

6. Pontifex Maximus Would Have To Held Down And Given A Good Dose..

of Sodium Penathol....!

[mrfrapp]

7. For completeness...

For the sake of completeness I'll post Tony Blair's meaningless response:

I am sorry but, as ever with the right hon. Gentleman, the jokes are good but the judgment less so. Let me explain exactly why he is wrong. The words in the amendment that he and the Liberal Democrats support—I hope that his hon. Friends realise this—refer to "the listener". That does not cover images, placards or written statements. Supporting that would significantly weaken our ability to prosecute the very people about whom he complained on television a couple weeks ago.

That is not all that the Conservatives have done to weaken the legislation. They would also change the wording of the test from there being an offence if the

"public could reasonably be expected to infer"

to "would infer", thus imposing on the prosecution a subjective test, which is harder to prove.

Furthermore, the right hon. Gentleman, all the Conservatives who will vote for the relevant amendment and the Liberal Democrats, would remove any reference to glorification in the proscribed groups. That would significantly weaken our ability to proscribe groups that glorify terrorism. Hon. Members must understand that, if we remove any reference to glorification from the Bill, people outside will infer that we have decided to dilute our law at the very moment when we should strengthen it and send a united signal that we will not tolerate those who glorify terrorism in our country.

http://www.theyworkforyou.com/debates/?id=2006-02-15a.1412.2

[mmonk]

8. I would settle for a real congress

[Wordie]

9. If we did have the equivalent of a Prime Minister's Question Time...

we would be forced to elect articulate presidents, ones who had a true understanding of the issues, who were capable of thinking on their feet, and who could speak without a teleprompter...and who would speak directly, instead of letting a press secretary handle the hard questions.

Why would anyone want that? :sarcasm:

[mrfrapp]

10. Waah?

"who were capable of thinking on their feet, and who could speak without a teleprompter.."

The Prime Minister of the UK is forewarned of the questions that will be asked. Blair might not read from a teleprompter but he does read from a piece of paper.

Seriously, if you're impressed by Prime Ministers Question Time then American politics is in a worse state than I can even imagine. Amateur dramatics, illogical and meaningless arguments are not in the least bit impressive to me. The USA declared independance from the anscestors of the sorry lot who inhabit Parliament today. Please don't aspire to be like them. You can do so much better.

[Wordie]

11. People in the UK must not realize just how bad it is with Bush.

Even if Blair prepares for the questions, he still is capable of putting a sentence together all on his own. Not so with Bush.

[chaplainM]

12. Funny

There's a rumor that a Tory M.P., knowing that Mr. Blair kept his notes in alphabetical order, would deliberately ask questions whose keywords were at opposite ends of the alphabet, just to watch the prime minister leaf madly through his notes.