UPDATE: Just realized there are 12 questions on the front page of 10 Questions, so the cutoff for getting asked is 1,165 net positive votes before midnight. I'm at +826 right now. The heat is on. Vote below.

The 10Questions question period is rapidly drawing to a close. Here is my question for the Presidential candidates. It's a simple and direct one -- one that forces candidates to articulate whether they'll reduce the size of government, and if not why not. I need you at least 908 1,165 of you to vote for it on 10Questions.com before the deadline at midnight tonight.



Here's the situation. The top 10 questions right now are stacked with you-name-it left-wing cause -- net neutrality, terrorist surveillance, medical marijuana, and "is America unofficially a theocracy?" There's a real chance that the Democratic candidates who participate will not be asked a single tough question that forces them to articulate their beliefs or address an unfamiliar issue.

Early reaction to my question is 2-to-1 positive, but as of now, I need 908 1,165 new net positive votes to make the top 10 -- and likely more than that to overcome whatever negative votes that are likely to materialize in the next seven hours. I know that more than 908 1,165 people will be reading this post, so I know we can do this. It's an audacious goal -- no other question has surged this far this fast. But it's worth the 5 seconds of your time it takes to vote to make sure the candidates are forced to articulate their views on limited government.

And Democrats are not the only ones who need to answer this. In case you haven't noticed, Republicans haven't done a real good job of shrinking government when they've been in office. It's time to hold all the candidates accountable.

Please vote.

To John Edwards credit, he appears to be a very forward thinking candidate with regard to navigation in the modern world.

Among other things, he was the *first* candidate to do a back-flip off the high-dive in to the world of socnets, he effectively responded to a potentially harmful viral video, his campaign and supporters have been active in Second Life, and of course, the big ticket purchase is that he hired Mr. Revolution himself, Joe Trippi.

Of course, the modern trail hasn't exactly been perfect for Mr. Edwards. In fact, Team Edwards was involved in the "First blog scandal of 2008."

Tomorrow, John Edwards will once again be *first* in something by taking part in the Myspace/MTV forum. Yay!

But does John Edwards really understand and care about the modern world or is he just a big phoney being encouraged by a savvy staff?

Two interesting nuggets lead me to believe it's the latter.

The first nugget comes from David Brooks' essential column in the New York Times on the influence (or lack thereof) of the netroots which includes this bit:

Several weeks ago, I asked John Edwards what the YearlyKos event was like. He couldn’t remember which event I was talking about, and looked over to an aide for help.

Couldn't remember? Seriously? How could you forget if you're supposed to be the most modern candidate?

And the Politico's Ben Smith reports that a spokesman for Edwards wouldn't even respond which is just plain stupid. [h/t Josh Levy at TechPresident]

The second nugget also comes from The New York Times, but this time, from their political blog, the Caucus. The Times' Julie Bosman reports on Edwards' appearance in the upcoming MySpace/MTV forum and notes that Edwards, perhaps trying to hide something, refuses to openly discuss the web sites that he visits:

But Mr. Edwards may not be ready for his own boxers-or-briefs moment. When asked by MTV to name his favorite Web sites, a tame request by most standards, he demurred. “I’m not telling,” he said. “That’ll just get me in trouble. No way, I’m not talking about Web sites.”

Awkward much? Awkward indeed for the candidate who "wants" to be the most modern candidate.

Perhaps Trippi needs to set down his diet pepsi for a moment and staff this guy personally. At least that way Edwards could continue to talk like a duck. What a quack.

Justin Miller over at Real Clear Politics surfs the YouTube channels of the Democratic Presidential candidates and finds that most of them are missing something: footage of their recent debate performance.

Surprisingly, modern media guru Joe Trippi's guy, John Edwards, who supposedly did a pretty good job during the debate doesn't have up any clips:

Strangest of all is John Edwards' channel, which has only a video of him arriving at the debate. His official website also lacks debate clips. Why is the Edwards campaign not touting his well-received performance through its web campaign, which has been described as one of the best in either party?