A lead from the British ...

Here is what I would like to see.

Prior to Woodrow Wilson, whom moved it to a radio broadcast, the State of the Union was submitted in writing to congress. I advocate we return to that format and instead use the national, prime time hour or so to host a "Question Time With The President", much the same way the Brits have question and answer time with their PM. This recent Q & A with the House GOP was a model on how this can be conducted. I saw many clips, including the Paul Ryan exchange, and I agree with Titus ... this is a useful exercise for the Republic. It clearly can be done in a civilized manner, so if Obama fancies himself a president of precedents let him institutionalize this format as a replacement for the pomp & circumstance surrounding a televised SoTU address which is nothing more than 3 minutes worth of information jam packed into 70 (after all, a written SoTU would satisfy the Constitutional requirement while the Q & A would do more to further the public's knowledge of where our leaders stand).

So I agree, I liked it. It cut through pundits and editorials and we as a viewing public gained as much from what questions the president didn't answer as the one in which he did. In fact, now that I think about it, lets make it a monthly occurrence ... I can't see a downside to that.