US Democrats have started the process of choosing their Presidential candidate and the media coverage is fab. It is a testament to the best and worst of US journalism. At times both magnificently earnest and majestically trivial. The first Presidential candidate debates were, of course, live on cable TV MSNBC. By common consent no one candidate really got ahead, although Obama and Hillary are seen as favourites. The MSNBC coverage is a mixture of a political beauty pageant, a College debating society and The X-Factor Show. Everything from Hillary’s pearls to Obama’s policy on military intervention in Afghanistan is pored over. And, being America, there is the fantastically committed liberal media monitoring website Media Matters to provide endless discussion about the way that the debate was covered. Feast yourselves on digital demcracy in action.