#AskTIME Subscriber Q and A: Zeke Miller

Welcome to TIME’s subscriber Q&A with TIME political reporter Zeke Miller.

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DonQuixotic asks, Zeke, In the wake of the Ethan Czahor brouhaha, is vetting for Presidential campaigns dead? Each campaign we seem to see more and more of these controversial people at various levels forced to drop out due to things they’ve said or done. Things that their campaign staff should have uncovered and taken well into consideration before bringing them along for the ride. Is this a reflection of the decline in the vetting process or more of the pervasiveness of social media and accessibility to everything someone has said and done?

Vetting is probably more important than ever in this hyperactive media environment. Often campaigns vet their new hires after they’ve started work, but before the public announcement is made. That may begin to change after this incident.

PaulDirks asks, This Axelrod claim actually opens up a huge can of worms. Do professional politicians actually believe anything? We often hear about how ‘angry’ House Republicans are with the various executive actions that Obama takes but I don’t believe it for a minute. They’re not angry, they’re delighted to gin up controversy in order to placate the folks back home. No politician ever says a single word that isn’t first vetted by their advisers on how it’s going to play to constituency x as compared to constituency y. Why on earth are we suddenly pretending that this is news?

The Axelrod pronouncement wasn’t “news” in the sense that most people suspected that Obama had misled on the issue. What was notable was how brazenly the keeper of the Obama flame wrote about it. More than anything, it probably indicates that Axelrod believes that in 20 or 30 years it will have been worse for Obama to be against same-sex marriage from the start than have misled the public for political gains.

DonQuixotic asks, Do Swampland staff – for all of your dedication and passion surrounding the Hill – dread election years? I imagine it’s a very trying time for you guys as far as workloads and travel are concerned.

I won’t speak for everyone else, but I love campaign coverage. It’s just a great story: 15+ people battling it out to lead the free world in the cornfields of Iowa. Also frequent flier miles. Too bad I won’t be vacationing until 2017…

yogi asks, while Jeb Bush obviously has his own beliefs and work experience background, how do you see him convincing voters he won’t be a continuation of his brother’s administration? Or will he embrace GWB’s legacy?

That’s definitely one of his toughest challenges. Part of what to look for is how Bush goes about introducing himself to the nation. He’s a very different person than Bush 43, and like the best storytellers, expect him try to show that instead of telling it.

deconstructive asks, Zeke, thanks to you and Alex Altman for reporting the DNC choice. What’s your take – beyond what was in Alex’s story – about why Philadelphia was chosen over Columbus? Peronal ties? Not their officially stated reasons – I question all the DNC premises….

Ohio is as important a state to win as PA, and PA leans more blue than OH as of now, so picking a more blue state over a equally important one can be challeneged. Also, if hotel rooms were the real sticking point, wouldn’t they say so outright? While Columbus’ biggest block of hotel rooms is downtown, the second biggest is up the street (High St.) at THE Ohio State University, and access back and forth between the two is easy …let alone all the surburban rooms all large cities have for those who want to sleep cheap. Also, the RNC’s host in Cleveland up front puts OH in play (see my first point), but Cleveland is the least red part of the state, so I think they should have hosted the RNC in Cincinnati, the most reliable red area (John Boehner’s district). Dwindling state money in OH? Don’t expect the D’s to help fund any R activities in OH, and the D’s could have afforded to host in Columbus, where the city is solid blue in a sea of red suburbs, so picking them would have helped the vote there. Anyhow, as you can guess, those are my thoughts, so what are yours? Thanks.

The GOP had ruled out Columbus last year largely because of hotel rooms for their convention. The Democratic convention has about 2/3rds more delegates and with an incumbent president, it’s just going to be bigger. Add to that, the RNC reaching to Columbus to fund its convention in Cleveland, and there was a concern there wasn’t enough money in the state to host it. New York was a logistical nightmare, without the hotel or media filing space in close proximity to Barclay’s. Also New York would come with some baggage, both its reputation, the ongoing Mayor-NYPD drama, etc. Philadelphia was an early favorite for the DNC, but in the end, it was also the only real option.

deconstructive asks, Zeke, while we know reporters are supposed to be neutral, we know no one is in real life unless they don’t care about a topic (and a reporter covering politics would care about the topic, yes? but I digress), so you can tell us, no one else will know – would YOU rather see a 2016 retread of Clinton vs. Bush or see a brand new slate like O’Malley / Klobuchar / Warren (even if Liz says for now she’s not running) vs. Paul / Cruz / Christie / etc.? I’ve been upfront along saying I’d vote for Warren in the primaries and vote for Hillary in the general, but I’d want new faces over familiar ones. We need new ideas from new people to fix our problems like unemployment.

From a news perspective, more primary candidates = more stories to write, which keeps me employed. (Thanks TIME!) Whether voters want new faces or old, that’s up to them to decide.

deconstructiva asks, Zeke, thanks for your coverage of the R’s pre-2016 run, especially on twitter. While Romney withdrew partly claiming a need for new faces, and others seem to say the same thing, do the R’s really believe their own new-face rhetoric when – thanks in part to Romney’s withdrawal, Jeb Bush is one of the front runners, if not THE leader in hoarding GOP cash? The Bush legacy name again? A former governor out of politics getting back in the game – Bush, not Romney? (But I digress.) Do the GOP main power brokers really want the tried and true, or are they willing to back a new face, most likely a Tea Partier?

The GOP establishment wants a winner, and they’re seeing momentum on the Bush side. That might fade and they could go elsewhere, but almost certainly not a tea party candidate. The ideological gulf is just too broad. Some Republicans in that camp would be pretty open about voting for Hillary Clinton over someone like Ted Cruz.

Deconstructive asks, Zeke, thanks for covering the White House a lot. Therefore, you can tell us – how do Obama and Biden really get along now? We know Biden wants to run in 2016, yet before the Super Bowl, Obama refused to take Hillary’s or Joe’s side in the upcoming race, saying, “I love them both.” Does Obama really love both, or does he get along better with Joe? If so, why not help out a friend, unless their relationship is a “business friendship,” not a personal one? The wild card here, of course, is Hillary is the prohibitive favorite, so Obama leaning towards Joe might not necessarily hurt, correct? Name one Republican who can seriously beat Hillary (hint – it’s not Bush, Paul, or Cruz, not even Jindal, let alone Romney).

It’s definitely a complicated relationship with them both. Obama has a closer personal relationship with the Vice President, but there have been flashpoints, in particular some of the VP’s more colorful comments over the years. With Clinton, it’s always been more professional. Expect the president to stay neutral until Biden decides what he wants to do this summer, and in the unlikely event Biden does get in, to stay out of it.

yogi asks, ZM, hypothetical: you get to interview one presidential candidate with the agreement they’ll give you real non-prepackaged-campaign-stump-speech answers. Who’s the candidate and what’s the #1 question?

All of them. “Why don’t you do this more often?” The equivalent of asking the genie for one million wishes.