Easy. Headlines like this.

Given that the participants are selected by a Republican polling operation, what does that say about the audiences convictions? On what basis are the people selected or not selected?

What does the small selected audience say about McCains’s ability to connect with larger audiences? What does it say about his ability to roll with the punches of unscripted questions?

How unscripted are these things? Sixteen questions were asked. How did the selctions of the questions come about?

Is this based on the idea that he’ll convince 200 people at at time and thereby win the election? Doesn’t seem to be efficient, and there was minimal television coverage of the event.

Are these warm-ups to real debates with the general public present? Are they footage for commercials?

Or is the McCain/Republican party fearing that they’re so out of touch that they need these meetings in order to get in contact with “real” people and their concerns?

Is there some super-secret strategy that these meetings push forward?

So what is the purpose of these meetings? Inquiring minds want to know.