As we speak, the teleprompter is being reprogrammed so that all evasive answers do not exceed 140 characters:

Starting at 2 p.m. ET on Wednesday, President Obama will hold the first ever “Twitter Town Hall,” to discuss jobs and the economy. The president will be speaking, not tweeting, but his questions will come from Twitter.

Thousands of Tweets are already populating the #AskObama hashtag created for the event. But the White House says Obama will also answer questions that are asked on Twitter while the event is going on.

Twitter will monitor hot tweets — those that have the most Retweets, Favorites, and Replies. Also, with help from visualization company Mass Relevance, Twitter will be mapping the big themes and locations that are “driving” the conversation.

The questions and comments are already flowing in. A couple of them are even non-snarky. For the first Twitter townhall, look for the debut of the phrase “Tweeting from Behind” and a pitch for Joe Biden’s new Twitter account, which the president will undoubtedly give a plug (pun intended).

The Twitter townhall website is here. Tweeters, start your engines.

Speaking of Biden’s new Twitter account, it turns out that Sheriff Joe won’t be writing his own Tweets. Darn — that’s like getting a clown car and hiding the keys from Bozo. What a letdown.

**Written by Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

If you were like me, you were on Twitter. The micro-blogging/social networking giant reports: “Last night saw the highest sustained rate of Tweets ever. From 10:45 – 2:20am ET, there was an average of 3,000 Tweets per second.” The graphic:

From vanity platform, to grass-roots organizing vehicle, to revolutionary samizdat, to global water cooler, people around the world have tailored Twitter for their diverse needs from the petty to the grand to the historic.

You can fear the flood of new information, as this writer does.

Or you can give thanks for the ever-evolving, freedom-enhancing communications tools at our disposable.

We live in amazing times.

Twitter is looking to hire their first DC-based employee to act as a liason between Twitter and the government and political organizations.

Since this ad is way over 140 characters in length, it looks as if they’ve already sold out to the government:

How would entrepreneurial or trail-blazing experience help you deal with the government? Seems like that would be more of a hinderance.

Nancy Pelosi starts using Twitter mere days ago, and now this? I’m getting the feeling that taxpayers are hiring Nancy a Twitter assistant.

The broader implications of Twitter climbing into bed with the government may mean, if anything, that the revolution will not be Tweeted.

**Written by guest-blogger Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

House Speaker Pelosi joined Twitter about a week ago:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) tweeted for the first time this weekend before the commencement ceremonies at Cornell University, where she addressed the graduating Class of 2010.

Her Twitter page is here…

…and it looks like she’s getting the hang of it quickly:

Welcome to Twitter, Ms. Speaker!

**Written by guest-blogger Doug Powers

Twitter @ThePowersThatBe

The impact of Twitter on events in Iran has been noticed by our usually dictator-compliant State Department, which risked insulting the ayatollahs by contacting Twitter to request they postpone a scheduled system maintenance down-time. Even al-Jazeera is commenting on the importance of technology, including Twitter, in what I hope is the Second Iranian Revolution.

Despite being old men with little exposure to leading-edge technology, Iran’s ruling Guardian Council understands the essential value of communication to freedom: If they can communicate freely, no people can be long enslaved.

The Iranian government has taken substantial steps to limit their citizens’ ability to use the internet. They have blocked most access to Facebook and other sites, have limited text messaging, and have cut the nation’s “bandwidth,” meaning the speed with which one can send information through the internet, but have stopped short of simply cutting of the nation’s internet connectivity (probably because they need it themselves.) However, with “tweets” of only 140 characters or less, bandwidth is a non-issue (as opposed to, for example, transmitting videos)…

…No wonder the mullahs are afraid of Twitter if it can not only help organize protests within their country but also stir up pro-freedom reactions thousands of miles away. It isn’t surprising that a CBS reporter says that all access to Twitter was blocked in Iran as of Wednesday morning. Well, until the young, tech-savvy population there finds a way around the mullah’s electronic muzzle.

I, like many others, was somewhat skeptical of Twitter but decided to get involved with it a few weeks ago after talking with conservative blogger Michelle Malkin. I asked her for her thoughts on the Twitter revolution in Iran: “I’ve tried to persuade friends for months that Twitter is much, much more than a celebrity vanity tool. The Iranian uprising has shattered that myth once and for all. In the hands of freedom-loving dissidents, the micro-blogging social network is a revolutionary samizdat — undermining the mullah-cracy’s information blockades one Tweet at a time.”

Ross is on Twitter here. I’m here. Click here for #iranelection.