The CNN/YouTube debate has devolved into a full-fledged nightmare for the TV network. Conservative bloggers show no sign of relenting after a day of disparaging CNN for its poor selection of questions. The story has been at the top of the Drudge Report all day and new reports from the New York Times (in which I’m quoted) and San Francisco Chronicle paint CNN in a very negative light.

The Save the Debate coalition, of which I am a member, released a statement tonight expressing its disappointment.

The Save the Debate coalition would like to thank the Republican candidates for participating in the YouTube debate, which reached an estimated 4.5 million Americans, a record for this primary cycle. We are hopeful that the candidates will consider future opportunities to use technology to reach new participants in the political process.

Further, we applaud the YouTube community for the quality of the questions submitted that sparked informative and substantive exchanges among the Republican candidates. With nearly 5,000 YouTube user-submitted questions — 2,000 more than for the Democratic debate ‚Äî Americans are increasingly taking advantage of the opportunity to participate in the democratic process.

Unfortunately, CNN’s flawed editorial process in choosing the questions asked of the candidates marred an otherwise lively debate and betrayed the trust of the Republican candidates and the YouTube user community. In the most glaring example, a questioner affiliated with the Hillary Clinton campaign was given a soapbox to berate the Republican candidates at the debate — when even a cursory web search of the individual would have revealed his clear conflict of interest.

A YouTube debate should strive to minimize the media filter rather than highlight it. Instead the selection of questions for the Republican CNN/YouTube debate highlighted CNN’s selection bias.

We strongly encourage YouTube and other new media platforms to refrain from working with CNN on future debates.

Conservative bloggers are taking a variety of views. The Directors at RedState are calling for the heads of two people at CNN, Michelle Malkin is pursuing the identities of the questioners, and Patrick Ruffini gave out grades — an A for YouTube and an F for CNN. Others, like Mary Katharine Ham and David All, who were with me in St. Petersburg, are disappointed as well. Amanda Carpenter of Townhall says, “The Clinton News Network Strikes Again.” The list goes on and on.

In the past 24 hours, CNN has released at least three official statements about the debate. The first statement defends the vetting process for selecting questions.

The whole point of these ground-breaking CNN/YouTube debates is to focus on substantive questions of concern to real people and to throw open the process to a wider range of Americans all around the country. CNN cared about what you asked, not who you were. This was the case for both the Democratic and the Republican CNN/YouTube debates.

The issues raised during last night‚Äôs debate were legitimate and relevant no matter who was asking the questions. The vested interests who are challenging the credibility of the questioners are trying to distract voters from the substantive issues they care most about. Americans are tired of that discredited low-road approach, and throughout this election campaign CNN will stay focused on what the candidates are saying about the pressing issues facing this country at a critical time in our history. Judging by the fact that last night’s event was the most-watched primary debate ever, it seems that the audience responded to our focus on plain-spoken questions about important issues.

CNN political director Sam Feist, the man RedState wants fired, also released a statement about the selection process.

When choosing among the 5,000-or-so questions, CNN considered factors such as length, video quality and whether the question would help Republican primary voters select their presidential nominee. We sought a variety of questions on a variety of topics. We also sought to eliminate anyone with a direct role in a campaign and with one unfortunate exception, which we regret and have fully explained, we accomplished that.

And finally, in a statement released during the Google after-party at The Coliseum in St. Petersburg last night, CNN sought to clean up the mess created by Hillary Clinton supporter Keith Kerr, who asked the question about gays in the military and was then encouraged by Anderson Cooper to lecture the candidates on the issue.

Following the debate, CNN learned that retired brigadier general Keith Kerr served on Clinton’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender steering committee.

CNN Senior Vice President and Executive Producer of the debate, David Bohrman, says, “We regret this incident. CNN would not have used the General’s question had we known that he was connected to any presidential candidate.”

Prior to the debate, CNN had verified his military background and that he had not contributed any money to any presidential candidate.

Following the debate, Kerr told CNN that he’s done no work for the Clinton campaign. He says he is a member of the Log Cabin Republicans and was representing no one other than himself.

I know several people who work at CNN, so it brings me no joy to criticize the network. I was tremendously hopeful in advance of the debate that we’d all be praising this unique format that promotes greater participation in the democratic process. While YouTube certainly lived up to its end of the deal, CNN let us all down.

UPDATE — 10:30 p.m.: Soren Dayton found a gem on the New York Observer from Steve Kornacki on CNN’s Democrat debate two weeks ago.

Once the gold standard for all-news television, the Cable News Network used the night to make a convincing argument that it should never again be entrusted with a presidential debate.