Tweet @Obama and @McCain During Debate

Instead of just detailing mundane thoughts on everyday moments of their lives, Twitter users will be able to have their political opinions featured as part of the upcoming presidential debates. Both C-SPAN and Current will integrate and display “tweets” during their debate coverage.

After providing all kinds of online video coverage of the conventions, traditionally staid C-SPAN is diving deeper into new media with both tweets and updates from the blogosphere. According to a recent segment (embedded above), C-SPAN’s “Debate Hub” will have live-streaming video on its site along with the most “interesting” tweets that provide “instant reflections” on what’s happening during the debate.

Elsewhere, Current’s stupidly titled “Hack the Debate” (you are not hacking anything) will show filtered tweets as overlays during the televised broadcast as well as its live-streaming coverage on its site. Concerned with possible misuse of the Twitter function, Current provided this reassurance in a recent blog post:

Since time will be a factor, if we get flooded with “Hey Mom, I’m on TV #current”, or “Palin is a GILF #current”-type tweets we will likely adjust to keep things fresh. When you get flooded by someone tweeting inappropriately on Twitter, you simply un-follow them, but when watching our broadcast viewers won’t have that ability. So we will help out in that regard.

The first debate is Friday, Sept. 26 at 9 p.m. EST/6 p.m. PST.