You might get people who intimately know an issue from reddit, but they won't know the politics or political players as well. Also, if you do get someone that

You might get people who intimately know an issue from reddit, but they won't know the politics or political players as well. Also, if you do get someone that intimately knows an issue from reddit it is likely from a very personal point of view. Sometimes that's not a problem but you'd have to really think about how their personal agenda colors the question...with strangers this is not always clear. Professional journalists are supposed to be somewhat removed which provides useful perspective -- or at least a perspective that is more generally applicable. So, no, they wouldn't be able to do what Woodward and Bernstein did. BUT they could offer valuable insight and perspective that contributes to the whole that would be hard to fish out any other way so I definitely wouldn't dismiss them.