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A couple of recent polls have some people envisioning the fall of blogs, but blogs are still rising in all the right places within Washington.

The latest evidence: President Bush and his top adviser, Karl Rove, are saying kind words about blogs. According to comments excerpted from a new book about Bush titled "Strategery," both of them see blogs as a counterweight to mainstream media outlets that they think haven't always been fair to the president.

"[T]he amazing thing about this world we live in," Bush said, "is that there's a kind of free-flowing, kind of bulletin board of ideas and thoughts out there in the ether space, sometimes landing on somebody’s desk and sometimes not, but always available. It's a very interesting period."

Bush himself didn't actually use the word "blog" or any related words in the excerpt, but that doesn't mean he hasn't been talking about blogs privately. Beltway Blogroll has learned through a Capitol Hill source of a recent meeting that Bush had with a Republican member of the House leadership to discuss blogs and their significance in Washington. That same lawmaker is now penning a follow-up letter to the president, the source said.

Expect to hear more about that soon. Until then, you can read what Power Line and Tapscott's Copy Desk had to say about the Bush and Rove comments from "Strategery."

And for a more critical response, see the post of Marty Kaplan at The Huffington Post. Here's an excerpt to pique your curiousity:

Sure, an abundance of opinion is swell, and the blogosphere breaks the monopoly on megaphones. But the only way to break up a "monopoly on the news" is more journalism, not more propaganda; more independent media companies, not more gigantic media conglomerates; more investigative reporting, not more subpoenaed and jailed reporters and whistleblowers; more government openness, not more official secrecy; more respect for the idea of truth, not more nihilism about the notion of reality.

Posted by at 07:59 PM | Comments (8)

One of the top newspapers in Wisconsin explored the presidential prospects of Sen. Russ Feingold over the weekend, and leading liberal bloggers weren't happy with the tone of the piece.

Specifically, and in the typically self-interested fashion of the blogosphere, they were ticked at some of the conclusions the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reached about Democratic bloggers.

The paper pitted the results of a Gallup presidential poll about potential Democratic presidential candidates against those of polls at Daily Kos and MyDD. The conclusion: Wisconsin's Feingold doesn't even register as choice among the Democratic population at large but is the favorite of the netroots.

That's no surprise, considering Feingold's outreach to bloggers as outlined in the article. But the paper hinted that being a favorite among bloggers may not be the best thing for a presidential contender. "While some view the Internet as above all a democratizing force," reporter Craig Gilbert wrote, "others see it as polarizing as well, fueling candidates who tap into the passions of activists and ideological voters but not the broader electorate."

Talk like that -- and quotes from people like Carol Darr, an enemy of Daily Kos' Markos Moulitsas Zuniga for about a year now -- sparked another rant against "tired D.C. conventional wisdom."

Eshcaton dishonored Darr with its "Wanker of the Day" award. Moulitsas also went ballistic, as did John Aravosis of Americablog.

"Let the institutional players keep thinking that we're 'extremists' and that 'no Internet candidate has been elected president' so that they stay away these parts," Moulitsas wrote. "There are too many good players who get this whole netroots thing -- like Feingold and [former Virginia Gov. Mark] Warner -- to worry about the rest."

Posted by at 12:50 PM | Comments (0)

Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee came to Washington last week and took some time from his schedule to meet with a few bloggers. All of them left the meeting talking about his rather transparent presidential ambitions at least in passing.

Most of the bloggers mentioned those ambitions in a flattering way. "Sitting in a small room with him along with a handful of other bloggers, it was easy to forget that you were talking to a governor and possible presidential candidate," Pat Cleary of ShopFloor, the blog of the National Association of Manufacturers, wrote in an entry that focused on Huckabee's healthcare views. (Cleary also recapped the governor's comments on partisanship, the budget and competitiveness.)

Tim Chapman, who blogs for Townhall.com, headlined his entry "Could This Man Be Your Next President?" "I would have liked to hear him say that Republicans should not have passed the 2003 Medicare bill," Chapman wrote. "I also would have liked to hear him talk a little tougher on congressional spending under Republican control. But I recognize that at this point in the ball game, you need more friends than enemies when you are trying to build momentum for a 2008 presidential run. There is plenty of time for his positions on those issues to be worked out."

At RedState, however, the anonymous blogger Augustine sees Huckabee's presidential aspirations as the sign of a "weak bench."

Even as he praised Huckabee, the chairman of the National Governors Association, as "one of the best Republican governors in the country," he dubbed him a "marginal candidate" for president and complained about the "sorry lot of GOP governors we've got" who could even seek the presidency. "[T]he current crop of governors has produced little in the way of policy advancement -- and a lot more in the way of tax increases and federal government payouts," Augustine wrote.

Andy Roth, who did not attend the bloggers' session with Huckabee, was even more critical at The Club For Growth, and he took his shots directly at Huckabee. Roth pegged the Arkansan as one of those governors who likes tax hikes and chastised his fellow bloggers for not calling him on it. "I'm sorry, but he is not one of the best Republican governors in the country, and he's not presidential material. Period."

Posted by at 12:12 PM | Comments (0)

Every Tuesday, Daily Kos and "The Majority Report" at Air America Radio profile a new congressional candidate. They also steer readers and listeners to the ActBlue Web site to contribute to the upstart campaigns.

All of the chosen candidates have two traits in common: They are veterans, and they are Democrats. Some call them the "fighting Dems," and these days the candidates rally under the Band of Brothers banner. Their ranks currently number 53 political soldiers from 51 districts in 23 states.

Every campaign has its engaging story lines, and the Band of Brothers is the first prominent one of 2006. In addition to Daily Kos, blogs like Blue Force and MyDD have helped push the story into major media outlets. At least one blogger is on the board of the Band of Brothers political action committee, and two other PACs -- Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, and Vet PAC -- also are behind the effort.

But weeks before the nation's first primary (in Texas on March 7), the band already has been broken: Three fighting Dems have laid down their arms. The only question now is how much staying power their comrades will have.

The most significant blow came this month when a bitter Paul Hackett withdrew from the Ohio Senate race. He blamed the Democratic establishment in Washington for undermining his candidacy in favor of fellow Democrat Sherrod Brown, currently a member of the House.

Also this month, David Ashe ended his congressional quest in Virginia's 2nd District, opting instead for a job in the new administration of Democratic Gov. Tim Kaine. And Bryan Lentz halted his campaign in Pennsylvania's 7th District when another veteran, Vice Adm. Joseph Sestak, decided to run.

In New York's 29th District, meanwhile, state party leaders only recently rallied behind veteran Eric Massa, one of the organizers of the fighting Dems. They had tried to recruit businessman David Nachbar instead, but he decided not to run when concerns emerged about his party affiliation.

The Band of Brothers faced an uphill campaign climb even before such setbacks. Voters traditionally trust Republicans more when it comes to security, the battlefield where Democrats are trying to compete by touting ex-soldiers. And on paper, most of the fighting Dems are long shots for election.

Three of the incumbent Republicans they are challenging had no competitors in 2004. Seven more won 80 percent or more of the vote, and the average tally of the relevant GOP candidates that year was 67.5 percent.

In addition, four members of the Band of Brothers are repeat candidates. None of them won more than 36 percent of the vote in 2004, and one, Al Weed in Virginia's 5th District, has to outlast fellow fighting Dem Bern Ewert just to win the right for a rematch against Rep. Virgil Goode. Democratic veterans Pete Duffy and Peter Sullivan also will compete in a primary in New Hampshire's 1st District.

Now the loss of three candidates in days -- and particularly of Hackett, a hero to Democratic bloggers and the inspiration behind the current movement -- has raised new doubts about the prospects of the remaining candidates. One diarist at Daily Kos wondered: "Who is next among the remaining [53] fighting Dems to be 'redeployed' or shunted aside? ... Hopefully, Hackett, Lentz and Ashe are the exception."

The Band of Brothers strategy is not necessarily a bad one. "A movement is more powerful than a bunch of political campaigns," said Erick Mullen, who has been involved since the start and now works with Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. "Being part of a movement gives voters something beyond themselves to contribute to the nation this Election Day."

NationalJournal.com contributing editor Charlie Cook offered another good reason for the political game plan: "In the absence of a compelling, experienced elected official, going with a combat veteran is sound, helping to inoculate Democrats from damage on a historically weak spot," he said.

But Larry Sabato of the University of Virginia added that "it only works if it is part of a much broader strategy. The party as a whole needs to be aggressive on a wide range of national security issues" and act upon missteps by President Bush. Sabato said last week's united attack against the administration for giving a government-run company in the United Arab Emirates oversight of security at six U.S. ports was "a solid start."

For now, most of the focus is on one fighting Dem, Tammy Duckworth in Illinois' 6th District. She is running for the seat being vacated by GOP Rep. Henry Hyde and actually was recruited even though Christine Cegelis, who held Hyde to 56 percent of the vote in 2004, already was running.

To gain the same kind of traction, the rest of the candidates will have to hit "success metrics like cash on hand," Mullen said. "Success breeds success. Those who make the mistake of believing that door-to-door lit drops and lawn signs alone can carry the day will be very disappointed."

Bloggers may well be the key. They proved their fundraising prowess for Hackett in 2005 and the "Kos Dozen" in 2004, and lately, they have made a concerted effort to fill the war chest of non-vet Ciro Rodriguez in Texas.

The fighting Dems who win the bulk of their attention may be the ones in the best position to score upsets this fall. "No one knows for sure whether there will even be a Democratic wave in November, or if there is one, the size of that wave," Sabato said. "Yet in the event, however unlikely, of a sizeable wave or tsunami, the bloggers could potentially help to position a larger number of Democratic challengers to take advantage of the circumstance."

Posted by at 07:16 AM | Comments (0)

PoliticsTV hasn't debuted its Internet television service yet, but it already has received a plug from a blog that supports one of the Democratic candidates set to be featured on the site.

LamontBlog mentioned the forthcoming site in an entry about its favorite candidate, Ned Lamont, the businessman who is challenging Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut in the Democratic primary. Lamont Blog, which is not affiliated with Lamont's blog-less campaign, reported that Lamont already has been interviewed by PoliticsTV.

The site bills itself as "an Internet TV network for progressives, independents, Democrats -- or any American opposed to the Republicans' radical right agenda." PoliticsTV plans to air interviews with candidates as well as elected leaders in Congress and at other levels of government. The site also will have a blog and a show dedicated to the blogosphere, plus channels focused on citizens, satire, pundits and issues.

Posted by at 01:48 PM | Comments (0)

The Senate campaign of New York Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton just learned the hard way that it doesn't pay to annoy the folks in charge of the most popular blogs -- even if those folks share your party affiliation.

Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, the man behind Daily Kos, took a shot at the Clinton campaign yesterday after having received a fourth unsolicited fundraising e-mail. Rather than just add the e-mail address to his spam filter, Moulitsas made sure his hundreds of thousands of daily readers knew just how much "alarmist crap" the Clinton campaign includes in its fundraising pitches.

He was particularly annoyed by Clinton's argument that she faces a difficult Senate re-election campaign this year, as opposed to the commonly held belief that she is raising money for a potential presidential bid in 2008. "If she wants to fundraise for 2008, all the power to her," Moulitsas said. "But she could be honest about it. Pretending to raise this money for a non-existent Senate contest is simply obnoxious."

Posted by at 03:28 PM | Comments (0)

When netroots hero Paul Hackett ended his brief bid for a U.S. Senate seat from Ohio two weeks ago, the frustrated Democrat said he was leaving politics altogether. "Thus ends my 11-month political career," he said.

A few days later, Hackett proved that nobody actually leaves politics altogether. He may yet prove true to his word and not run for elective office again, but he hasn't totally abandoned politics. He has agreed to join the board of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America political action committee, which is dedicated to electing other military veterans like Hackett.

"As a candidate for the House and Senate, I got a crash course in party politics that wasn't always pretty," he said of his contention that leading Democrats in Washington forced him out of the race. "IAVA PAC represents the best hope to get early institutional support to others who face the same challenges I did. I want to be sure that they do not suffer the same fate that I did by helping them build campaigns that can run strongly without party support."

IAVA PAC is one of a few groups touting the candidacies of veterans who are running for Congress as Democrats. I'll be exploring the prospects of that Band of Brothers in my biweekly Beltway Blogroll column, which will be published at NationalJournal.com tomorrow and reprinted here at the blog on Tuesday.

Posted by at 02:58 PM | Comments (0)

Rep. Sherrod Brown on Friday accused the Bush administration of outsourcing national security to a terrorist-friendly country and of putting profits over people.

His entry at The Huffington Post was the latest example of lawmakers taking to the blogosphere their opposition to a port security deal with the United Arab Emirates. The issue has been the hottest topic on blogs across the political spectrum for the past several days.

"Recently, the Bush administration approved the takeover of six United States ports' security by Dubai Ports World, a state-owned company controlled by the United Arab Emirates," Brown wrote. "The Bush administration has been outsourcing jobs for five years, and now they want to outsource our national security."

He noted that United Arab Emirates was one of only a few nations to recognize the Taliban as the official government of Afghanistan and that two of the hijackers involved in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks were from United Arab Emirates.

Earlier in the week at RedState Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., took a less combative yet cautious stand against the deal. "I'm not prepared to sign off on this agreement, and from what I've been hearing from my constituents, they aren't either," she wrote.

"I don't say this as a knee-jerk reaction against foreign investment and business. I've supported free trade for years, but the security angle involved in this matter adds a dimension that takes us beyond a simple matter of business."

UPDATE: GOP Bloggers and Real Clear Politics were not impressed with Brown's rationale at The Huffington Post. The former said Brown was "dishonest," and the latter accused him of "real nuttery."

Posted by at 02:33 PM | Comments (0)

The author of the Outraged Moderates blog used the Freedom of Information Act to make public some handwritten notes of aides to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

The notes were made after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, which included a commercial airplane crashing into the Pentagon. The Guardian has the full story.

Law student Thad Anderson scored the FOIA coup. I suspect that Mark Tapscott would like to see more bloggers follow in Anderson's footsteps. He regularly uses Tapscott's Copy Desk and his position as the head of the Center for Media and Public Policy at the Heritage Foundation to sing the praises of FOIA.

The debate about strengthening FOIA also led to the first known reference to blogs from the Senate floor. That happened a year ago this month.

Posted by at 10:16 PM | Comments (0)

The blog Managed Care Matters has a new feature geared toward health policy wonks: a regular recap of the best content at health policy blogs.

"We've asked over two dozen health policy, infrastructure, insurance, technology and managed care bloggers to send in their best, provided to you in Cliff Notes style," Joe Paduda wrote. "We'll do this every couple of weeks or more often if the host wants to."

The first entry covers Medicare history, conflicts of interest between academia and the pharmaceutical industry, "pod slurping" (go read it if you want to know more) and pharmaceutical-related blogging, among other things.

Posted by at 10:04 PM | Comments (0)

Big technology firms are on the hit list of some members of Congress these days because of reports that the companies are aiding efforts to censor Internet content in countries like China.

The topic was the subject of the first live-blogged hearing on Capitol Hill last week. And this week, Pajamas Media interviewed Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., who has been among the chief critics of Big Tech.

Posted by at 09:23 PM | Comments (0)

Conservative blogger Michelle Malkin has been all over the story about the publication of controversial Muslim cartoons that sparked rioting in some European countries. Now cyber troublemakers are all over her blog.

Last week she noted that "The Islamists' War On The Internet" had spread to her site. "Last night, my hosting service notified me that it is receiving ongoing threats from individuals vowing to take down this site -- and others along with it -- which will presumably continue until I take down the cartoons," Malkin wrote. "For now, we are on guard and continuing with business as usual."

But today, hackers hit her site with a denial-of-service attack that briefly forced Malkin to do her blogging at Pajamas Media. She has contacted the FBI about the attack.

Posted by at 09:20 PM | Comments (0)

Mike Krempasky of RedState reports that decision day at the Federal Election Commission on whether to regulate blogs will be March 16.

"Oddly," he added, "it's almost exactly a year to the day from the formation of The Online Coalition -- organized in response to then-Commissioner Brad Smith's warning to the Internet community of the possibility of impending regulations."

The FEC may hope that the rulemaking will be its final word on how campaign finance law should apply to the Internet, but the courts already have kicked the issue back to the agency once. Odds are good that someone -- whether bloggers, campaign reformers or free-speech advocates -- will be unhappy with whatever rules the FEC writes and initiate another legal challenge.

Posted by at 08:44 PM | Comments (0)

Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., at The Huffington Post: "If we had 100 Iraqis and seven Americans killed in the last couple days, that's just an indication of how bad things have gotten: We've lost the hearts and minds of the people."

Posted by at 08:39 PM | Comments (0)

Fifty-one candidates have filed to run for Congress in Indiana, but only one of them, Democrat Barry Welsh in the 6th District, has a blog.

Rep. Mike Pence, the Republican incumbent in the 6th and a favorite of some conservative bloggers, has a blog at his congressional site. But House rules prohibit the use of campaign-related materials on Web sites, newsletters and other outlets covered by taxpayer funds.

The political world in the Hoosier State also includes these blogs: In The Agora, Indiana Politico, Liberal Indiana, Masson's Blog and Taking Down Words.

Here are entries on other states in my running tally of candidate and political blogs:
-- Kentucky
-- Illinois
-- New Mexico
-- Ohio
-- Texas
-- West Virginia

If you are aware of blogs or diaries that I have missed, please shoot me an e-mail at dglover@nationaljournal.com.

Posted by at 07:34 AM | Comments (0)

Only one of the 11 candidates for Congress and governor who filed by New Mexico's deadline last week has a blog. The lone candidate blogger is Democrat Patricia Madrid, who is challenging Republican Rep. Heather Wilson in the 1st District.

However, at least one state senator, Dede Feldman, also has a blog, and The Land Of Enchantment has a few blogs where political junkies can keep tabs on the 2006 campaign. The list includes Roundhouse Report, a blog authored by staffers at The Albuquerque Tribune, as well as independent blogs like Democracy for New Mexico, New Mexico Politics, and New Mexico Politics with Joe Monahan.

Here are entries on other states in my running tally of candidate and political blogs:
-- Kentucky
-- Illinois
-- Ohio
-- Texas
-- West Virginia

If you are aware of blogs or diaries that I have missed, please shoot me an e-mail at dglover@nationaljournal.com.

Posted by at 07:18 AM | Comments (0)

More than a dozen of the candidates who filed to run for either Congress or governor in Ohio have blogs.

The big news in the Buckeye State earlier in the week was the decision of Democrat Paul Hackett, whose campaign Web site included a community blog, to end his Senate bid. But of the 100 congressional and gubernatorial candidates who met the Thursday filing deadline for the May 2 primary, 14 have campaign blogs and two more, Democrats Richard Sifer in the 4th District and Charlie Wilson in the 6th District, plan to have them. That's the most candidate blogs in any state to date.

All but three of the candidate bloggers are Democrats. Three incumbents have blogs, but all of them -- Democratic Reps. Sherrod Brown and Ted Strickland, and Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell, a Republican -- are seeking higher office.

In addition to the blog at his campaign site, Brown also is behind the Grow Ohio effort, and he has blogged periodically at sites like The Huffington Post and TPMCafe. Plus there is the unofficial and independently run Sherrod Brown Blog.

Brown's Republican opponent, Sen. Mike DeWine, has neither a campaign blog nor one at his congressional site. But maybe that's because his most memorable encounter with the blogosphere was an unpleasant one: About two years ago, he fired Jessica Cutler, the aide who published the racy Washingtonienne blog.

One candidate, Democrat Jim Parker in the 2nd District, maintains a diary at Daily Kos in addition to his campaign blog. And another Democrat, John Swords in the 12th District, only blogs at Daily Kos.

Here is the list Ohio candidate blogs:
-- Kenneth Blackwell, Republican, governor
-- Sherrod Brown, Democrat, Senate
-- David Fierst, Democrat, 3rd District
-- Richard Holt, Republican, 6th District
-- Mary Jo Kilroy, Democrat, 15th District
-- Nathan Martin, Republican, 4th District
-- Jim Parker, Democrat, 2nd District
-- Jeff Seeman, Democrat, 16th District
-- Richard Siferd, Democrat, 4th District
-- Jeff Sinnard, Democrat, 2nd District
-- Zack Space, Democrat, 18th District
-- Ted Strickland, Democrat, governor
-- Stephanie Studebaker, Democrat, 3rd District
-- John Swords, Democrat, 12th District
-- Charlie Wilson, Democrat, 6th District
-- John Wolfe, Democrat, 13th District

Ohio also has a thriving political blog community, as evidenced by the groundswell of support for Hackett in a special House election last August and his Senate candidacy before his withdrawal. At least three blogs -- BuckeyeSenate, Ohio 2nd (where Hackett ran last year) and Ohio13 Blog -- are focused on covering specific races.

Other political blogs in Ohio include Blue 88, Ohio 2006 Blog, Ohio Political Journal and Politics Extra by the Cincinnati Enquirer staff.

This is the fifth installment of my running list of candidate blogs. The other entries cover Kentucky, Illinois, Texas and West Virginia. If you are aware of blogs or diaries that I have missed, please shoot me an e-mail at dglover@nationaljournal.com.

Posted by at 11:15 AM | Comments (0)

The United States faces new challenges in fighting a war against terror in a new media era, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said today, and blogs are part of the equation.

Rumsfeld made the comments in a speech before the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. He noted that in many ways the United States is ill-prepared for the first war in history that is being waged in an era of blogs, the Internet, e-mail, instant messaging, BlackBerries, digital cameras, cellular telephones and other technological advances.

Two particular references to blogs are worth noting. The first involves how the Pentagon is engaging them:

[G]overnment public affairs and public diplomacy efforts must reorient staffing, schedules and culture to engage the full range of media that are having such an impact today. Our U.S. Central Command, for example, has launched an online communications effort that includes electronic news updates and a links campaign that has resulted in several hundred blogs receiving and publishing CENTCOM content.

The second notes the role blogs are playing in spreading information, even in repressive countries:

I believe with every bone in my body that free people, exposed to sufficient information, will, over time, find their way to right decisions. Throughout the world, advances in technology are forcing a massive information flow that dictatorships and extremists ultimately will not be able to control. Blogs are rapidly appearing even in countries where the press is still government-controlled.

Posted by at 08:54 PM | Comments (0)

Atrios and I are on the same wavelength.

Last summer, after the History News Network started a blog focused on the presidency, I suggested that the time for a blog on Congress also had arrived. Atrios, whose given name is Duncan Black, pitched a similar idea at Eschaton in the wee hours this morning.

"Something that's missing is a blog-like shadow of C-Span, essentially explaining what's going on in the House/Senate at any given moment," he wrote. "Sure it isn't exciting most of the time, but often when it is exciting, the viewing public isn't really sure why. And, in between interesting moments, it'd be the perfect place for more gossipy stuff."

His idea comes on the heels of "RedState's Call For A Capitol Hill Blog." The two proposals combined provide further evidence that bloggers are getting serious about watching what happens in Washington. It should be interesting to see how Washington reacts to being watched.

Posted by at 04:02 PM | Comments (0)

The former federal election commissioner who sparked the first major blog swarm in Washington has agreed to enter the blogosphere himself. His forum of choice: RedState.

Brad Smith sparked the blog swarm about a year ago, when he warned that the Federal Election Commission might be forced to regulate political speech on blogs because of a federal court ruling. The agency quickly distanced itself from that notion, however, and last fall the FEC granted one network of blogs a media exemption from campaign finance rules.

Though Smith left the FEC last August with both fierce critics and loyal defenders of his tenure, he left as a hero to bloggers across the political spectrum.

Smith made a virtual return to Washington late last year. At RedState, he defended the decision of President Bush to appoint three FEC members, including his replacement, during a congressional recess, thus bypassing Senate confirmation. Now Smith has agreed to contribute to RedState on a regular basis.

Mike Krempasky made the announcement. "At various times, Brad has been described as everything from the most effective defender of the First Amendment in Washington to an unlikely hero for conservatives within the machine of government. ... Look for regular coverage and analysis of Washington's coming campaign of 'reform' and keep checking back to see why, no matter how well-intentioned or lofty-sounding many of the legislative 'fixes' may be, you can bet one thing: Almost all of them will decrease your freedom at some level."

Posted by at 12:15 PM | Comments (0)

Instapundit Glenn Reynolds and Instawife Helen Smith started The Glenn and Helen Show podcast early this year.

It didn't take them long to score a major "get": Their latest show includes a podcast with Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Republican from Tennessee, which also happens to be where the Instaclan lives. Frist "talks about the threat of avian flu and new government programs to prepare for epidemics of all sorts," Reynolds wrote at Instapundit.

"I know that you've been interested in the evolving relationship between blogs and politicians," Stephen Smith of VOLPAC, Frist's political action committee, wrote in an e-mail to me, "and as far as I can tell, Senator Frist is the first prominent political figure to have ever been interviewed specifically for a podcast."

The latest Glenn and Helen Show also includes interviews with various bloggers who were at the Conservative Political Action Conference. Reynolds attended the event in Washington last week to promote his forthcoming book, An Army of Davids: How Markets and Technology Empower People to Beat Big Media, Big Government, and Other Goliaths.

Posted by at 09:03 AM | Comments (1)

... at the House International Relations subcommittee that is examining the role of U.S. technology companies in aiding limits on Internet content abroad. You can get the news by clicking on the links below:

-- Rebecca MacKinnon of Harvard University, who has been leading the pack in covering this story, is blogging up a storm at RConversation -- even though she'll be in and out of the hearing because of a previous speaking engagement in Washington. See her multiple entries: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.

-- Clayton Wagar is covering the hearing for RedState. Wagar's day job is with Cisco Systems, one of the company's testifying at the hearing. He smartly disclosed that fact at RedState. UPDATE: Brad Dayspring, a spokesman for subcommittee Chairman Chris Smith, R-N.J., said in an e-mail that Wagar "disclosed the fact that he worked for Cisco to me as well in advance of today's hearings."

-- Tim Chapman is there for Townhall.com, and he already has video of the hearing at Capitol Report.

-- Human Events Online is live-blogging, too, but I don't see any posts on its blogs yet.

-- And The New York Times has a blogger there. But as I noted yesterday, the paper's blogs require a subscription, so there will be no link love here. Curiously, the paper already has a story about the hearing online that includes links to the other blogs. What are folks at the Times thinking?

Posted by at 12:14 PM | Comments (0)

Former Hotline editor and columnist Howard Mortman has staked his claim in the political blogosphere at Extreme Mortman.

Yesterday he posted the first of what he promises will be a series of interviews with "top bloggers from early presidential caucus and primary states." The first interview is with Thomas Niblock of Hawkeye Republican from Iowa.

Mortman is heading a new public affairs division at New Media Strategies, a firm whose specialty is online market intelligence. Extreme Mortman is now on the blogroll to your left.

Posted by at 11:54 AM | Comments (0)

The rise of blogs within Washington made this breaking news inevitable: A House subcommittee for the first time will make room for citizen journalists to "live-blog" a congressional hearing.

The International Relations Subcommittee on Global Human Rights, Africa and International Operations will hold the hearing Wednesday at 10 a.m., and the topic is most appropriate. The panel will examine the role that U.S. companies like Google and Yahoo play in filtering Internet content in countries like China.

"Modern communications have empowered individuals to get their news from different sources," said subcommittee Chairman Chris Smith, R-N.J., "and blogs have become a regular news source for many Americans -- particularly students and younger people. Live-blogs from different events in Congress will enable more Americans to hear their elected representatives, allow for increased transparency and encourage greater civic participation."

The hearing also will be webcast via the committee's Web site for bloggers who want to cover the event remotely.

UPDATE: Brad Dayspring, a spokesman in Smith's office, said three organizations so far have confirmed their plans to live-blog the hearing. Two of them, Human Events Online and TownHall.com, are more traditional online media outlets that also have blogs. RedState is the only pure blog on the list for now, though Dayspring said he is waiting to hear from at least two others.

All three are conservative publications. Dayspring said the blogs that have not yet confirmed would fall elsewhere within the political spectrum but declined to elaborate or name the blogs.

UPDATE II: Dayspring just