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If You're Still Interested In The Blog Swarm ...

... surrounding the piece I wrote in yesterday's New York Times, here are more links and excerpts:

Entries by bloggers mentioned in my article
-- Julie Fanselow of Red State Rebels: "Unfortunately, the story ... made it sound like Larry Grant paid me to flack for him here on Red State Rebels. ... In fact, as most of you know, Larry paid me to write his Grassroots for Grant blog (on which I made nearly 500 posts) and to reach out to the national netroots. I also did some writing and media relations work on the Jerry Brady for Governor campaign early in 2006."

-- Jon Henke of QandO: "Sure, bloggers vigorously criticize politicians; after all, they have strong opinions about politics. But those are exactly the kind of people likely to get involved in politics. Voters criticize politicians too, but they still manage to vote for them. I also reject the idea that blogs' "outsider" status is really relevant. Any emerging field will necessarily consist of "outsiders" to the political establishment. "Objective" and "intellectually honest" may be selling points for bloggers, but I don't think "outsider" is a big one."

-- Aldon Hynes of Greater Democracy and Orient Lodge: "While there maybe bloggers whose activism is driven by contempt for the political establishment, there are many more bloggers driven by a love for our country and an interest in using new tools, both inside and outside of the political establishment to make our country even better. There are also a lot of bloggers that seek to bring about better journalism through the blogosphere, in part, perhaps, in reaction against the shoddy journalism they see in the mainstream media."

-- Aaron Silverstein of SquareNet (and Heading Left): "When politicians hire bloggers, they are not buying positive coverage from a seemingly unbiased source. Look at my writing about Bill Winter from before he and I had even met. I was a highly opinionated and partisan source, and made no secret of it. Bill didn't have to pay me if he wanted good coverage. He already had that from me .... Bill hired me to help him better hear our community, not to better speak to it."

-- Tim Tagaris of Swing State Project: "I'm curious as to what part of Ned Lamont's campaign was 'establishment' when he was down 60 points in the polls to a former VP nominee; when every single organ of party infrastructure was fighting tooth and nail against us; when I decided to leave the DNC (now that's establishment!) to join Ned and people literally said it would be 'difficult to hire' me in the future if I made that move."

(Editor's note: Tagaris said in his post that he e-mailed me to correct the payments to him that I cited in my initial story. I never received that e-mail. My only communication with Tagaris was in a telephone interview before the NationalJournal.com story ran. I corrected the payment numbers for Peter Daou after he contacted me and would have done the same for Tagaris had I received his e-mail.)

UPDATE: Tagaris e-mailed me yesterday to say that he earned $6,500 a month from Lamont in a job that ran from the end of April until Election Day.

Other entries
-- Daily Kos: "Your piece is shallow, you're reaching (badly), and making a Herculean stretch to find 'evidence' of some kind of malfeasance, when in fact what is happening is that people who write for and are enjoyed by large communities are getting (gasp) attention and in some cases support (monetary, infrastructural or other) for their efforts and for their communities. Horrors!"

-- Right Wing News: "Although I don't have a problem with bloggers working as consultants, I think Glover made a great point about blogging and consulting. If you're consulting for a politician, you're not free to say what you want to say as a blogger. ... That's why all bloggers who consult should either take a break from blogging while they consult or at least avoid writing about the race that they're consulting on in order to preserve their credibility."

-- World Wide Webers: "Glover's piece is horribly disingenuous. It's obvious that when you fill almost an entire page of the Sunday New York Times with a chart that details how much money specific bloggers were paid by political campaigns they advised, and then quotes positive comments those bloggers wrote about the politicians they worked for, the innuendo is clear: The opinions of these people who pretend to be independent are actually for sale to the highest bidder."

-- Writes Like She Talks: "The generalizations are overused and if anything, bloggers should be working hard to dispell them -- by the blogging they do as well as calling others out on it."

Posted by Danny | 09:13 AM

Comments

This topic won't and shouldn't go away, and I am still interested to hear you talk about the gender imbalance on both the blogger and candidates who hired blogger aspect. Any insight on what you found in that regard would be interesting, I'm sure. Thanks.

Jill | 12.04.06 12:51 PM

Jill,

I don't have any insight into the gender issue. That topic did arise after the blog lunch that former President Clinton held earlier this year, but it's not an issue I have covered beyond that flare-up.

Danny

Danny | 12.04.06 12:59 PM

Tx, Danny. I'm trying to get a handle on whether it plays too much into "identity politics" for anyone to really touch or if it in fact matters and makes a difference (I obviously lean toward the latter but I'm just in Ohio).

Jill | 12.04.06 01:13 PM

I'm curious why you won't answer Brad's request? You have time for a new post. You have time to respond to Jill (within 8 minutes in fact).

Odd.

Kevin Lyda | 12.04.06 01:30 PM

I just looked again at the blogspot terms of agreement -- I don't see anything in there about having to be objective, never ever being able to vote, or working for the man.

On the otherhand, here are some fine examples of journalists that I am sure religiously practiced their objectivity and never worked for the government:

* Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed Stephen T. Early, a United Press International reporter and Associated Press correspondent;
* Harry S. Truman appointed J. Leonard Reinsch, a radio man; Jonathan W. Daniels, a newspaper man who was in the Franklin Roosevelt Administration in multiple agencies and boards just prior to becoming White House Press Secretary; Charles Griffith Ross, a newspaper man who received the Pulitzer Prize in 1932; Early; Joseph Short, a newspaper man; and Roger Tubby, a reporter and editor turned Democratic National Committee spokesman before becoming White House Press Secretary;
* Dwight D. Eisenhower appointed James C. Hagerty, a New York Times reporter;
* John F. Kennedy appointed Pierre Salinger, a reporter and editor;
* Lyndon B. Johnson appointed George Christian, a reporter for International News Service;
* Gerald Ford appointed newspaper veteran Jerald terHorst and NBC News correspondent Ron Nessen to the post;
* Ronald Reagan appointed Larry Speakes, a newspaper man, and Marlin Fitzwater, a newspaper man;
* George H.W. Bush retained Fitzwater.
* George W. Bush appointed Fox News anchor Tony Snow.

Glover has been at Technology Daily since October 2000. Before that he was the associate editor of IntellectualCapital.com, an opinion e-zine whose editor was one-time presidential candidate and former Delaware Gov. Pete du Pont. Glover moved to Washington in 1991 to work as a reporter for Congressional Quarterly. He held various writing and editing positions there until moving to IntellectualCapital in 1997.

A native of West Virginia and graduate of West Virginia University, Glover began his journalism career as a copy clerk and obituary writer for The Tampa Tribune in Florida. He also worked as a political reporter at the Dominion Post in Morgantown, W.Va., and interned at the Charleston Daily Mail in his home state's capital.

As a freelance editor and writer, his work has been published in National Journal magazine, Silicon Alley Reporter and Financial Executive, among other publications. Glover also wrote a children's e-book and e-coloring book, George Washington Beaver and the Cherry Tree.

Come on, let's face it Mr. Managing Editor of the Technology Daily, you have an undisclosed conflict of interest here, don't you? Perhaps you should check in with the nearest ethics board?

jerry | 12.04.06 03:06 PM

Well, let us try again:

Dear Mr. Glover:

Writing to Micah Sifry in writing to Micah Sifry in semi-apology-exculpation mode with respect to your much-derided piece, "New on the Web: Politics as Usual", you said:

>"[Y]ou are being unfair in characterizing my piece... as an "attack" piece.... My article neither states nor implies that anyone... is 'corrupt'.... I don't believe that. Candidates have the right to pay for Internet advice, blogging, etc., and bloggers have a right to be paid.... I do think it's interesting that some bloggers made a name for themselves by fighting the establishment and billing themselves as revolutionaries but at the same time are willing to work for campaigns..."

Which of twelve webloggers you named yesterday do you believe billed themselves as revolutionaries who disdained to work for candidates?

Yours,

Brad DeLong

Brad DeLong | 12.04.06 04:16 PM

Didn't the "gender issue" that arose after President Clinton's lunch concern the prominence of one of the female blogger's breasts in the group photo? Some gender issue. And who raised it?

LB Jefferies | 12.04.06 06:47 PM

When are you going to answer Brad?

And btw, I only ever read anything in the NYT if it's in a blog link. If it's subscription only I don't bother.

Y'all better pray against net neutrality because otherwise the jig is up.

Margaret | 12.04.06 09:14 PM

Danny,

Thank you for posting an excerpt from my blog in which I cleared up the essential fact missing from your chart (but noted in the earlier MSNBC article): that I was paid by Lary Grant to write his campaign blog, not my own blog. Two more thoughts ...

1) Jill in Ohio, I also noticed that I appeared to be the only female mentioned. I am sure there are others who weren't mentioned - and if there aren't, there damn well ought to be. It's worth noting that some of the most prominent Page 1 writers at Daily Kos are women (though I believe Kos Page 1 regulars remain unpaid, which needs to change).

2) I'm a professional writer first and a political operative second. As I just wrote at Red State Rebels (click my name), I hope more candidates hire professional writers instead of career political operatives for their blogging and writing needs. And I hope many of those writers are outside-the-Beltway bloggers who know their regions and who think outside the boxes that the overpaid, underperforming D.C.-based consultants have constructed for our party.

Julie Fanselow | 12.05.06 10:41 AM

A clarification to above: Kos has indeed hired several paid fellow, including Page 1 regulars McJoan and SusanG. Here's the announcement from last week:

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/11/30/12380/037

Hopefully, we'll see more campaigns hiring women to blog for the 08 cycle, too.

Julie Fanselow | 12.05.06 12:33 PM

Amazing, Julie is a paid writer and yet has the time to post corrections to comments in Danny's blog. I've never read her stuff but just by virtue of her intellectual honesty I'm going to guess that it is much better by far than the "content" produced by Danny-boy.

Still no response to Brad, eh?

Kevin Lyda | 12.05.06 05:00 PM

Thanks for your comments, Julie. Glad I can dump the "is it just me" line on this one.

Jill | 12.05.06 05:25 PM

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