http://www.zonkette.blogspot.com

But I appreciated you sending me the link so I could respond,

Z

I just landed on this article and haven't done all the background reading, but I can just say that I know from experience that your work as a consultant for at least one campaign did not result in any pro-candidate blogging on either MyDd or DailyKos. At times I wish it would have!  But I respected that you kept the two roles quite separate.  I can post more on this if you think it would add to the debate at all.

I feel that your earlier post, Financially Interested Blogging was a terribly stupid essay.  First, the timing of the post (on the heals of the Armstrong Williams revelations) is either intentional or accidental.  If accidental, you are not a very smart political operative (regardless of your "it's a private blog, oops, pardon me" excuse above).  If it is intentional that can only mean that you are so petty that you have chosen to attack fellow Democrats at a time in which unity should be our goal.

You will say, "But no, I was not talking about Kos & Co., I was just using them as the only example I was intimately familiar with.  I was just trying to make a point."

Well, as all my high school English teachers taught me, always lead with your main argument, that is what people remember.  And what did you lead with?  Well, it was this: "I think the ethics question is a serious one, which I've brought up elsewhere and fought with Markos Zuniga, and several others in the blogosphere, about."  In that sentence, you say that ethics are important.  Presumably you are not arguing for poorer ethical standards, so when you say in the second clause that you have "fought" with Kos over ethics, the implication is obvious: his ethics are lacking.  Otherwise, why would you have fought with him?  And why is he the only one named?  You say there are others involved in this fight, yet you only return to Kos (and later his partner, Jerome Armstrong).

You continue, in the third paragraph, "On Dean's campaign, we paid Markos and Jerome Armstrong as consultants, largely in order to ensure that they said positive things about Dean. We paid them over twice as much as we paid two staffers of similar backgrounds, and they had several other clients."  You later allude to the fact that they were totally unaware that this was your aim (although you do not directly say that).

So, what have you said in your first three paragraphs is that Kos has no ethics (and so far you have had to fight with him over this) and that he accepted payment to say positive things about your candidate.  In other words, Kos' ethics suck, here is why.

Why do I care?  I do not really care about Kos (he seems to have sharp enough elbows to defend himself).  This bothers me for three reasons.  First, as I said above, the timing is atrocious.  Second, these are your ideological comrades and you are creating a controversy where none existed for no good reason.  Finally, it seems that you intentionally mislead your "private" audience into thinking that the Kos/Armstrong contract was quid pro quo.

Timing:  As a member of the Dean campaign, and I assume a follower of the general election, you probably noted the media's determination to be "balanced" in its coverage.  They would say, "Bush lied about WMD, but Kerry lied when he said his favorite food is burritos."  It did not matter how egregious the conduct of the Republicans and the White House was, the press always sought to find "comparable" items from Kerry and the Democrats to balance their reporting.  So, now with the revelation about Armstrong Williams, the story of the publicly funded GOP propaganda machine is finally gaining traction in the media.  There is an opportunity to expose hugely unethical behavior.  Behavior which appears to be widespread.  Now, with your little private essay on ethics, you have handed the conservative blogosphere their comeback, their counter attack.  I will bet you $10 that any conservative who gets asked about the Armstrong Williams thing will say, "I don't know about that, but did you know that Dean and other Democrats PAID JOURNALISTS to say good things about them?!?!?!!?"  And then, that will make its way into every article about Armstrong Williams and his fellow propagandists.

Unnecessary Controversy: If your goal truly was to talk about ethics in blogging, then good.  That is a subject ripe for discussion.  In fact that discussion has been going on for quite some time.  I agree - there should be ethical standards.  But that was not the hook in your essay.  The hook was that the Dean campaign paid Kos to write positive things about Dean.

No quid pro quo: Lastly, your very poor clarification of the facts is stunning.  You imply that there was a quid pro quo.  You say, "To be very clear, they never committed to supporting Dean for the payment -- but it was very clearly, internally, our goal."  While they never "committed," you omit NEVER KNEW that was your goal.  You also omit (as noted above) that Amstrong shut down his site during the term of his contract.  To me, that would seem to eliminate any point of using this as an ethical issue - he clearly was NOT paid to say good things since he did not say anything at all.  You omit that Kos posted a very clear disclaimer of his role in the Dean campaign.  You omit that though the campaign wanted them to say good things, they were hired in a TECHNICAL capacity.

My final thought on this issue is that it takes a big set of balls to say, essentially, "Hey people we need to start being more ethical because at my last job I paid bloggers to say nice things about my candidate."  Perhaps before you wrote the essay exposing Kos' "unethical" behavior you should have written the essay about your and the Dean campaign's unethical behavior.

I think I've given myself carpal tunnel syndrome.

This was my first introduction into the political blogging arena.  This is why I remember the article.  From MyDD, I broused the blogroll and came upon Daily Kos, liked what I saw there and became part of that community.  When you came back from the campaign, I looked, liked what I saw and joined this one also.  (By the way, who was the person who yelled "I write on MyDD" outside of Trippi's office and he yelled back "You are Hired!")

I saw the disclaimer on Daily Kos, and applied it appropiately. Kos also went the extra step and reminded people when he posted that his was a biased opinion because of his association with the campaign.  Honorable and approiate disclosures.

I would suggest that WILLIAM M. BULKELEY and JAMES BANDLER the staff writers at the WSJ for that article, look at the back editions of their paper prior to trying to make these type of partisan accuations.  

What Armstrong Williams did was to ACCEPT PAYOLA period.  It is illegal in the music industry and should be illegal in the news media. (Do I see a reform legislation proposal here?)

And while we are discussing WSJ articles (and reform legislation).  In the last month I have seen more than one front page article on how churches got involved in politics and helped GW achieve victory.  Why then, are these organizations tax exempt?  I would suggest that as a more interesting story for the WSJ readers.  

What is a really more interesting discussion is why Ms. Teachout feels the need to squeal in such a fashion to the WSJ to make you guys out be the moral equivalant to Armstrong Williams. Supporting a candidate is very different from pushing legislation for an elected official.

But again to me, I would rather talk about how effective it was to pay bloggers. I personally think it wasn't that good of an idea.

Full-time bloggers need funding and full-time bloggers like Jerome and Markos with the volume of internet savvy they carry with them, should capitalize on their skills and their knowledge.  We all benefit from it.  Better websites, faster news, better conversations...etc...etc...

As bloggers, there is a community to be part of and a community to police.  In the post-04 election blogosphere, we democrats, left-left-left of us and the middle of the road of us need to stick together.  Support each other.  This near tabloid gossip -dare i say it- "trash" -  is red-meat for the wingnuts and they will be eating it up.  

Respect a bloggers right to earn, albeit, ethical and with disclaimers (which Markos and Jerome both did).  Remain loyal to the cause and loyal to the mission.  

Democrats in 2006, in 2008, and beyond...

Markos & Jerome, we have your back.

Zephyr Teachout: Donkey Splat
by Jerome Armstrong

and

'Zephyr can go to hell'
by kos

you be the judge.

Jerome has made a forceful argument without the ranting and raving...compared to the other who ranted and raved and then sent out his goons to with clubs into the diaries to "rant and rave".

At the end of the day..(maybe not perfect timing) Zephyr is right, there needs to be some code of ethics for bloggers if they want to continue to be taken seriousely.

Wouldn't it be great for the "left" "liberal" wing bloggers to "TAKE THE LEAD" on this thereby distancing themselves from the multitude of right wingnut disinformation blogs that are popping up like mushrooms.

But there is another important difference too.  Armstrong was paid, silently, to enunciate a specific opinion.  The very purpose of paying Armstrong was so that he would propagandize for Bush's so-called education "reform." This far different then the situation with Markos and Jerome, who were paid to consult a presidential campaign during an election about a subject (building the netroots) of which they were very familiar.  

And clearly anyone who fired the shot from the WSJ edirorial pages didn't do it to help the Democrats.  (and that clearly covers the DLC) And BTW - Rosenberg left the DLC before the Dean ambush.

Gasp!

She made it clear that Kos and Jerome were not selling their endorsement.

If they feel that they have been used... Fine...

But to say that somehow Zephyr is being disloyal to the "cause" is absurd.

I don't understand why Zephyr doesn't understand how her words will be exploited to undermine our arguments about journalistic ethics against the paid off pundits everywhere like Armostrong Williams.

I don't understand how someone on our side can not see that she is undermining the fact checking and media watchdog aspects of the blogosphere but essentially agreeing that bloggers don't meet journalistic standards. The is a tacit admission to many on the other side that, yes indeed, blogger are nothing by an echo chamber, tin foil wrapped, conspiracy theorists.

Disappointing.

there is NO conflict of interest here.

i cannot believe we are wasting - yes WASTING - our time talking about this when we should be focusing elsewhere.

what in the world does this have to do with armstrong williams?  what he did was clearly on another level of reality.  he was a PAID SHILL.  jerome and markos were NOT.

and zephyr, i'm sure you're reading this thread.  i've got to say i'm incredibly disappointed that you threw this bone to instapundit.  how can you say insty is right on this one when clearly the two situations have nothing to do with each other?  i don't get it.  is there so much bad blood between the three of you that you felt you had to go public with this?  

i mean this is truly ridiculous.  truly truly ridiculous.

1. Was Zephyr foolish or disloyal for discussing this already public information about the business relationship between Kos, Jerome and the Dean campaign because it might lessen the impact of the Williams story?

(My personal feeling is that Howard Dean didn't get the same reaction from the blogosphere when he said the capture of Saddam didn't make America any safer... Many mainstream Dems thought he shouldn't have given this ammunition to his opponents and to the right... But, sometimes you say what you believe, even if it may not be smart politics...)

2. What, if any, should be the ethical quidelines for bloggers working for candidates (or corporations)...

(I agree that blogging is not journalism, but there should be nothing wrong about sharing opinions about this issue...)

I'm reading the WSJ article generated by Zephyr Teachout's comments on her own weblog about the primary campaign.

"Zephyr Teachout, the former head of Internet outreach for Mr. Dean's campaign, made the disclosure earlier this week in her own Web log, Zonkette. She said 'to be very clear, they never committed to supporting Dean for the payment -- but it was very clearly, internally, our goal.' The hiring of the consultants was noted in several publications at the time."

I note the word used above - "our."

Does this mean Zephyr's boss, Joe Trippi, attempted to bribe bloggers?

Did Zephyr just admit to trying to bribe people when she was 'head of internet outreach' for the primary campaign?

Is Zephyr now calling for an ethics investigation into her own actions?

If Zephyr just admitted to trying to bribe people during the primary campaign, then did Joe Trippi approve her attempt to engage in bribery?

I'm very confused. Can somebody answer these questions for me?

If no more Payola is found then the Armstrong Williams Punditgate story will have been effectively defused. Stories on Williams from this point forward will have a paragraph or two that show that the Democrats are also guilty using the Kos, MyDD, and Dean connection as detailed in the WSJ.

We all know the two incidents are not morally equivalent. In the Democratic example there was adequate disclosure and no taxpayer funds. In the Republican example there was secrecy and taxpayer money.  On the one hand we have normal campaign behavior while on the other we have possibly criminal behavior. But the public at large won't get this due to the Republican Noise Machine.  

The only hope to get more mileage out of Armstrong Williams and Punditgate is to find more commentators that were paid off. It is hard to believe they don't exist. It strains credulity to imagine that his is the only instance of a secretly paid commentator shilling for Bush Administration positions.  

We need to smoke out any further taxpayer payments for propaganda and when they appear be relentless about pursuing the case in the media and if possible also in the courts.

They didn't like Dean I think because they felt, like they do about Rosenberg, that they were betrayed by him. He was a moderate DLCer, and then he started to talk like the left and get all the liberals excited in his campaign.

He seemed to them to abandon their way of thinking of how to create a majority. I was more ambivilant about Dean, although his personality and the people shouting at me about him rubbed me the wrong way.

I supported Clark, helped draft him, told my bosses supporting the war was a mistake, and left the DLC. But they aren't the bad guy.

The bad guy is sitting in 16000 Penn. Ave. Let's focus on that and not intraparty spats. As others have said, the fight is not about ideology, but about reform vs. stagnation. I am supporting Fowler, then Rosenburg, and then Dean.