Blogging on it all
by Jerome Armstrong, Fri Jul 28, 2006 at 03:59:51 AM EDT
Watching another blogger go through the cloud of demands for disclosure this past week (Patrick Hynes from Ankle Biting Pundits) --of having to back-track for not going above and beyond the FEC law in disclosure-- made for this post's reflection on the past month of open disclosure of my online life (I've a rant at the end that's more relevant, yet in advance, I'll ask you to excuse the personal post as terribly boring; but given how much serious ink was spilled over things so unimpressive, here's the guest post on the matter).
In regards to bloggers that work for candidates, I've often remarked that it's both the best and the worst of possible intersections. In terms of access, knowledge and impact, I can't imagine any other place in politics that I would rather be. But being an intersection of journalism, campaign work, and activism, it also places the blogger in the position of being held in suspicion by many in both the press and the blog world. Because I've been living in this intersection for the past three years, seeing others come into it and react to it is interesting, as I realize how much I take the whole thing as normal. And, at least from my experience, the notion that any campaign would be paying for blogging (and not the actual goods they are getting) really grants a bit too much strategery on their part. Surely with the skull-drudgery that's done by pseudonym bloggers, but for known bloggers that work on campaigns, I've not seen anything shady at all. This intersection isn't going away, and I hope more and more bloggers are able to work to influence how campaigns are run.
But it's ironic, given how little transparency there is over other mediums of communications (newspaper, radio, television), how much disclosure is demanded in this medium. I've often remarked that the only standard for blogging is FEC regulations, but not surprisingly, more seems necessary to most (or at least among the vocal ones). I've always played by the `rules' in this regard, and either completely not blogged about any candidate I'm working with, openly disclosed the matter beforehand, or stopped blogging completely. I think we've reached the point where some sort of disclosure is the norm, which is fine with me. My only gripe is the seemingly dual standard that people make on bloggers in comparison to the talking heads, for example.
On the other matters that were dredged up. The whole astrology matter is really just a lark that I have to laugh at myself with along with the crowd. You know, I grew up in a fundamentalist Christian family, and that whole mindset took some years in my late teens and early twenties to let go of holding as the absolute truth. Having had that experience, I came out of it with a sense or realizing that you can think you know it all, and not know it, and to not take one's own system of thought so self-righteously serious. Writing the articles under a pen name, associated to me the lack of seriousness with which I approached the matter of looking at politics through the astrological spectrum with, but to others I guess they thought I was hiding the matter. Obviously they don't go away, but I had them deleted from the site to make the issue clear about their relative weight in my political thinking. I found the whole accusation that it was a secret bizarre, given how anyone who was around MyDD during the 2001-2002 early blogging breakout days here, would have seen me linking to those writings as things I did. A bit arcane and strange... ok, live and let live and if you need a laugh on my behalf, feel free... just watch out for the beam.
In regards to the SEC issues, given the agreement I made, I can't unfortunately talk about the details of the case. What I can say is that it happened over six years ago, and it was a civil matter, which in the grand scheme of things places it quite low in regards to such matters. I was a newbie to the world of stock trading, and made some naive mistakes that I would not do again, but I sleep fine knowing what my state of mind was during the time. What a crazy time that was too, as anyone who was around remembers, when we'd ride those stocks up 100's of percent in a matter of weeks or days. I rode the tech stock-holding train all the way down too though, which wasn't as fun. We all make our own mistakes in life. The good thing is being able to learn and get beyond them.
One other point about bloggers and campaigns-- the blogger-criticism part of the blog world strikes me as totally against the spirit of what we are trying to do with the blogs. I hardly think that setting standards above what is done in other media outlets is something that's of vital importance--if it were then the FEC would make it so. My own standard, before I criticize any other blogger, is to look at how that person is acting in a comparative manner to the other things that are going on in the media or campaign world. When you look at how many millions of small donor dollars were totally wasted with Dean's media campaign, it's amazing that people would blog about Markos and myself making $18K the entire campaign and having totally disclosed it every day (Markos) or having stopped blogging completely (myself) to work at the headquarters in Burlington. Obviously, it's not about the money. I don't know if it's just plain ignorance, or that the issue is just not sexy enough, but realizing that, for about 90% of the competitive races, we are going to see the same wasteful media practices in place this cycle--that's what should be getting people riled up!
I will echo what Simon Rosenberg said the other day at an NPI forum. You can point to John Kerry's 2004 media practice (how he spent 70% of the funds) and, more legitimately than with any other issue or decision, conclude, `that is why he lost.' My own small commitment, working with the potential candidate Mark Warner, is that at least I can help shift the practice toward doing things differently from the inside. I came out of the Dean campaign, like most people that have lived through a presidential campaign, needing life rehab to get my mental sanity back. But I also realized, especially after doing the research for Crashing the Gate, how Democrats start so far behind, simply because of the campaign practices (especially with media), and they are still a tremendous obstacle to our winning again. So, I'm still at the intersection, avoiding the traffic...
And just a note about '06. I might have the urge to start blogging here again after labor day to the election. Especially seeing how the gains to be made by Democrats could finally be on their way to finally happening this decade. Given how destructive the rule of Republicans has been to this nation and the world, it'd be about time. Or, who knows, maybe the Democratic Party's continued institutional denial of the existence of cable and the internet, as the media for about half the nation, will be our downfall, ugh.
I can't wait for August and the much needed vacation on the Oregon coast with family and the two kids, Taj, now 6, and Maya 18 months. They are like having happiness show up in reality every day to remind me what's important, and why I work to make change, regardless of whatever gets thrown about.
Tags: campaign blogging (all tags)
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myDD - skin
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