New York Times
Feb 24, 2005
The Latest Initiative in Congress: Blogging
BY BRIAN WINGFIELD
AS he stood inside the National Cathedral at President Reagan's
funeral last June, Representative Mike Pence, Republican of Indiana,
typed a stirring message into his BlackBerry.
"My wife and I stand amidst the most powerful people in
the world," it read. "We have stood beside presidents
and princes, prime ministers and leaders of every stripe but that
is not what moved us these past two hours. There was the undeniable
presence of the Spirit of the Lord in this place and it was a
sweet presence." As hymns echoed through the cathedral, "the
casket swept by to our right, and tears filled my eyes."
Later that afternoon, that message was posted on Mr. Pence's
blog. "We got wonderful feedback," he said in a recent
interview.
Blogging, the Web-based craft of diary-keeping and commentary,
is taking root on Capitol Hill.
The nonprofit Congressional Management Foundation, which helps
educate Congress on running its business, says at least four members
- Mr. Pence; Representatives Mark Kirk, Republican of Illinois,
and Katherine Harris, Republican of Florida; and Senator Patrick
J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont - have taken up the task on a continuing
basis. (Others have used temporary blogs to document trips, said
Brad Fitch, the foundation's deputy director.)
The Congressional bloggers praise the power, popularity and potential
of blogging, citing it as one of the most frequently visited parts
of their Congressional Web sites.
"It shows your constituents that you're going to be updating
your Web site regularly, and the next time they log on, they will
see something new," Mr. Kirk said.
While popular political blogs like Wonkette, MyDD and Daily Kos
serve as an alternative to traditional news sources and allow
their authors to purvey commentary, Congressional blogs are extremely
tame. In many cases, staff members - not the legislators themselves
- post entries, and they rarely link to other blogs, as most blogs
do.
Mr. Fitch said that did not disqualify the Congressional efforts
as blogs. "I don't think there is a definition of blogging,"
he said. "There are quite a lot of restrictions on what members
of Congress are allowed to put up on their Web site or send to
their constituents in any sort of mass media way."
For Ana Marie Cox, editor of Wonkette, blogging has a very loose
definition. In a recent interview, she said her only criterion
was that "it is updated regularly."
"Do we want government to define what blogging is?"
she asked rhetorically.
That said, the range of Congressional blogging is vast.
Mr. Leahy's blog, More From the Floor, is a real-time account
of Senate events. Updated by two staff members, it includes a
link to send e-mail to Mr. Leahy and one allowing readers to be
notified of any new posting.
It can sometimes have the flavor of a lesson in how a bill becomes
a law. On Feb. 15, the blog walked readers through the confirmation
of the new homeland security chief. "Today the Senate will
be debating the nomination of Michael Chertoff to be Secretary
of Homeland Security," said an entry time-stamped 11:32 a.m.
"A vote on the nomination is expected around 4:00."
In a recent interview, Mr. Leahy said the purpose of the blog
from the beginning had been to keep people attuned to "the
nation's front porch," the Senate floor. "It only works
if people can be on the porch," he said.
Ms. Cox said the absence of Mr. Leahy's opinion did not necessarily
disqualify it as a blog. "Real time?" she said. "That
seems pretty bloggy to me."
Mr. Kirk's blog, begun Jan. 9, is essentially a continuing account
of his official activities. Many entries editorialize on policy
issues. For example, from Feb. 17: "As we work to maintain
a stable democracy in Afghanistan, we must move quickly to prevent
a narco-state from emerging." Or, from Jan. 28: "The
Federal Railroad Administration is just a couple steps away from
imposing a costly train whistle regulation on our communities."
The entry from Jan. 31 links to the blog of an Iraqi voter, who
chronicles his experience in last month's election.
Mr. Pence's blog is somewhat more personalized. Begun in May,
it serves standard public-relations functions, linking to editorials
he wrote and providing transcripts to his appearances on talk
shows. But it also serves as something of an Internet diary.
His entry for Dec. 13 describes his trip to Afghanistan, when
he "took a roller coaster helicopter ride on a CH-53 Super
Stallion through the mountains around Jalalabad." An October
entry announced the wedding of a staff member. In July, Mr. Pence
wrote about taking his son to meet the former astronaut Neil Armstrong.
Mr. Pence said a staff member spent 30 to 60 minutes each day
updating the blog, but the entries also say who posted them. "Anything
that is personally submitted is always me," he said.
Ms. Harris began her blog late last month. "It's kind of
a collective group of ideas," she said in a telephone interview
from Florida. A Feb. 17 entry explains why she started: "Blogging
is doing for the written word what digital cameras and cellphone/cameras
have done for the photographed image."
Mr. Fitch of the Congressional Management Foundation said he
believed that members of Congress who do not blog "are missing
the boat."
"It's an opportunity for them to match up with constituents
in their district, virtually free of charge," he said.
At this stage, he added, members of Congress are primarily experimenting
with blogs as a creative means to reach voters, not as a way to
attract the attention of the blogosphere - the bloggers' realm,
which can sometimes be an incubator of ideas and news. "The
Hill has yet to really reach that level of sophistication"
with the Internet, he said, but "there are people that do
get it."
Senator John Thune, Republican of South Dakota, has urged his
colleagues to take advantage of blogging. At a West Virginia retreat
for Congressional Republicans last month, Mr. Thune led a workshop
on blogs that "generated a considerable amount of discussion,"
he said in an interview.
For the moment, however, he does not have his own blog. Mr. Thune
said he was considering creating one, but would wait until he
finished moving into his new Capitol Hill office to make a decision.
"It's a function of time," he said. "If you're
going to keep it fresh, you have to be posting fairly regularly."
Carol C. Darr, director of the Institute for Politics, Democracy
and the Internet at George Washington University, said Congressional
blogging had great potential because the readers are information
devotees who will most likely tell others about what they read.
"They will magnify your voice and disseminate your message,"
she said.
Ms. Darr said she did not think the low number of Congressional
bloggers reflected a lack of interest.
"At one time, there were only three people with Web sites,
too," she said.
Copyright© 2005 New York Times
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