I was amused to read today in the Wall Street Journal that "Howard Dean's presidential campaign hired two Internet political 'bloggers' as consultants so that they would say positive things about the former governor's campaign in their online journals."
The two blogs are DailyKos (the ninth most linked blog in the world, according to Technorati) and MyDD.
Both blogs were already pro-Dean, so I really don't understand why the Dean campaign wasted its money.
Of course, the blogosphere trashed the mainstream media for having a political agenda, for example bringing down the house of CBS on Dan Rather's head over the Bush National Guard documents.
I guess it's hard to trust anyone, online or off.
Except, of course... for yours truly.
Full disclosure: I never took one red cent from Howard Dean's campaign.
Or George Bush's.
Sure, they offered an awful lot of money for my support, but my only loyalty is to my readers, those faithful few who see me through times good and not-so-good.
joeheads rule - everyone else drools.
Article comments
1 - BB
Heh... a doc with ethics.
Who'd a-thunk :)
2 - Eric Berlin
Here's the quote from the leak:
I don't really find this that significant at all. It's generally known that the Dean campaign, under the innovative leadership of Joe Trippi, revolutionized the way new media, including blogs, are used in political campaigns.
It makes sense that they would have a few high profile liberal blogs on their payroll as consultants.
This is a lot different than Bush paying a pundit to hawk an administration policy proposal.
Eric Berlin
Dumpster Bust: Miracles from Mind Trash
3 - spiderleaf
If you actually followed the links you provided to those sites you would see that they are covering the "dead story" (as the original reporter for the WSJ called it) themselves.
They were paid as Technical consultants (i.e. placing banner ads, search, setting up the BFA, etc.) not to write positive things about the campaign which they were doing anyway.
Jerome Armstrong took down his blog while he worked on the campaign. Kos put a disclaimer on the front page stating he was a paid consultant for Dean.
Both these men were paid with campaign dollars ($3000/ month for 4 months). Armstrong Williams was paid with taxpayer dollars ($240,000) and did not disclose it.
Wow, really big story on the blogs eh? Kinda fortuitous it "broke" as everyone started investigating the Bush admins payola scandals eh? Kinda funny the people that "broke" it are all right wing pundits/ reporters eh?
Get some perspective.
4 - Eric Berlin
Spider: you said it better than I could have -- thanks.
5 - spiderleaf
nah, you said it well too.. I just couldn't let it go... it really ticks me off that the very real issues of Bush admin payola will be buried beneath this non-story... as always.