(Mike Mulcahy is on vacation)

I'm really not a geek by nature and this is probably old news to most of you but RSS has really made following politics in Minnesota a lot easier. RSS -- really simple syndication -- is a code/language that allows a 'reader' (like Yahoo or Bloglines) to assemble all the stuff that's being posted -- from news articles to blogs) on one page. So rather than you going from Web site to Web site, the content comes to you.

MPR provides RSS feeds of the Session 2005, Politics, and this very column.

A complete list of MPR's RSS feeds can be found here.

Several blogs on Minnesota politics also provide RSS feeds but the dirty little secret of Minnesota political blogs is they're not very good. A good blog has to be updated every day and there are darned few that are.

One RSS feed that has been of value to me is from the Capitol itself. The Minnesota State Legislature offers a feed of its What's New list. Here's a list of RSS feeds at the Capitol. Among the more useful is the Session Daily feed from the House Information Office.

Individual legislators also provide RSS feeds. But legislators are notoriously bad updaters and, besides, most of the content is of the "I'm terrific and the other party isn't" variety.

What's new here

Both of the MPR main talk shows addressed the shutdown today. As I write this, Dean Johnson and Steve Sviggum are on Midday.
You can listen to the archived version (available after 12:30 p.m.).

Midmorning this morning featured Bob Meeks, longtime lobbyist at the state Capitol and Twila Brase, president of the Citizens' Council on Health Care. That audio is available now in RealPlayer.

Let's hear from you.

-- Bob Collins