News Cut: August 25, 2008 Archive

The message is not the media

Posted at 6:05 AM on August 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)
Filed under: The political conventions

National Public Radio had a fascinating story on Friday afternoon, analyzing how media coverage of the national conventions has changed. It's had to, partly because politics has changed -- convention delegates don't actually do anything significant here that hasn't already been done. And partly because -- in this week's case -- political parties haven't really changed how they handle media access to their made-for-TV show.

Behind the scenes of a political convention are political turf wars. There's a reason Texas is stuck in the back of the Pepsi Center. There's a reason some Clinton delegates here are feeling disrespected. As political winds shift, old scores are being settled and those who -- as one delegate described it to me -- "jumped on the right bus" are taking advantage of their newfound power.

It's the culture of power. Inside party politics is a totem pole. The role of convention producers, is to hide all of that. They're usually pretty good at it until the group that's most affected is the media. Credential day -- the day many media organizations find out the degree of access they'll have this week -- is the day the various media entities find out where they stand on the pole. Sunday was credential day.

Conventional wisdom says this is the "blogger's convention," but as the New York Times reported on Sunday, the credential process revealed that when it comes to getting access to power, it's still 1980 for many in the media.

"It's unprecedented access for bloggers, yes, but it's certainly not equal access," said Ms. Spaulding, who learned last week that Pam's House Blend would receive two extra credentials. "What, pray tell, is the big secret?"

The annoyance felt by many bloggers is familiar to those who previously attended conventions as correspondents for smaller print publications. "This is very reminiscent of being at the low end of the totem pole," said Micah Sifry, the co-founder of the group blog Techpresident.com, who formerly wrote for The Nation magazine and attended his first convention in 1984. "They can't buy a sky box, they're scrambling."

There are various levels of credentials for an organization like a Minnesota Public Radio. The "hall pass" gets you into the Pepsi Center, but not much farther. The 'arena pass' gets you closer to the action. The "floor pass" gets you on the floor to talk to delegates. The "perimeter pass" doesn't really get you anywhere but inside the security perimeter, but it can almost make you look dead sexy hanging around your neck.

The number of each type of credential alloted to a news organization, is a statement from the Democratic Party about its position on the totem pole.

It's a good thing, actually, that reporters are limited in their access to Pepsi Center this week, especially since Hollywood producers are making sure everyone inside the building sticks to a script. But it still defies logic in the 2008 media landscape to put on a show exclusively so the media can tell your story, and then make it difficult for the media to get to your story.

Why? Because if you make it impossible for them to cover your spoon-fed story, whose story do you think they are going to cover instead?

While it's true that an anti-war protest is synonymous with an anti-Republican protest, it wouldn't take too many under-credentialed reporters to note that it was the Democratic Party that swept into power in the last election by promising change, and then caved in on virtual every major showdown with the White House.

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Discussion: What role does faith play in your politics?

Posted at 7:11 AM on August 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (3 Comments)
Filed under: The political conventions

Yesterday, the Democrats held an interfaith church service, picketed by a group called COCORE.org, which is made up of several Colorado atheist organizations. The group asserted the Democrats are "assisting the emergence of a religious-left to counter the religious-right."

Religion, however, is a big part of politics. It's unlikely that's going to change anytime soon.

But here's why I ask. Over the last two weeks, I've been interviewing several Minnesota delegates to the two major party conventions. Two have made a particular impression. On the Democratic side, Rep. Yolanda Lehman of St. Cloud is a liberal who clearly comes to her politics as an extension of her faith. She can cite the Bible for guidance on a political philosophy.

Nancy Haapoja of Redwood Falls is a Republican delegate (watch for her profile later this week). She is the director of the Campus Life Center of Youth for Christ. She also comes to politics by way of her faith. She, too, cites the Bible for guidance on her political philosophy.

Two delegates, both come to their politics through their religious belief, both cite the Bible as their favorite book, both pray to the same God, yet both end up in very different locations on the political spectrum.

How is that possible? And what about you? What is the role of your faith in politics? Did your faith shape your politics and, if so, how?

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Live-blogging: Is there a voting system that'll work?

Posted at 10:25 AM on August 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (4 Comments)
Filed under: The political conventions

Greetings. I'm live at one of the Hyatts in downtown Denver where I'm blogging a comprehensive look at the election system we have. Does it work? Can you trust electronic voting? This is part of the Pew Charitable Trust "Make Voting Work" initiative. "For all the attention to election reform since the 2000 presidential vote -- and the resulting upheaval... that continues today -- in most states, individuals can't get a simple answer to basic questions, like 'Am I registered to vote?'" the project description says.

A similar forum will be held next week in Minneapolis. At the moment, few people are in the room for the 9:30 (Mountain Time) start. So sit tight. Most of the attendees are probably loss. Denver is a nice city, but there's one major flaw (listen up, MSP 2008), there's no directions to anything. The maps printed in the official convention guide are designed to get you to the local businesses, but little else. There are two Hyatts within two blocks, and two towers to one of them. One has to be persistent to get here.

By the way, if you have a question, feel free to post it in comments.

All times Mountain time

9:58 a.m. We're underway with a look at the changing face of the electorate. (Tangent: Interesting story here on how the changing face of the nation is changing the Democrat Party.

We're talking with Anna Greenberg, a researcher who's studied voting behavior and admits to be a Democratic pollster. The pace of change, she says, is far faster on racial and ethnic diversity than we thought. But the other area undergoing rapid change is the changing family structure. For the first time last year, a slight majority of people are not married. The growth of the unmarried population has a big impact on politics.

Greenberg is looking at younger people who, she says, are much more diverse. The general population, for example, is 69% white, but looking at those under 30, only 61 percent are white. One of the fastest-growing demographic areas in elections, is unmarried women -- and in turnout, unmarried Hispanic women are leading the uptick in turnout for presidential elections. Twenty-six percent of the people who turned out in 2008 primary/caucuses were unmarried women. How do you think this will affect the issues that candidates select?

This group -- unmarried women -- is the easiest to discourage from voting, Greenberg says. They tend to be less educated and affluent, and less likely to ask for help when voting.

10:22 a.m. - We're talking with David Beirne of the Election Technology Council, which represents electronic voting machine vendors; and Steven Rosenfeld of Alternet, whose latest article from last Friday is "Why your vote may not count this November."

Beirne says electronic voting machines were originally designed as "an auditing tool," and not to be the "ballot of record."

Computerworld Magazine has a story up that examines the problems with voting machines in Ohio in '04.

A major electronic voting system vendor has changed its story in an attempt to explain how its machines dropped hundreds of votes in Ohio's March primary elections, saying it was a programming error, not the fault of antivirus software.

Beirne highlights as an industry challenge that "there haven't been any product upgrades within the last two years." These need to be certified by election officials. He says there is a lack of industry involvement in the development of standards for voter machines. (By the way, Colorado is one of the states that has banned electronic voting machines.)

10:47 Rosenfeld's turn. He's not buying it. "If we in the press call something a glitch instead of it being a 'system that doesn't work as promised,' are we just supposed to blame the poll workers who can't understand the equipment? This is why this issue is so controversial and why the public has lost confidence. Nobody can understand this."

He says there's nobody who can look at the underlying software because the industry has declared it proprietary. He says he's not a fan of conspiracy theories but just said the Ohio Secretary of State's Web site in 2004 was on the same server as the White House. I have no idea if that's true, but he's clearly suggesting the Ohio voting machine problems in '04 were rigged by Republicans.

Rosenfeld says the problem isn't the machines themselves, but the voting lists that are inputted into them. In New Mexico, he says, the voting machines during the primary were missing the voter lists for an entire county. In Georgia, they didn't deploy enough laptops to the polls with the latest voter lists.

11:09 a.m. - Three election officials -- from Los Angeles County; Cuyahoga County, Ohio; and Marion County, Indiana -- are speaking about whether polling places can handle the crush of voters expected this fall (remember the Minnesota caucuses last winter?)

"We're not just asking poll volunteers to flip through voting lists and hand people ballots anymore," says Dean Logan of Los Angeles. "It's far more complicated now." If I translae that correctly, that means there are more points of failure now in elections than before. That's not comforting.

Cuyahoga County's (Cleveland) Jane Platten says they thought there'd be more new voters registered so far this year than that city has had. Memo to self: Check voter registration experience in Minnesota. She says high school volunteers make great election judges because "they're better at problem solving." Does this spell the end of the little old lady at Minnesota's polls?

It's a sign of the times: Platten says "we will be sued on November 4th."

Beth White, the clerk of Marion County, Indiana, says her county has the toughest voter ID law in the country. You may remember the Supreme Court upheld the system earlier this year. She's been sued since, she said, on state constitutional grounds.

Indiana requires a photo ID in order to vote and opponents, including the League of Women Voters, say it diminishes voter turnout. White's most interesting comment: "Indiana has a history of low voter turnout." Oh, then.

"It's too early to know whether (the Voter ID Law) will diminish voter participation," she said, although she promised "we will be ready." This law, by the way, has been a huge issue in Minnesota. I wrote about it here.

All of the people on the panel said there'll be a lot of first-time voters in the coming election, and they tend to be less patient than other demographics (see earlier notation on the changing demographic). "These are people who are used to a rushed lifestyle," Dean Logan, the clerk in Los Angeles said, "and that's going to be their expectation with the voting experience too, and that's why we have to be very concerned about long lines at the polling place. I've heard the stories of voters who've been sent to two or three places because their names wasn't on the voting list. After two or three times, they give up and getting them back to trying to vote is problematic."

Trivia time : Over 100 helicopters are employed in Los Angeles County to deliver ballots on election day. There are 4,300 precincts.

Question for your discussion: Why do we have 50 different voting systems? Should there be a single standard?

12:11 p.m. I'm moving on to "Will new voters navigate the system" with Mike Slater of Project Vote. He, too, is worried about the experience the younger voter may have on Election Day. Slater says many jurisdictions work too hard to bounce people from voting lists. "A number of these factors fall hardest on low income and minorities," he said.

A continuing theme here: Each state treats the right to vote differently. "In Washington, you have a long period of time to correct a mistake on your voter application. In Florida, you must correct it before the close of registration or you won't be eligible to vote," he said. "In some states, election officials pick up the phone and call a voter who may have a problem; in other states election officials would never pick up the phone."

Slater says anecdotally he sees high voter registration for November, "and we know the kind of problems they're going to face." He encouraged us journalists to start asking questions of our elected officials for how they plan to correct voter registration problems.

Eddie Hailes, Jr., of The Advancement Project says 600,000 voters in Ohio may be disenfranchised this year. Coincidentally, we're about to have lunch with Jennifer Brunner, Ohio's secretary of state.

In Ohio, as in other states, voters are mailed a card 60 days prior to election. They can't be forwarded by the postal service. If the cards are returned as undeliverable, the voter may be challenged on Election Day.

How are you liking that same-day registration voting now, Minnesota?

Hailes, by the way, sees the future of voter information online. His organization is about to launch projects on the major social networking sites to assist voters -- and potential voters -- around the country.

"There should be a movement in place to enshrine in the Constitution, an affirmative right to vote," he said.

"Amen," said Beth White behind me.

12:56 p.m. - We're talking with Jennifer Brunner, Ohio's secretary of state, who gave up her judgeship to run for office in 2006 after voting regularities in the state in 2004. Brunner has had to clean up the mess, firing election officials in the state, some of whom had close ties to the Bush administration. The former secretary of state, J. Kenneth Blackwell, also was the Bush-Cheney campaign chair in Ohio.

She says she's issued more than 70 directives this year to create a voting system "that's more transparent." She said she wanted to get rid of voting machines and go back to paper ballots this year, but the poor Ohio economy (she needed $64 million) wouldn't allow it. Instead, Ohio "has been working with a bipartisan team around the state to roll out security procedures that we'll roll out today or tomorrow. We developed minimum standards that will tell each board of elections how to develop a security plan." Ohio will give voters a chance to use paper ballots as a backup.

She wouldn't take the bait, though, on the question of whether the election in Ohio was rigged. "We're trying to focus on what's ahead," she said when asked about long lines at the polls in 2004 in minority neighborhoods.

1:32 p.m. Listening to Rosemary Rodriguez of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission prompted me to go to the Commission's Web site. There, I saw a news release from the commission chairman on a New York Times article from earlier this month.

On August 16, The New York Times (NYT) ran an incomplete and outdated article that reports on "a government backlog in testing (voting) machines' hardware and software." The article suggests that the backlog has been created by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission's (EAC) voting system certification process and leaves the impression that EAC is doing nothing while States are left to fend for themselves to fix problems before the November elections.

Which prompted me to go back and look at what I wrote earlier today about the guy from the electronic voting machine industry.

Beirne highlights as an industry challenge that "there haven't been any product upgrades within the last two years." These need to be certified by election officials. He says there is a lack of industry involvement in the development of standards for voter machines.

Confusing? Yes. Comforting? Again, no.

Here's the Times article

.

1:39 p.m. - I mentioned earlier that the idea of a photo ID when voting has been a big issue in Minnesota. Now we're going to hear about it. David Muhlhausen of the conservative Heritage Foundation is going to give a presentation on why the idea doesn't inhibit voting. He'll be followed by Tova Wang of Common Cause who says it does.

1:40 p.m. - Wang is going to go first because Muhlhausen can't get his Powerpoint presentation to work. Twenty-four states now have ID laws that go beyond the Help America Vote Act. The rest -- like Minnesota -- just requires people to sign a poll book.

"Indiana is a state in play this year so it (the photo ID) may influence the election," she said. "If you don't have a passport or government ID, you'll have a hard time voting. There will be a number of pollworkers in other states who will think this is a national law and ask for IDs where it's not required."

She says polling place fraud is "almost non-existent and we saw that during the U.S. attorney scandal. Not one of the voter fraud cases they prosecuted would've been affected by the photo ID law," she said.

She says the argument for the law's proponents now is that people have lost confidence in the system, noting that their citing of a fraud problem that doesn't exist is one reason for the lack of confidence. Plus, she said, "it's a stupid way to steal an election. There are better ways."

1:50 p.m. - Now the other side from the Heritage Foundation. David Muhlhausen says 69% of whites, 58% of African Americans support the idea. He admits "the prevalence of in-person voter fraud is hard to find, but the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."

Trivia time: In Ohio, there's a popular bumper sticker that says, I Voted. Twice.

2:08 p.m. - There was a question about people who move with a Photo ID law in effect and have IDs that don't carry the current address. "I don't understand why people move so much," Muhlhausen said. "And sometimes people have to take time out of their day to take care of these sorts of things"

"Sometimes people are busy having their home foreclosed on," Wang responded.

( This concludes the focus on our voting system. Continue discussion below.)

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Denver Diaries: Do prairie dogs bite?

Posted at 10:20 AM on August 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (5 Comments)
Filed under: The political conventions

This entry will be updated through the day on Monday.

Political science

The MPR contingent that is housed in an out-of-the-way hotel has been thinking of moving it location. The light-rail line is two miles away if you take the way the hotel official says is the "closest" light rail station. But this morning I found a closer one. But here's the problem: It requires a short cut through what appears to be a field of prairie dogs -- very active prairie dogs. Not knowing the nature of the beast, I went around.

Meals on No Wheels

Wednesday is a service day at the Democratic National Convention, a day when delegates can get out of their hotel rooms and go into the community to assist in some sort of social endeavor. It's a chance to meet some of the people of Denver and the organizations that serve them.

But the Minnesota delegation won't be leaving its hotel to do so.

The group is preparing meals for Denver's Meals on Wheels program. All of the food to be packaged is being delivered to the delegates' hotel, where it will be packed and sent back out to seniors and others, according to a state party official.

Some delegates had hoped their social work would be more involved, and less of an obvious photo opportunity.

First impressions

Minneapolis-St. Paul, you can outdo these folks. A****** , from what I can tell, appears to be Denver's way of saying, "Hi there, welcome to the Mile High City." Drivers wait about 3 seconds when a red light turns green to honk.

And all we need in the Twin Cities is a clear day to show off all the smog we don't have.

The volunteers who were in such abundance seem pretty much to have disappeared from the streets downtown, where much of the convention activity takes place. For the record, the nicest, most helpful people I've met so far, have been the cops.

The big tent

Most of the caucuses happen around the Convention Center, about a mile from Pepsi Center. It's what a lot of delegates do during the day. During the evening, the Democrats will attempt to look like one big, happy family. But during the day, they splinter into all sorts of factions -- unions, religious groups, ethnic groups etc. -- and hold their meetings to, presumably, push their own interests.

It's part of the "big tent" thing, and while on the one hand there's strength in the diversity of the political party (at least that's the convention wisdom), it also means that some faction is always upset about something, and a significant amount of time has to be spent soothing hurt feelings in order to keep the larger coalition together.

The other Big Tent

Via @jasonbarnett on Twitter (The Uptake), the "Big Tent," which has garnered so much publicity for being the nuclear core of bloggers here in Denver, had no outlets for laptops this morning.

How do you like that Obama text-messaging gimmick now?

It seemed like a nifty idea at the time (to some people). But the Obama campaign has not been shy about using the e-mail and text message addresses it gathered through the gimmick of announcing the vice presidential pick. Over the last day -- my anecdotal research says -- Obamaspam has been coming in about once every four hours.

The 'jerk ratio'

I talked to a young man working security in the Hyatt. He says he's working 14-hour days this week and said Sunday was 'crazy' but the first day of the convention hasn't been as busy as he thought. "What's the jerk ratio?" I asked. "It's not too bad, he said. Much better than when there's a tech convention in town."

It's worth noting, I think, that people are getting to work fine, the light-rail is running, restaurants aren't particularly crowded and while I've never been in Denver before, most every other political convention city has had the same experience -- the reality doesn't tend to match the pre-convention hype and panic about how things will grind to a halt.

Teresa's story

I love the Internet. A few days ago I wrote about a volunteer I met at the media party on Saturday. Somehow, she found News Cut and added an interesting comment. News Cut will travel anywhere to sign up one new reader.

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First look at Invesco

Posted at 2:19 PM on August 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (2 Comments)
Filed under: The political conventions

MPR's John Nicholson has just sent along the first peek at things inside Invesco Field, where Barack Obama will give his speech on Thursday.

Today, it was revealed that Bon Jovi and Bruce Springsteen will perform there prior to the speech.

I notice that "The Rising" has been taken as the Obama campaign theme song.

More pictures:

Meanwhile, back at Pepsi Center, the delegates are starting to stream in for their evening of work which will include... well... I don't really know. But Michelle Obama is going to speak (and maybe Ted Kennedy too) and news stories around the world will report tomorrow that they liked them.

Hat tip to Michael DeMark of the MPR Operations Department for sending that picture along.

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Denver vs. St. Paul: Traffic comparison - Part I

Posted at 3:10 PM on August 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)
Filed under: The political conventions

Minnesota's Department of Transportation today released a list of ramp closures during next week's RNC.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation will close the ramp from northbound Interstate 35E to Kellogg Boulevard and the ramp from eastbound I-94 to 5th Street at 6 p.m. Friday, Aug. 29. The ramps will remain closed throughout the convention and will reopen at 6 a.m. Friday, Sept. 5.

The ramps are being closed to provide more efficient traffic flow and security during the event. Only delegate buses and other official vehicles will be allowed to use the closed ramps.

Inconvenient? Probably. Significant? Probably not.

Last week on MPR's Midday, both mayors said I-94 will remain open.

Now let's switch to Denver. On Thursday, I-25 -- the main drag through the city -- is going to be closed for 5 miles around Denver. In other words: Denver will be closed.

Advantage: St. Paul. Maybe.

Light-rail stations (there doesn't appear anywhere near as significant a bus system in Denver as in the Twin Cities) are closed near Pepsi Center.

Nonetheless, a local traffic reporter's blog confirmed what I observed this morning. The day-to-day, get-to-work traffic here this morning was not a big deal.

I took light-rail into the city around 8 this morning. If this, as the traffic reporter suggested, was heavier use than normal, it must usually be near empty.

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Denver Diaries: The Gustavus connection

Posted at 9:17 PM on August 25, 2008 by Bob Collins (2 Comments)
Filed under: The political conventions

For two weeks every four years, I talk to strangers on the street and on trains. This is one of those weeks.

And, you know, it's funny how many people you meet with roots in Minnesota. On the way back to the hotel this evening on the light-rail system, I introduced myself to a man who looked like an interesting character.

He was.

He was a former Gustavus Adolphus professor from the '70s, now living in Parker, Colorado.

"How do you like it here?" I asked.

"I'm a walking Chamber of Commerce," Connor Shepherd said. "I've lived in 11 states and I've been here for more than 20 years."

He also gave up the education gig, to run for -- and become -- the mayor of Grand Junction, Colorado for one term, "until they found out I was a liberal." Now he operates a consulting firm, Circuit Rider of Colorado, which provides services to local government.

But even after all these years, he's puzzled when I ask him about Colorado politics. "Our legislature leans Democrat, the mayor of Denver is a Democrat, our governor is a Democrat, a senator is a Democrat, and yet the state went for George Bush.

"And this year?" I asked.

"It's a toss-up, he said," stroking a professorial beard and shaking his government-wonk head.

In exploring his background, I learned he taught sociology at Gustavus until he decided to pursue a master's degree in leisure studies.

"What's involved in pursuing a master's degree in leisure studies?" I asked.

"You have to be very mellow," he said.

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