Polinaut: January 25, 2006 Archive

Do you...take this money....?

Posted at 12:01 AM on January 25, 2006 by Bob Collins

The Institute on Money in State Politics is out with a new study on the amount of money spent by ballot committees surrounding same-sex marriage bills at the state level.

Minnesota wasn't one of them, of course, since the bill died in a Senate committee. The closest state was North Dakota.

Groups supporting gay and lesbian rights raised the most amount of cash, more than conservative groups raised.

Here's the PDF file.

OPEN ITEMS

Patching up the Post

Posted at 3:03 PM on January 25, 2006 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)

The Washington Post has been embroiled in a controversy over the ethics of blogging. The Post recently turned off the comments section of its blog after readers inundated it with, in the view of the Post, unacceptable comments. This followed the Post's ombudsman's column on the Abramoff story.

Today the Post hosted a "chat" (I had no idea people still hosted chats, actually) featuring several bloggers.

This exchange caught my eye:

Seattle, Wash.: The Post's dramatic over-reaction to some critics has, in effect, broadly painted all Democrats on the left as vulgar. Last night, one of the sillier TV pundits characterized blog reaction to Howell's column as "organized terrorism." What can The Post do to tamp down this sort of dangerous mischaracterization, and how can readers who care enough to participate in the dialogue trust that they won't again all be treated as barbarians when they disagree?

Jeff Jarvis: (ed note: Jeff Jarvis is Buzzmachine)That's a great point. To extend the argument, this chat itself is looking at the wrong end of the pipe. It would be better to have a chat about all the great things that do, indeed, come from finally opening up the pipe to two-way collaboration. NashvilleIsTalking.com is my favorite example of a media organization forging a new relationship with citizens by sharing (1) conversation, (2) promotion, (3) content, (4) knowledge, and -- this is a big one -- (5) revenue.

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Debate challenges

Posted at 3:22 PM on January 25, 2006 by Bob Collins

Ford Bell has issued a challenge to DFLer Amy Klobuchar in the race for Senate. One piece of advice for the Ford camp. Put your releases on your Web site.

Among other things Ford said in a letter to Klobuchar:

-- Please join me and Mark Kennedy on KSTP TV's At Issue with Tom Hauser for a debate on the issues. You and I both know that the viewers will see Mr. Kennedy as an extreme ideologue of the Bush White House which will be a good contrast for both of our campaigns.

-- Please accept my challenge from Saturday, January 21st to participate in an open series of debates between you and me and any other DFLers running for U.S. Senate. (This is my preferred manner of debating you, because I believe it is important for our party's activists to see that they have a choice about who will represent them in Washington).

-- Please ask Senator Charles Schumer to stop attempting to meddle in the time-honored grassroots DFL Party endorsing process that will officially begin at our precinct caucuses. I do not believe that Mr. Schumer is doing you any favors with his heavy- handed negative intimidation tactics to "clear the field". We need a positive debate on the issues.

Bell also said he accepted Rep. Mark Kennedy's challenge to debate.

FYI, Bell and Klobuchar will be on MPR's Midday on March 3.