According to a story in Wednesday’s Politico, increasingly political bloggers are using their sites as springboards to higher office. Slate‘s Mickey Kaus is a bit of an outlier, since he ran for federal office. Either because this is a new trend and people tend to start low on the ballot, or that local government is more comfortable, bloggers that run seem to be seeking state legislature and municipal seats.
The blog might be the new on ramp to American politics.
At least 20 candidates are running for office this cycle who owe their public profile — at least in part — to blogging, POLITICO has found. Leading voices in Internet politics said that’s more than in any prior cycle. The clutch of candidates suggests a new chapter in the history of the blogosphere, one in which blogs, having proved themselves as potent tools for fundraising and advocacy, emerge as launching pads for the nation’s next generation of political leaders.
The list of candidates and officials include the men behind ThinkProgress and RedState. It makes sense. If you’re getting your shit together every day to read the news and field tips and write about politics, it only makes sense that you would consider stepping off the sidelines and getting into the action. It’s really no different that being a regular letter writer to newspapers or getting involved in local political meetings or just having a salon with friends at a party.
Even back in college, we had people asking us if we’d run for office. The answer was, an is, “No fucking way.” One reason is fundraising. That shit is not fun. Calling for dollars, approving fundraising letters, asking friends and family to turn over the Benjamins and hold fundraising parties — we’re not fans of that marathon of begging. The only thing that’s possibly worse is going door-to-door in the wretched heat that claims the South from the beginning of April through mid-November. And the more people you meet and shake hands with, the more people you think shouldn’t be allowed to drive a car, much less vote. And that’s the nexus of winning — asking people for money and votes. If you are not 100 percent committed to these things, you shouldn’t run for any office, anywhere.
Also, the idea of dropping f-bombs in a debate against Columbia City Councilwoman Belinda Gergel, Rep. James Smith or Sen. John Courson isn’t exactly high up on our list of unrealized life experiences.
You don’t know Politico, you only think you know Politico. It turns out that editorial meetings happen in a secret hideout in The District, with Mike Allen doing his best superhero impression and Jim VandeHei holding it together, sort of. Special thanks to that great goddamn American, petersmith2822.
It is a nice development that our small endeavor made national political news site Politico on Wednesday, for our post announcing that former Rudy Giuliani rapid response man Tim Pearson was joining Rep. Nikki Haley’s gubernatorial campaign as communications director.
May has indeed been a good month for WR, as we broke the story that Haley was running for governor two weeks before it was announced, along with her hiring of consultant Jon Lerner, Pearson, the hiring of the new S.C. Republican Party executive director and the party-switching of Rep. Dennis Moss.
