And they call us the new kids on the block

There’s been this long running debate about the ethics of bloggers versus the professionalism of old media outlets. Old media thinks that bloggers are reckless, border on the verge of being sued for libel, and are generally not worthy to be labeled “media”. Some bloggers do fit this mold (see Red State), but generally we try to strike a fair balance between rumors, innuendos, and truth. We can be extremely opinionated, cranky, critical, and sometimes we are not fair or balanced. We have our favorite political candidates (and differ even often amongst ourselves) and we even write lots of positive posts about our favorite candidates. But one thing I can say is that at BlogforDemocracy we don’t shill for any political campaigns.

So when I receive a call from a political campaign whining that their campaign hasn’t received a fair shake by the entire media, I take it with a grain of salt and don’t respond. I don’t think it’s my responsibility or job to assist that campaign with their spin factor. Especially when the campaign doesn’t offer any solutions, like “can my candidate write a guest blog post” but instead wants me to write a new post on how unfair this whole sticky and messy politic thing is. Puh-leaze with the “woe is me”.

Clearly the AJC, old media at its finest, doesn’t agree with me. Instead they ran a sympathy blog post for the Borders campaign while their next blog posting labeled Kasim Reed’s latest poll as a “sales pitch”. Isn’t this supposed to be the “old media” – where is the fair and balanced reporting?

Note to other campaigns: If you’re going to whine to me at least make it a debate about what I wrote. If I’m in the wrong or erred then I will make the necessary corrections. But BlogforDemocracy is not the AJC and we won’t shill your latest talking points. If you want to have a relationship with bloggers then give us something to work with. There are lots of tools that bloggers can use to place your candidate in a favorable light, like guest blogging, live interaction via “cover it live”, internet radio, and lots of other really cool stuff. It’s new media. Not old media.

A wise political woman shared this with me:

Until you’ve been in politics you’ve never really been alive.

It’s rough and sometimes it’s dirty and it’s always hard work and tedious details.

But-it’s the only sport for grownups – all other games are for kids.