Dissin' The Blogs

by: Chris Bowers

Mon Apr 14, 2008 at 16:37


From the way I understand it, in the highly competitive Oregon Seante primary, Steve Novick has more online and general progressive grtassroots support than Jeff Merkley. If I am wrong, feel free to correct me in the comments. And yet, recent comments by Novick might reveal that while he has online support, it isn't exactly a constiuency that he takes very seriously. This following is written by a Merkley supporter, but Noick's comments are hard to defend:

Deep inside the Willamette Week endorsement interview of the Dems running for the U.S. Senate, there's a clip of Jeff Merkley and Steve Novick talking about blogging.  And it sparked a mini-firestorm in the netroots over the weekend.

In the clip, Jeff Merkley praises the blogs, noting that the netroots will spread the word about our Senate race in the fall.  But Steve Novick dismissed blogging as "a way for a number of people to waste a vast quantity of time."

And while it's certainly true that there's plenty of time wasted all over the blogs, it's also true that the netroots have become a central part of the progressive infrastructure in this state and across the country - helping take this country back.  We share information, build community, get organized, raise money, and influence the dialogue.   Novick's backhanded dismissal is just bizarre.

Thanks for dismissing a new medium, profession, and political power source as a "waste of time." While he did apologize, it is a pretty dismissive attitude to hold toward one of your largest bases of support in the primary. And slips like these can be demonstrative of real feelings that slipping out due to fatigue or lack of preparation.

Maybe I'm just insecure, but I kind of believe that most candidates, even most of the ones who seek our online support, actually think about us blogging types this way. Hell, when people ask me what I do, very few both beleive me and understand me when I tell them that I am a blogger. Why should politicians be any different?
Only a rare few actually both like and understand us, and among members of the House or top-teir House candidates I can count their number on one hand. If the online community is important to you, it is important to keep that in mind. Be wary before throwing your support behind candidates whole-hog. Many of them want your support. Very few actually take the online grassroots seriously as an actual partner for progressive political coaltiions.  

Chris Bowers :: Dissin' The Blogs

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Dissin' The Blogs | 26 comments
What? (0.00 / 0)
You're a blogger? I thought you were this guy. Crap!
Novick also backed Edwards, then endorsed Obama (0.00 / 0)
Novick supports equalizing tax rates on earned and unearned income, which Merkley opposes.

Novick supports eliminating the cap on income subject to the Social Security wage tax, which Merkley opposes.

They both support repeal of DOMA but only Novick calls for opening up civil marriage to all couples. Merkley thinks Oregon's domestic partnerships law gets the job done.

Novick supports full repeal of NCLB. Merkley's position has moved closer to Novick's during the campaign, but he's not there yet.

I am unaware of a single issue where Merkley is to the left of Novick.

Novick is clearly more progressive than Merkley.

Proud to support a principled progressive, Steve Novick for US Senate.

[ Parent ]
Actually... (0.00 / 0)
...we were once told he was really this guy!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11...

[ Parent ]
dissin (4.00 / 3)
This is a hard thing. Gordon Smith is a tough incumbent, but he's still vulnerable and we need to be united to defeat him in November.

That's why these comments, and the idea that Novick would prefer a former Republican (now independent) over his main opponent, are so eye-popping. The last thing we need are burned bridges and a thoroughly divided party here in Oregon.

Steve Novick has been a good progressive, but that's no excuse for these comments and his other past divisiveness.

I admit that I'm a Jeff Merkley supporter, but I support him because of his great progressive record in the Oregon House and because he's looking to unite Democrats under a common banner: defeating Smith and bringing progressive values to the Senate in his place. And it helps that he has the backing of many, many, many progressive organizations and people.  

PS: (4.00 / 2)
Forgot this:

For what it's worth, the Republican-to-Independent Novick named in preference to Merkley is John Frohnmeyer. Here's an article on it from the Portland Oregonian's blog.

Party unity, people! Party unity...

[ Parent ]
pps: (4.00 / 1)
Sorry for the cascading thread, but I keep forgetting pieces. Here's a video of the above:


[ Parent ]
Novick prefers the Independent to the Democrat (4.00 / 2)

That's the video that bothers me... (0.00 / 0)
I can get over the blogger comment, because in all honesty I think Novick just wanted to disagree with Merkley. However, supporting the Indie over Merkley is not acceptable in my book. I like how Jeff answered quickly that he would support Steve for the Senate. He didn't even blink an eye.  

Netroots Director for Oregon Senate Candidate Jeff Merkley
[ Parent ]
good thing he doesn't (0.00 / 0)
I'm sure you're not intentionally suggesting Novick won't support the Dem nominee, right?

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[ Parent ]
Very weird that blogging isn't taken seriously... (4.00 / 1)
...the business commmunity is most defiitely taking it seriously.  For example, my wife is paid $40/hour (30 hours/week) to blog for a company, and she knows people who make two or three times that amount blogging and podcasting for corporations.

As usual, it seems that the politicians are behind the rest of the country.

Obama Redux (0.00 / 0)
"Bloggers are a sensitive bunch about being respected and it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to the internet or community or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-establishment sentiment as a way to explain their frustration."
[ Parent ]
Novick is a former blogger... (4.00 / 2)
...and I think this should be taken into consideration when this quote is tossed about. Novick blogged on Blue Oregon regularly before he began his Senate run. He was talking about all the hot air and flame wars that we've all seen take place online (tell me that's not a waste of time), not smearing the entire "blog-o-sphere".

I'm still trying to decide who to vote for in the Oregon Senate primary, but I'm leaning Novick and this comment (taken out of context repeatedly, and unfairly - maybe blogs and the old media have something in common after all) does not make me any less likely to vote for Novick next month.

Check out Future Roots for organic rock'n'roll goodness from Oregon...

Merkley has tons of Grassroots Support (4.00 / 1)
You might think that Steve Novick has more grassroots support simply because Jeff Merkley is the more accomplished Democrat in the race.  But that's just not true; in addition to Merkley's many organizational endorsements (including Planned Parenthood, AFL-CIO, Sierra Club), he's supported by a large grassroots movement with strongholds in Portland, Washington County, Bend, Salem, Eugene and across rural Oregon.

What's more, Jeff Merkley understands and appreciates the value of netroots activists like myself.  There are many of us who proudly support Jeff's candidacy.  

As with lots of politics, the loudest voices can dominate.  And Novick's netroots activists, while very vocal, are outnumbered by Merkley's.  We are proud to talk about our candidate, and he's been fully grateful for the work we've done.

This primary election is about style and the commitment to defeat Gordon Smith.  Jeff Merkley has made it clear to me that he's focused like a laser beam on ousting Smith, and he's busy building a huge grassroots campaign to do it.

Novick's made a lot of comments that he's regretted, many of them about progressive allies like Obama, Clinton, Richardson, and Oregon Rep. Darlene Hooley.  And now he's offended blogs, one of his key constituencies.

We need everything we can get to beat Gordon Smith.  It's going to take a lot of resources.  We can't afford to spend them by having the nominee constantly eating his words.

We need Jeff Merkley as our nominee.

Town Hall in Salem (0.00 / 0)
I got to introduce Merkley at a town hall today as Political Director for the Willamette University College Democrats where the town hall was held.  Merkley's campaign is the only one paying attention to other parts of the state besides Portland like Salem which the second largest city in Oregon.

Even though it was in the middle of classes the event was well attended and Jeff spoke well.

[ Parent ]
The O's political reporter disagrees (0.00 / 0)
as was pointed out by mcjoan at Kos, Jeff Mapes notes an energy deficit in the Merkley effort:

But the poll is a sign that Novick has made inroads thanks to the buzz over his unconventional ads (which made light of his physical disabilities) and his strong volunteer organization. When I was in Medford a week ago covering former President Bill Clinton, I watched Novick volunteers handing out fliers to the 2,000 or so , people standing in line - and there was no one in sight from the Merkley campaign.

Anecdotal, but I keep hearing the same anecdote.  

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[ Parent ]
grassroots earned him 11% and 3rd place (0.00 / 0)
in SUSA. So let's not pretend Merkley has amassed a huge grassroots organization. In fact, when the poll came out last week, one of the bloggers Merkley passes his oppo research to said that Merkley was just getting going reaching out to voters, having started with the political establishment and special interest groups first. (!!)


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[ Parent ]
Chris, beware (4.00 / 1)
Novick has problems with bloggers.

Come to EENR blog and ask Jeff your questions live on Wed afternoon.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

I think Jeff is the most progressive, considering he backed John Edwards, but has gone to Obama, and we all know Edwards' agenda was the most progressive.

Quit relying on polls, make it about better Dems who aren't Bush Dogs.  

I second that Benny! (4.00 / 1)
Chris should come over to EENR and get to know Merkley a little better on Wednesday for the liveblog at noon pacific time. Since I'm an Oregonian I have had the opportunity to meet with Jeff and talk to him about numerous bills he pushed through the Senate. His record as Speaker of the House and work on environmental/labor issues totally won me over. The liveblog is a great opportunity for out of state bloggers to get to know Merkley as well.  

Netroots Director for Oregon Senate Candidate Jeff Merkley
[ Parent ]
Novick's apology in full (4.00 / 5)
Chris,

We hear you and we love the blogs. I can't speak for what most candidates feel, but Steve is a former blogger and has great respect for the medium. As you mentioned, he posted an apology on his own blog over the weekend after realizing the trouble his poorly chosen words caused. I'd like to call out a key sentence from Steve's apology because I think it's illustrated nicely by the comments we're seeing on this post right now:

In my own primary, we've seen bloggers who are typically allies divided into increasingly personal and repetitive fights that I worry do little to help reach a broader audience or advance our cause.

If you look at the previous comments in this thread you'll see people who spam every blog that mentions the race in any way with pro-Merkley platitudes and anti-Novick bile. I won't call anybody out by name here, but guys, you know who you are.

I know most of the people in this discussion have already read Steve's apology, and from what I can tell many of them are already partisans who have made up their minds in the primary. But for those of you who haven't, here's his post reproduced in full:

In the Willamette Week endorsement interview the other day, I gave a pretty dumb answer to a question about the impact of blogs on politics. Some folks online are blowing my comments up as a betrayal of the netroots, so I wanted to take a moment to apologize for my statement and clarify what I was trying to say.

We were asked: "The blogs ... do you think they've helped or hurt the Democratic nominee's chance to win in November?" Given the editor's additional comments, I took this to mean, "Has all the back-and-forth between the candidates' partisans on the blogs so far helped or hurt the cause?"

The truth is that blogs and the netroots are doing a lot to beat Gordon Smith and they are doing a lot to help my campaign. I was proud to attend the Yearly Kos conference last year and be recognized as a netroots candidate. I've blogged here on my site, on Daily Kos, Huffington Post and Loaded Orygun. And I'm incredibly thankful for all of the online support I've received and the value of the blogs in exposing just how out of step Gordon Smith's record is with the priorities of regular Oregonians.

My concern, which I agree came out very poorly, was whether the internal fights between like-minded progressives can distract us from the larger task of taking back our country. In my own primary, we've seen bloggers who are typically allies divided into increasingly personal and repetitive fights that I worry do little to help reach a broader audience or advance our cause. Of course, as I noted in my comments, this is (hopefully) really just a loss to those individuals, but I worry about the cost to personal relationships and uniting progressives in the general election. Kossacks have been having a similar discussion over the past month about the back and forth in the presidential race. And it was in that context that I thinking when I responded to the question. (I feel quite sure that's how Willamette Week intended the question, too.)

That being said, of course blogs and the netroots have been a huge boon to progressive activism. The ability to connect people across geographical distances, demand transparency in our government and media, bundle small contributors to give regular folks a fundraising voice in national politics - these are all transformative developments in politics today that have been made possible by the internet and online activists. I am sorry for my poorly chosen words caused this misunderstanding.

Thanks for listening.

Andrew Gorry
Online Director
Novick for Senate

Inconvenient truths (0.00 / 0)
One has to stretch far to be truly offended by Novick's comment (regardless how out of context it has been quoted).

"a way for a number of people to waste a vast quantity of time."

[x] True
[ ] False

Let that be another virtual vote for Novick. The man is a blogger for goodness sake. Until becoming a candidate, he was a guest columnist on BlueOregon.com. This blog is run by Merkley's media staffer, Kari Chisholm who pledged to keep his forum "neutral" (or something to that effect) despite his paid relationships. After failing miserably to do so, neither Novick nor his campaign manager comment there any more.

I see several other Merkley surrogates have already arrived. Bdupree, your co-blogger Michael works for Kari still, right? And Bdunn, you started your blog solely to promote Merkley, right? And isn't your blog co-creator a Merkley staffer? O, hi Kev from premptive karma. You're pretty tight with Merkley's netroots staffer, right? And was that you in the Merkley commercial?!

I'm a blogger, and decidedly pro-Novick. I'm also an activist which is one reason I can't support Merkley. There's a lot of flur flying now that Merkley is polling third. It's a shame he's using the old tried and true "So and so is too angry!" meme. Ever since Rove used it successfully on McCain, Dems have employed it on their own... Remember the Dean Scream?

Folks, don't find offense where none was intended. I find it remarkable that Novick reached out immediately. There are things Jeff Merkley (like Hillary Clinton) needs to apologize for, like his robo calls, his push poll, his misrepresentations with regard to his Iraq Invasion vote and his DC funded, old politics establishment attack campaign.

We're a tough and independent breed, Oregon bloggers. I for one prefer Left Look Lager to Republican Lite.

Come on (4.00 / 2)
I think it's really insincere to call Jeff Merkley Republican lite. I mean he's for marriage equality, presided over the greenest and most labor friendly House session in 30 years, opposed the Iraq War from the get go, has called for all American contractors to leave Iraq immediately, pushed through domestic partnerships legislation, pushed through payday lending regulation, is for UHC....is that what you consider Republican lite these days?

The truth is, in case anybody wants it, both Jeff Merkley and Steve Novick are progressive Democrats. Both candidates would in my book, be considered one of the most progressive Dems if elected to the Senate. I think they differ in political style, and have different and intriguing bios. I back Merkley because of what he's done in the Oregon legislature and I happen to believe he's the most electable candidate.  

Netroots Director for Oregon Senate Candidate Jeff Merkley

[ Parent ]
You are correct (0.00 / 0)
A gross hyperbole for the sake of an extended beer visual. I apologize. (And Sarah, let me compliment you on your role as "good cop" in the Merkley-Mandate echo chamber.)

Sarah, will you please do me a personal favor and ask ANYbody in the know in the Merkley campaign, "Where is this "anti-war" article you say you got published?"

Kewl. thx

[ Parent ]
merkley not for gay marriage (0.00 / 0)
In the same endorsement interview, Merkley gets caught trying to say yes, while being confronted with and agreeing that he believes marriage is between a couple and God, and that gov't civil marriage rights aren't really important to people.

Novick is endorsed by equalitygiving, dedicated to supporting those who are openly for same sex marriage. Steve couldn't be clearer on his webpage.  

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[ Parent ]
merkley not for gay marriage (0.00 / 0)
In the same endorsement interview, Merkley gets caught trying to say yes, while being confronted with and agreeing that he believes marriage is between a couple and God, and that gov't civil marriage rights aren't really important to people.

Novick is endorsed by equalitygiving, dedicated to supporting those who are openly for same sex marriage. Steve couldn't be clearer on his webpage.  

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[ Parent ]
Incomplete (4.00 / 1)
If you actually look at the video rather than relying on a summary by one of his opponents' supporters, the question posed to the candidates is not about bloggers in general, but whether bloggers had helped the Democratic primary candidate's chances.

The first part of Novick's response is that He had no idea whether that was true. He then said that they were a way to provide information to to some people which led directly into the line about them being a way for some people to waste a lot of time.

In other words, he didn't know whether the blogs -- of which the most prominent in Oregon is fairly pro-Merkley -- were going to do the Democratic primary candidate any good.

That's hardly a slam at blogs in general.

Those who have had a chance for four years and could not produce peace should not be given another chance. --Richard Nixon, 9 October 1968

Speaking of videos (0.00 / 0)
h/t to Chris for bringing me here and exposing me to the OpenLeft Video Wall. "Jon Conyers on Impeachment" will especially drive my activist friends berserk.

Darrel, your point is well taken. I've pretty much had my say here. If this is yet another election about the past, fear and the politics of wait, then I'll be disappointed (again) up and down the ticket.

[ Parent ]
Dissin' The Blogs | 26 comments





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