West Virginia Blue
The Best Blogging Community in West Virginia Democratic politics, progressive policies, the good life and free living in Wild, Wonderful West Virginia.
I'm sure Clem and Wabi will want to weigh in on this, but from my perch here it seemed as if they were treated very well by the West Virginia delegation, politicians, the DNC folks and the sponsors of The Big Tent.
How does the Republicans treat their version of the netroots? Not so well:
Here on what is passing for "Bloggers Row," there is plenty of grumbling about the accommodations supplied by our hosts. Some descriptives [sic] are not printable. Most reflect a huge disappointment with the way the GOP has shunted most of the bloggers off to the side, far from the action ... .
snip
The labyrinth one has to navigate to find the darn place would tax the abilities of a carrier pigeon. I honestly felt like leaving a trail of breadcrumbs when I went out for a quick smoke. Not that it would do any good. The food on our level is so bad that I have no doubt some ravenously hungry media type would have preferred the breadcrumbs to the greasy, tasteless crud they were serving at the kiosks. If I wanted the same stuff they serve at a hockey game, I would go to the Libertarian convention down the way.
snip
Bloggers could do just as well "covering" the convention by sitting in their hotel room. Or better yet, they could have saved a lot of money and stayed home and done as good a job.
I know from talking to Clem that he's got a lot more to post about from the convention, including his interview with Governor Joe Manchin on energy. The access and willingness to discuss issues with our WV Blue bloggers by the West Virginians was fantastic even with some of the politicians we've criticized most. That's to the credit of our party's leaders and to the DNC to take the risk and open itself up to such transparency from the bloggers. In the end, our bloggers were the eyes and ears for the people who couldn't be there, citizen journalists as some have described bloggers. Our WV delegation and our party treated our two bloggers with respect and courtesy.
The rightwing bloggers also represent their readers as ordinary citizens there to cover the RNC. We see how the GOP treats ordinary people, in their own words "shunted" off to the side and away from the action.
That's a very telling difference between the two parties and their leaders.
Copyright 2011 West Virginia Blue
Site content may be used for any purpose without explicit permission unless otherwise specified.
This site exists thanks to financial support from BlogPAC, dedicated volunteers and participation by members of this community. The views expressed at West Virginia Blue belong solely to their respective authors.
