It figures that an NRO flack would mention all Dem bloggers except McCain and Allen.  Just another case of whiny bitches who are pissed because they got their asses handed to them this election.  This election shows the reason why state houses are so important.

Are you serious?  Is this a confession of blatant wrongdoing or are you intentionally exaggerating what appears to be a serious transgression of blogging ethics?

Roberto in Utah

I knew it! You all fit into neat compartments... because you're all aspects of the same person!

So tell me, is it just a hidden agenda or do you have a multiple-personality disorder? Now that you've been unmasked I think we in the blogosphere deserve to know!

For what it's worth, the pro-Menendez "excerpt" that's offered up for me came from a diary -- not a front page story -- posted at MyDD, Daily Kos, and Blue Jersey titled, "Menendez For Senate - Kicking Off The Campaign."

It's pretty clear from both the title and the post itself that I was on payroll with the Menendez campaign. I haven't looked at all of the other examples, but I'd be willing to bet that it was pretty much the same story all around -- that full disclosure was offered.

What, I wonder, is Glover's point? That bloggers are "for sale"? As Steve Gilliard pointed out this morning, "not every blogger has the same rules." I consider myself an activist first and an ideologically-driven citizen journalist second. That's just how I've defined my role. It's something I think I've been pretty clear about. If I believe in a candidate, I'm willing to work for that candidate. If I don't, then I'd take a pass. At no point would I ever fail to disclose my work for that candidate.

Also, it's worth mentioning that at the Menendez campaign, I was paid to be the internet director. I did some blogging, but that wasn't the main thrust of my job. I was not paid the amount that he listed "to blog." A number of my jobs have involved management of intranet/internet sites. I know for a fact that that experience was just as much if not more of a factor in my hiring than my experience blogging.

I remember when I was young, getting really annoyed at the kids who would get A's on their tests without studying, or who would hit home-runs without spending hours at the batting cages. I can't help but sense some of that same irritation here on Glover's part. He seems to be frustrated that some of us have found a way to make a living out of our love of writing about politics without going through the traditional, established channels. I tend to think that's something to be proud of, not something we should have to apologize for.

It's a dead giveaway.

(Yup!  You're right!  So does 'Paul'!)

it would be good to have a conduit to and from candidates...kind of the gold standard having reps online.

I'd even be good if it was secret...what the heck. Having a campaign person actually debating the issues online is not the worst thing.

Just posting campaign press releases should get zapped by if a paid staffer wants to join the discussions, why not?

In disclosure mode, I got zapped on KOS over this very issue...pretty stupid since I use my real name and it's easy to check...but most online are anonymous which makes the demands for online "confessionals" a bit silly. How the heck would you know if someone who was paid wanted to post anonymously.

I fail to see the reasoning for this post at all. The logic and motivation are so opaque as to be complete cyphers. If it was meant to be satirical, it failed; if it was meant to be funny, it failed; if it was a true confession of egregious wrongdoing, well, it's just sad.

Jonathan, Chris, Matt, Jerome and Scott:

The more I think upon this sorry confession of yours, that your multiple blogging personae were really just you in spite of your previous post denying this very fact, and then you go sell yourself under different names to different campaigns, the more sordid and shameful it appears.  You claim you made full disclosure of your "work" with these campaigns.  This is on its face impossible, given that you deceived us, your readers, with your multiple names and personalities.  The deception is also on those who paid you, the campaigns as well as your blog advertisers.

Roberto in Utah

the two quotes glover pulled from staffers who actually worked full-time on the Lamont campaign came from AFTER the election.  Could it be that Sirota and I actually believed in who we were working for?

Tim

P.S. He got my $$$ amount wrong as well.

TakeBackTheHouse at SquareState.net discusses the Glover's op-ed about bloggers working on campaigns with a bit better clarity than you do. The whole thing is well-worth reading. Here are a couple of excerpts:

In a NYT Op-Ed piece, K. Daniel Glover, editor of National Journal's Technology Daily, did what he could to paint the netroots as just a collection of bought-and-paid-for shills. The gist of the piece is that the bloggers complain about the corruption of money on politics, but they are just as quick as anyone else to go to the well. They use my place on Bill Winter's staff as an attempt to prove this.

2) This story shows a basic misunderstanding of the internet. The print media thinks it is somehow like their top-down corporate world of editors, publishers, and high barriers to new voices.

That is why they need 'influential' bloggers who are tied to important sites. For instance they note that I write HeadingLeft, which is no doubt [snark]highly influential [/snark], but I doubt very many people have ever read it. I hardly update it at all. I am much better known for being a small part of much larger sites like SquareState.net and DailyKos. I am not a solo blogger leading a heard of followers. I am one of a community of writers who can each call bullshit on one another and has the same opportunity to have their voice heard.

It isn't a top down thing at all. It is a community group like any other, and if a candidate hires someone to advise them on Latino issues, or on GLBT issues, or on issues affecting the disabled, they do not have to find an 'influential' transvestite who wants to sell out and sway the opinions of lesser transvestites. They just find someone in that community who already supports them and that they trust, who will share with them some insight on the challenges and issues that are important to that constituency.

When politicians hire bloggers, they are not buying positive coverage from a seemingly unbiased source. Look at my writing about Bill Winter from before he and I had even met. I was a highly opinionated and partisan source, and made no secret of it. Bill didn't have to pay me if he wanted good coverage. He already had that from me, Johne, ColoradoLib, and everyone else on this side of the Tancredo Wall. Bill hired me to help him better hear our community, not to better speak to it. When running for office, he did not have time sift through all of the sites, figure out who was who in the rapidly changing land of screennames, and get to the conversations where he needed to participate. Nobody had to bribe me to think Tancredo sucks. Bill paid me to stay on top of the internet side of his campaign, watch the web for things of interest, and to help navigate him around the trolls.

The oddest thing about this story was how it implied that Larry Grant and Jerry Brady paid me to flack them on my own blog, Red State Rebels. In fact, I was paid $1300 a month to write the Grassroots for Grant blog from Nov 2005 through Nov. 2006. It was easily one of the busiest campaign blogs in the country; I did close to 500 posts in addition to outreach to the national netroots community. Of course, I kept a full disclosure post on Page 1 at Red State Rebels the entire year.

Alas, Larry asked me to mothball Grassroots for Grant the week after the election, which is probably why it didn't show up on the radar for this report. The blog is still available; it's just password protected. Anyone with a legitimate interest in seeing it can contact me for the log-in info.