Saturday, June 7, 2008

Saturday Progressive Blog Roundup - 06/07/08

Sean Parnell will be gaining far more scrutiny by progressive Alaska blogs, after the Club for Growth endorsed him. Erika Bolstad put their announcement up on the Anchorage Daily News political blog, which got comments, mostly from fans of either Parnell or Don Young. Sean Cockerham followed up at the ADN poliblog two hours later, with Young's response, in which Don seemed to be characterizing the Club for Growth as something just to the center of the Sierra Club.

Brendan Joel Kelley's second profile in his series at the Anchorage Press, on major candidates running for a spot on our state's D.C. delegation, was on U.S. Senate candidate, Democrat Ray Metcalfe. Steve, at What Do I Know?, critiqued both the article and Ray's accusations directed against Metcalfe's opponent in the primary, Anchorage Mayor, Mark Begich. Steve's article is perhaps the longest, most considered yet on not just Ray and Ray's quest, but on a number of interconnected issues that are emerging as this election and its coverage heats up.

And Steve topped his respectful critique of Kelley's press story with a more scathing look at some radio reporting on the cost of the 1-Halibut limit to Southeast Alaska businesses this season. The first real post at Progressive Alaska was a tribute to Steve and his brilliant work, and for those of you who get in his headlights, don't worry, he's there to help you do a better job.

Steve has commented on how, as we build a blogging community in Alaska, the conversations that develop in comment strings can be more important, more informative than the original posts themselves. Steve, like Celtic Diva, often takes an important comment to an essay at his blog and turns it into the next, or a later essay.

And Celtic Diva, in her great post about aspects of her ongoing dialogue with other bloggers who will be attending the Democratic Party National Convention in Denver, showed how to build the next theme around information one can get from a blog comment, an e-mail in response to a blog, or from feedback from a newspaper op-ed about what one learns blogging, when she used an e-mail she received from her recent ADN op-ed as a building block for a deeper, yet more lofty theme.

Sorry - again, not enough time to cover all the wonderful stuff being written by Alaska's progressive bloggers this past week. We covered the road between Grants Pass and Klamath Falls today, with a long stopover at Crater Lake.
Crater Lake image by Judy Youngquist

3 comments:

Steve said...

Phil, I'm not sure what spell you're under that you continue to treat my posts with such kindness. Even this week where I have some major egg on my face for misunderstanding what was said in original broadcast that led to the Halibut post.

The whole point of the post was negated by my mishearing what was said. Only when MPB of Grassroots Science suggested the accurate interpretation, did I see the error. I decided to leave it up with a correction rather than hide my screw up.

Anyway, thanks and glad you and Judy are enjoying the trip. Love the picture of Crater Lake.

Philip Munger said...

Steve,

A part of why you and I are here is so that younger writers can observe that everyone gets egg on their faces occasionally, and that bloggers tend to be able to react more quickly, more honestly, more openly in dealing with it.

CelticDiva said...

Speaking of kindness...thanks Phil for your nice review of my posts!

And Steve, I agree with Phil. We all make mistakes and it's nice when folks admit it and don't hide it!