Allen Campaign Looking to Hire Conservative Blogger; Interviews in Martinsville?
By: Lowell
Published On: 8/22/2006 5:33:49 PM
I find this to be very amusing:
Burned by a blog-induced firestorm over an an off-hand comment at a campaign rally, Sen. George Allen's campaign wants to find and employ a conservative blog maven who can blunt future attacks and help rally conservatives in the state and elsewhere behind Allen's campaign.
The search is one of several steps Allen's brain trust will take in the next few weeks to retool his campaign. Several Republicans close to the campaign said Allen was deeply frustrated at what one Republican called "the inept response and lack of ability of his team to handle crisis management in an effective and professional manner."
Seems to me that Chris LaCivita and Company should be able to pick someone up at this weekend's blogger conference in Martinsville. On the other hand, maybe there's a deeper problem involving Allen's pathetic, negative campaign to date - "macaca" comments included - itself. According to the Hotline blog, "Virginia Republican bloggers have yet to rally behind Allen with the same intensity that the liberal Netroots has circled James Webb." In contrast, the enthusiasm for Jim Webb has been tremendous. Gee, I wonder why THAT is...
[UPDATE: Check this out.
Among the conservatives and liberals who author Web logs, traffic is more mixed, but the drops appear to be greater among the bigger red sites than among the blue sites.
RedState traffic is down 28 percent but page views are up 12 percent over the past three months. RedState underwent a redesign and management overhaul this summer. Right Wing News dropped 20 percent over the same time, Blogs for Bush was down 13 percent, and Townhall, which also was recently redesigned after an acquisition, dropped 14 percent.
By contrast to the big drops for RedState and Right Wing News, readership at the liberal Huffington Post is down 14 percent, and the drop is 12 percent at Daily Kos, the most trafficked blog. Some liberal bloggers even saw gains. Traffic at MyDD is up 9 percent, as is Alternet, and traffic to Virginia's Raising Kaine grew 119 percent over the past three months.
Comments
HA! (phriendlyjaime - 8/22/2006 5:34:44 PM)
Get out of my head, Lowell! ;)
(see my last comment)
I can only think of a few truly "Republican" bloggers (va.walter - 8/22/2006 5:41:50 PM)
in Virginia. To me, the problem isn't the failure of those bloggers to rally around Allen, it's the failure of those bloggers to exist in significant numbers. Sadly, and I mean this as no offense to you Lowell, we can't go after Wadhams and his crew for "hiring" bloggers since Webb has paid a few. That said, Webb's use of bloggers and alternative media has been the highlight of his campaign to date.
I'm not at all going after Allen for hiring bloggers (Lowell - 8/22/2006 5:43:58 PM)
I see nothing wrong with it whatsoever. I just think it's funny that Allen's camp is JUST realizing the importance of blogs, especially with Dick Wad(hams), who was masterful (albeit less than ethical) at this in South Dakota, on board. I also think it's funny that Allen has so few enthusiastic supporters among the conservative blogosphere...
His "supporters" (phriendlyjaime - 8/22/2006 5:49:26 PM)
are busy praising toasters, hating gays, wanting to decide what all women do with their bodies and ignoring them when they can't afford to do what the "we're always right" conservative crowd wants them to do and forces them to do, and protecting flags from the only real way to disp[ose of them.
Sounds like a real smart group of people. I can't wait to spell/grammar check their tripe.
Plus... (Nick Stump - 8/22/2006 7:21:34 PM)
...they have to know how to type.
I Nominate Guy Fired by the "Wash. Post" (bb10 - 8/22/2006 6:47:58 PM)
You know, Ben Domenech, cofounder of the right-wing RedState.org blog, who got fired in his first week as a conservative blogger at the "Post" when his earlier flagrant, multiple instances of plagiarism were uncovered.
If I remember correctly, he lived and attended school in Virginia (William & Mary?) for a while. Given his ethics, he'd fit right into the Allen campaign.
Send them over to Mason Conservative (Nick Stump - 8/22/2006 7:18:13 PM)
...I go over there and poke a little fun at that guy. He's harmless. Usually won't answer at all if you throw a logical point at him. But he does think anyone who's not on the neocon bandwagon is a traitor and I'm sure Allen people would admire that.
Aren't they getting into the blogging game a little late. Setting up a successful blog isn't likes rolling in a FEMA trailer. Don't you have to build an audience over time?
Why not a sandbox (Kathy Gerber - 8/22/2006 7:26:03 PM)
for I. Publius?
I.Pub gets my vote (Doug Garnett-Deakin - 8/22/2006 8:26:22 PM)
He's got the knee jerk anger we need on that side. Plus his mom keeps calling me and asking me to get him something to do. I've called all the recruiters, but he doesn't seem to be able to make it out of the house.
Besides, I lost all respect for Mason Conservative. Before macaca happened I bet him that Webb would pass Allen in the polls before oct. 1. The bet was all night drinking on the loser. He talked it up then backed out. Then the macaca hit the fan and we all know where it went from there. We can't have a blow hard that backs down that easily, plus I actually respect some of his posts.
Congrats! (Waldo Jaquith - 8/22/2006 8:26:33 PM)
I don't know what's better -- your climb in traffic or the fact that publications see fit to check y'all out as a bellwether.
In the past month and a half Raising Kaine's traffic has consistently exceeded mine. Alexa has long reported -- rightly or wrongly, I can't say -- that my blog has enjoyed the highest level of traffic among Virginia political blogs. I can't think of a better site to beat me up and take my lunch money. :)
Thanks Waldo. As far as I'm concerned, you're (Lowell - 8/22/2006 8:36:05 PM)
still the best writer in the Virginia blogosphere. Also, how accurate is Alexa? I usually rely on Sitemeter for "apples to apples" comparison of traffic stats...
Alexa - (Eric - 8/22/2006 9:21:46 PM)
I believe, someone correct me if I'm wrong here, that they get their data from people who have installed the Alexa toolbar. So, if Alexa installers are a reasonable representation of the internet then these relative rankings are fairly good.
And the top 10 sites in Alexa's list seem reasonable, so they may be good.
And related to your main post - RK (and Waldo, of course) is crushing GeorgeAllen.com in the three month average. Yet another reason that they're looking for a blogger of their own.
Maybe I'm slow on the subject... (SRS - 8/23/2006 12:27:36 AM)
... but if no one is blogging for Allen, how will it help to hire a blogger? Obviously no one is searching the web to support Allen or else someone would already have filled that niche. And if one does decide to search for Allen on the web solely based on the fact that Allen will now have a support blog, I'm guessing 9 times out of 10, the search will pull up progressive or pro-Webb blogs instead of the sole Allen blog. Unless someone is A) planning on some serious "google bombing" or B) highly promoting and publicizing said blog or C) just going to use said blog of smears, I'm missing the point. All 3 options reek of desperation to me.
Good questions! (Lowell - 8/23/2006 5:45:33 AM)
"Desperation" sounds possible to me.
Yes Indeed (Nick Stump - 8/23/2006 12:43:44 PM)
There's more to it than knowing how to get on the internet. Though Lowell is a one-man blogosphere--it still takes some readers. Allen's way too late to catch this train before November.
Oh!!! (The Ditzy Democrats - 8/23/2006 4:52:52 PM)
We'll do it! Please, Senator Allen? Please! Hire the Ditzy Dems! That's the most awesome job ever. You'd essentially be paid to make stuff up. That's a job you don't even have to be
sober for!
Oh, and congratulations, Lowell and the rest of the RK team. 119%, wow!