One of the continuing universal themes I'm continually hearing as the November Ogden City Council election approaches, is how government officials are perceived as isolated, and unreceptive to the ideas of the citizens by whom they're elected. This is a topic that comes up repeatedly, not only in blogs like Weber County Forum, but all over town, in the non-cyber world as well.
Another recurring theme centers around the emergence of "people power" in the political arena. With the emergence of the internet as a powerful new medium for the exchange of ideas, politically-oriented blogs have become a major force in politics, as further set forth their own here and here.
The above two separate ideas have come into conjunction, it appears, as political candidates are themselves now entering the internet fray, and setting up blogs of their own.
Tuesday's Standard-Examiner published a story on Tuesday, announcing that a seemingly formidable Utah challenger has thrown his hat into the ring in the 2006 U.S. Senate race for Senator Hatch's seat. Republican challenger Steve Urquhart is a blogger, the Std-Ex's Jordan Muhlestein reports. This came as no surprise to our gentle readers, as Utah State House Representative Urquart's candidacy and his blog was mentioned in an earlier article here, and his blog has been linked in the Weber County Forum sidebar since late in July.
Out of curiosity, I set about "googling," to find out whether the incumbent Senator-for-Life Hatch may have joined the blog revolution; and this is what I found. Yes! Orrin Hatch is now a blogger, too!
I'll make no further comment on this, except to invite our gentle readers to visit each of these blogs, and decide for yourselves which of these U.S. Senate contenders is actually using his blog to promote two-way conversation, and which one seems to exist in isolation in some elitist ivory tower.
Just because I've refrained for once from offering my own analysis, it doesn't mean our gentle readers have to keep mum about this.
Comments, anyone?
Thursday, September 08, 2005
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