Split brain

How do you know if you're a moderate? When stuff like this happens:

Right now the site is getting a stream of (presumably) conservative/Republican readers, thanks to a link from Hugh Hewitt to the post on health insurance and Mitt Romney.

At the same time, another stream of visitors is coming in from the Daou Report, to read why we have no reason to trust the GOP on ethics or budgetary matters.

It's good to be in the middle.

politics, midtopia

Tell me about yourself

The site had its 1,000th visitor last night -- not bad for a blog that launched just over a month ago. Thanks to the various sites that have linked here, and thanks especially to all the readers who chose to make Midtopia part of their day.

I get very curious, though, about who those readers are, since so few of you leave comments. So I'd like to invite all of you to add a short comment to this post telling me a little about yourself. It'll help me get a mental image of just whom I'm writing for.

Feel free to chime in on any other post, too, of course, or continue reading without commenting. And as always, if there are things you'd like to see added, removed or changed on the site, e-mail me. I hope for this to become an interactive blog that readers have a stake in. I can't do that without your comments.

Hands off the blogs

The Federal Election Commission yesterday decided to regulate online political advertising, but not the content of political blogs like this one.

The decision means that bloggers and online publications will not be covered by provisions of the new election law. Internet bloggers and individuals will therefore be able to use the Internet to attack or support federal candidates without running afoul of campaign spending limits.

Unsurprisingly, this was one of those rare issues that united bloggers of all stripes in opposition to any regulation of blogs.

But I don't see how the FEC could have ruled any other way. How does one measure the worth of a blog entry? Not by the money spent to post it; most bloggers work for free. Readership would have to play a part, as well as value judgements about what constitutes support for a given candidate. With millions of blogs that at least occasionally discuss politics, It would have been a nightmare.

Never mind how such a rule would deal with online discussion forums.

if bloggers are paid to support a particular candidate, as happened in South Dakota in the last election, those payments should show up in campaign reports, and the bloggers should have to disclose the payments. But absent such direct involvement, the only real option is to leave the blogosphere alone.

FEC, campaign finance, politics, midtopia