53 white male owned blogs; 1 female-owned blog; 1 Latino-owned blog.

Can anyone defend that result? It is not a defensible position. Therefore, the DNC needs to figure out a way to fix it before this thing continues to spiral out of control

I’ve seen articles on the lack of diversity in USA Today, Washington Post, Dallas News, Los Angeles Times and in most politically-oriented Black-owned blogs.

The fix seems simple. Add QUALIFIED Black and Latino bloggers to the current State Bloggers Corp. The 55-person limit is arbitrary. Increase the limie so that QUALIFIED bloggers of color can participate with all the rights and privileges given to the (virtually) white-only State Bloggers Corp announced by Mr. Dean earlier this month.

Simple fix…
Villager

As long-time progressive state bloggers, we have now witnessed many of our well-respected colleagues from crucial states be passed over. In many states, it appears that parochial politics and hurt egos played a role in these decisions. These concerns run counter to our shared goals of using programs like the state blogger pool to “tear down the walls” in Denver — and better connect the American people with the events on the ground.

The Democratic Party endangers its own long-term viability when it makes fealty a criterion for inclusion. Instead, the Party should act to ensure that it includes its ideological media allies, even if those allies are occasional tactical or strategic critics.

We, the undersigned, have been included in the state credentials pool, despite our own history of criticism of local Democratic actors. This speaks well to the character of our own local parties. But while our peers in other states are being excluded, we’d be remiss in staying silent.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/5/20/145149/953/610/519071

see how if one play to kiss ass, instead of self regulating, things will get dicey quickly? State bloggers really need to coordinate. Otherwise, state blog is nothing more than stenographer. Therefore, fighting all the usual blogging variables are necessary.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/5/20/124211/486/720/518961

So why would the DNC take a program that had gotten rave reviews, and then muck it up by 1) creating an unecessary controversy, and 2) appear so uninterested in quietly fixing things? The rumor is that state parties were given veto power, and the excluded blogs all have a history of criticizing and holding their state parties accountable. For example, here’s what Cotton Mouth heard:

We’ve been in contact with people who have told us that we were considered for the credential, but were vetoed by someone in Mississippi’s Democratic Party. We are attempting to find out who that person is and why they felt we should not represent Mississippi.

This is obviously bull, as is the lack of responsiveness and outright tone-deafness to this problem by Myers and company at the convention. They’ve let this become a public controversy when it could’ve easily been handled quietly, and things will escalate, as many of the credentialled state bloggers are closing ranks around the snubbed ones and are already pitching the story (successfully, as we’ll soon see) to the traditional media.

Completely unnecessary. Luckily, it’s not too late to fix things, and the DNC should do so immediately.

So how did the DNC choose to recognize the growth of local blogs “in line with Governor Dean’s 50-state strategy”? Mostly, they got it right. At least in 45 states. But they blew it big time in five others, dissing some of the best state bloggers in the country.

In New York, the excellent Albany Project was passed over for a site focused on NY City corruption founded by the Politico’s Ben Smith. Go to that site, and it’s nothing but press releases.

In New Jersey, the inimitable Blue Jersey got passed over for PolitickerNJ — a non-partisan, corporate owned site run by the guys who own the New York Observer. Somehow, I doubt that’s inline with the spirit of Dean’s 50-state strategy, online organizing, or being agents of change.

In Alabama, Left in Alabama was passed over, as was Cotton Mouth in Mississippi, passed over in favor of a site, Natchez Blog, devoted to Natchez MS, population 18,000 — a site, by the way, that didn’t have a single post or action alert on the MS-01 special election we won last week. Cotton Mouth was one of the best resources on that race (and the Senate race as well).

Finally, Michigan Liberal was given the big diss as well.

The DNC’s online guy at the convention, Aaron Myers (email: MyersA@demconvention.com) claims that it’s a big ado about nothing, that the snubbed blogs will be getting regular blog credentials when those are announced sometime this week.

But that’s not the point.

The state blogger corps were a special program and a particularly coveted one since it allows those bloggers to sit with their delegations on the convention floor. Regular bloggers can’t do that. They may “have access” to the state delegations, but they won’t be sitting with them.

The solution was easy — take the five blogs that were given their unwarranted access, and give them regular blog credentials just like most everyone else. Those are the same credentials sites like Daily Kos will have, so there’s nothing shameful about them.

Then they could give those five state blogger corps passes in MI, AL, MS, NY, and NJ to the blogs in those states that have are TRUE reflections of Dean’s 50-state strategy, those blogs that are organizing and building for a Democratic majority at the local level with little recognition virtually and no money. Those are the bloggers who are in the trenches helping make victories like MS-01 possible.

This fix could’ve been done quietly and without any public commotion, but Aaron Myers and whoever ultimately makes those decisions have decided to be obtuse about it. They’re pretend that there’s no difference between the regular credentials and the state blogger ones, a farcical position. If there was no difference between the two classes of credentials, then there wouldn’t be two classes of credentials.

Meaningfully play in 2010 and 2012 races will put any blogger in the map.

initial stat here:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/5/20/12501/2123/219/518461

I think that’s the issue here. Black bloggers who, we must assume, can afford a laptop and travel expenses to Denver cannot be classified the same as blacks who couldn’t eat at a lunch counter back in the day. When people go around tossing out “Jim Crow” so liberally, it automatically places everyone in defensive positions, regardless of the merits of the complaint/observation at hand. It can also diminish the reality that was Jim Crow.

That’s just my opinion. I know if I did that at my place, I’d have few readers willing to engage me on the difficult topic of race relations. But of course, those who go for the flamethrowing approach may not have any interest in dialogue, or are so frustrated with hitting the wall of white privilege (and the denial of it), that they don’t care how it comes across as long as the point is made. That’s why I chose to post Francis’s point as he framed it. It illustrates a frustration based in reality out there, as well a definite communication gap between parts of the blogosphere communities that has been difficult to bridge.

http://tucheandautomaton.blogspot.com/

if there is no aggregator , then create a giant “group blog” which is nothing more than traffic magnet to force google to uprank all your blog asset. (profile page, all blog you control using that particular account) It doesn’t matter what that blog is about: as long as a) updated often, b) not a spam blog c) lots of interesting blog attached to it.

If there are 3 or 4 big blog connected to that “group blog” the entire group will receive a good lift, if not only at your profile page. Then use that profile page to lock several keywords and link up to your important blog asset.

another obvious often neglected is : register to all search engines and feed. Use category and tag, this one matters for technorati.

I have found that in Alaska that I’ve not been able to find ANYONE who is willing to make the committment to contribute to my blog. I especially want someone from the Alaska Native community to blog more authoritatively on Native issues. Generally, that person needs to have the type of career (or lack of career) that allows for that kind of time and so far I’ve not been successful. I’m hoping that the increased exposure as part of the Blog Corps will help bring someone who is interested to me.

While it’s obvious that the tone used by certain members of the AfroSpear has rubbed me the wrong way, I can see the benefit of raising this issue in the first place. Hopefully, it will encourage other minority bloggers to start their own state-focused blogs, shift the focus from an already-established blog towards state issues or sign on as contributors to some of the large state-oriented blogs. My opinion: we have a plethora of truly excellent blogs that effectively cover national issues and/or are specific-issue-oriented. How POCs are going to make a difference is state-to-state…Barack Obama has proven that Howard Dean’s philosophy works. I believe that is the point of the State Blogger Corps and I hope that is the message that people take away from all of this.

I certainly hope they keep this in mind, though, when they give out the other blogger credentials.

I’ve reconciled it - I am indeed on the mailing list, as you said, but missing from the official blogroll, that was remedied last night. I have the updated blogroll on my front page now (in widget form).