That was the same kooky press secretary who called me up recently and asked me what kind of radio show I do and how she could listen to it and whether my newspaper column is exclusively political. I sort of figured this was one of their improv skits, so I went along as though these were perfectly reasonable questions to ask me. I then suggested that she could better understand one of my takes on Lieberman by reading a certain posting elsewhere in this blog, whereupon she told me she makes it a point never to read any blogs because they get things so wrong. I love this press secretary.
The mysterious and spooky campaign manager is very funny too. He has kind of exploded the old crypto-truckling stereotype of political operatives dealing with members of the press. Here is how he concluded an email to a local TV reporter: “If you distort the truth and report that we are running a negative campaign and Ned is not, I will not forget it.” Ooh! It’s only June, and they’re already propping up pony heads in our percale, those scamps!
Needless to say we're talking about the Lieberman campaign here. The cluelessness on display is almost charming, though it's also a bit creepy. Whatever value blogs add (or detract) from the world, much like talk radio they have have an influence and sizeable audience. How a political campaign thinks they can ignore such things, especially when their opponent's campaign has largely been driven by those blogs, is truly weird to me.
I don't think blogs are the most important thing in the world, but they are a "thing" that exists and it's frightening that people running campaigns just want to pretend they don't exist.