Should Blue Mass. Group endorse a candidate in the Democratic primaries for Governor, Lt. Governor, Secretary of State, and/or contested legislative races? If so, how should we arrive at the decision on who to endorse – questionnaire, another phone interview, do we know enough already? What role, if any, should the “BMG community” (as distinct from its three editors) play in that decision? And who should the winners be?
Relatedly, if we endorse a candidate, does the role of the site change, and how? Would we/should we morph from our current “op-ed page/discussion board/gathering place” sort of character into more of an activist place that tries to encourage donations of money and time to particular candidates? Or should we stay out of that game and just “endorse” like a newspaper does?
We have our own ideas on all of these questions, but we want to hear from you before we move forward. So fire away!
I think it would be more fun if you guys just announced in the fashion of a newspaper editorial board. Pick a date in the future, build a little suspense, and then unload. Then wait for the sparks to fly. That’s just me, though, as I’m a little more hard-edged, less kumbaya than many liberals. I’ve a certain appreciation for the value of provocative bold action as that’s what stirs the pot and gets people fired up–on both sides.
site remain a place where we can openly support or bash any Dem candidate.
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Naturally once the primary is over, we should support the democratic candidate and do what we can to that aim…
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M.
even if we were to endorse a candidate in the Dem primary, we certainly hope that those who disagree with our choice would continue to voice their views as loudly and proudly as they do now. We also would continue to speak our minds as freely as we do now – meaning that if “our” candidate did something we thought was dumb, we’d call him or her on it.
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In short: absolutely, this site will remain a place “where we can openly support or bash any Dem candidate.” We don’t want to lose that.
Everyone is fully entitled to bash away right up to September 20th — in the spirit of civility and raillery, natch.
Or, heck, bring on the raillery too.
“First you fall in love…
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…then you fall in line.”
You guys do a great job of running an open, fair forum. You each have your own views, which you share, but you don’t systematically favor postings for one or another Democratic candidate. (If you are putting your hand on the scale you’re hiding it well.) There are probably more Patrick supporters here than Reilly or Gabrieli, but that’s the internet political market talking, not you.
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I know you just endorsed Lamont in the CT Senate race, but that’s CT. If you start endorsing in MA primaries, I think the site will lose something special: the sense that it’s a place where everyone can come and give her own spin to a topic or candidate, but where BMG as an institution is neutral.
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If you open up “the voting” to those of us who post, watch the campaigns start registering everyone and his uncle so they can be counted in the “straw poll.” There goes the neighborhood!!
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In a world full of “fair and balanced” media outlets, I really value what you’ve created and maintained. Here’s a vote that you keep it.
I agree. Endorsing Lamont in CT, or Cardin in MD or what have you is fine, but many of us here work hard on these campaigns.
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We have enough attacks from supporters of a candidate on supporters of opponents, and “endorsing” would just make it worse.
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And yes, part of this is because I support Reilly, and the lion’s share of the people on this site clearly back Deval. But this site is close enough to a Deval shrine already, an official endorsement would seal the deal.
As a site. Each of you could endorse individually (as Bob has done with Silbert).
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Also, as the member who may have been the first to make an explicit fundraising user post a couple of days ago, I suppose I’d be interested in somehow working financial donations to candidates into this site somehow. I realize there are FEC implications to this (I have no idea if there are OCPF implications, but I would think there’s not enough $$ coming from MA blogs for it to be an issue), but it could be something interesting to explore given how important money is in campaigns today.
Shouldn’t this thread be entitled “Endorsement of Deval Patrick?” After all, isn’t this blog controlled by Deval guys? I think the troika has clearly enunciated its support of his heroic and historic quest. I am no gourmand but this blog has a decidedly strong Deval Patrick flavor. I am also no oenophile but I detect subtle hints of Jarrod Barrios on this site as well.
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Come on guys!! Why the ruse? Why the sham? We all know its coming. Just come out of the closet and endorse Deval.
since I was pretty clear on who I thought should be Middlesex DA when it was still a race.
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As for this blog being “controlled by Deval guys,” can you provide a link to where we have “clearly enunciated” our support for his candidacy over Gabrieli and Reilly?
Listen David, my mother tells me that I have a perfect little nose. Are you implying that she is wrong? Are you saying that you are going to work on my nose (a punch may do it good) or that it is just ugly?
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I think my nose works fine. I have seen how the Gabrielli guy from Haverhill has been treated by you. You guys feign fairness but, when all is said and done, you clearly love the cut of Deval’s jib over the other candidates. Why not just admit it? No more coyness!!!
jdhaverhill’s post have all been gabrieli press releases, tv ads, or unsubstantiated cheerleading. he posts the exact some content verbatim on various blogs, including posting the same thing here repeatedly.
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there are many gabrieli supporters who are treated fairly and contribute greatly to the discussion here.
the reference was to your “oenophile” comment. I’m suggesting that it’s picking up flavors that aren’t there.
For the most part, their coverage of the race has been very good. Quite honestly, the ONLY reasons why I’d guess a majority of the 3 “owners” of this website would go with Deval is because A) the poll resulted in 27 Deval votes, 1 Tom, 1 Chris and 2 Healeys — most of the registered users support Deval, but not necessarily a supermajority (as there was a majority of “no endorsement” voters in the straw poll) and B) because right now a small plurality of Massachusetts Democratic voters supports Deval and if I had to guess what candidate would get the majority of three informed voters’ support – it would be Deval.
60% want the site to remain neutral and there are a bunch of Deval fans who hang out here đŸ™‚
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As I indicated above. This site should stay neutral through the primaries. It just seems right.
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Things will really start to get interesting after the primary and I think we can be a great resource for the independent voter of MA when they need to decide between Healey and the Dem Candidate.
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BTW, I’m glad to see that our three gov candidates are not getting bloody. I think we should stay blood-less too.
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Mark
[Yeah, I know, big surprise!]
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That said, I respect the views expressed that such an endorsement might stifle discussion to some extent because this would then become perceived as a blog of Deval Patrick groupies (as if that weren’t evident already!).
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Okay. Maybe.
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An endorsement is hardly “getting bloody” — I adamantly oppose going negative, but coming out FOR one candidate is hardly negative!
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I disagree that things “will really start to get interesting after the primary…” — maybe you haven’t noticed, but the mood of the country doesn’t exactly favor those of the Repuglican flavor, such as Joe Loserman in CT.
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My feeling is that our next Governor will be selected on September 19.
I like this site because everyone can feel comfortable here, whether they support Patrick, Reilly, or Gabrieli. Endorsing in this primary (or, for that matter, in the Lt Governor’s race) would put supporters of the non-endorsed candidates on the defensive. Don’t do it.
though individual endorsements by Our Leaders would be welcome.
and everyone’s able to share whatever they think about any candidate up to and past the regular elections–as long as the site is around. why would anyone suggest that critical discourse needs to stop for any reason?
I don’t know what sort of goals you guys have for this site, but my opinion is that if you intend to bring more people in, then you should stay neutral.
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Maybe in 2010 when BMG gets more hits than boston.com, you can endorse in the primary (of course, there will be a Dem incumbent in 2010, so there may not even be one).
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That said, I think you should encourage activism. Without activism, we’re just sitting in the dark typing away into the ether.
In the poll posted on top, I did indeed vote for Deval Patrick the same as I am planning to do on two upcoming state ballots–however, I only did so here because I wanted to make sure that, if in fact the majority call was for open endorsement, I did my part to support the best candidate.
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Overall, though, I agree with what’s becoming the consensus in that the founders of this blog should not endorse any candidate until after the primary. Although from that poll its clear who most active bloggers here support, making an official endorsement would create an environment of presumed antagonism and defensiveness for all those personally supporting other candidates.
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Although I’m relatively new to posting, I’ve been reading a while and think the way BMG has developed so far–promoting a wide, unhindered scope of Democratic discourse–is good and in need of no dramatic change.
You really need to make an extra effort to make sure the coverage isn’t even anything remotely being close to biased and/or prejudiced.
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If you endorse, you’re going to get some ire and anger directed at you by a lot of people. However, it’s not my website… so I can’t tell you what to do.
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However, when it comes to my website, I only endorse candidates who I can vote for. Seeing as how you’re all residents of Massachusetts, you’d fit that description. LOL.
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That said, as long as you endorse Deval Patrick, I’m happy =p In fact, I dare say, that’d actually make a little news splash of mini proportions.
entertainment value the 100’s of comments, complaints and whining your endorsement would create here.
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Seriously, I think you should. I and I think a lot of people are genuinely interested and respect your collective opinion.
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How about a poll predicting your endorsement choice?
First of all I would like to thank the three administrators for taking the chance to ask us ahead of time and I think my previous critcisms regarding the Lamont endorsement have been addressed. That said I think that that endorsements should be made like a newspapers and that the endorsement should only reflect the opinions of the three admins and a majority of the BMG subscribers. I do NOT think this site should be used for fundraising since that is what corrupted Kos and MyDD when the admins used the fundraising to create for themselves prominence in the party at the expense of open debate. I think fundraising would turn off a lot of people whos candidates were not endorsed and erode free discussion.
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I think people should also be able to use this as a tool for activism but the site should not directly coordinate those activities with campaigns.
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As for how to endorse the admins should have questionaires, and interviews with all the candidates, publish them, open up polls for subscribers to vote for which candidates they want to endorse, and then use those polls to influence the final decision which should be made by the three admins.
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I used to think that the final decision should be made democratically but I cannot envision a system that could not be corrupted by trolling or campaign workers creating temporary accounts, so I think that the polls should be taken as guidance for the final say and not the final say itself.
My understanding is that Markos of DailyKos wants to win elections. That is his openly stated goal. And therefore, promoting open discussion in a vacuum from all other influences is not his goal; or at least, desires for said pure discusssion lose out when in direct conflict with the Prime Directive. So, I wouldn’t call dKos “corrupted” by fundraising by any stretch; I would simply call it a blog with a different set of priorities, which as a result takes on a different direction and tone than BMG.
Sorry, I don’t get to this site much on the weekends, so I missed all the discussion… but my two cents:
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As I’ve said before, it depends on what we mean when we say “BMG”. There’s a couple of different definitions that could be used, and they become particularly important when talking about the possibility of endorsements.
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First of all, you could define BMG as “Bob, Charlie and David” (BCD). In which case, the three of them should just endorse as they see fit, and the rest of us can do so on our own blogs as Charlie has suggested. This is fair, though I’ll admit to being disappointed if BCD want to ignore the community aspects of this site when it comes to such matters.
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Otherwise, you can open it up with polls like this one and call it an endorsement if somebody gets, say, 2/3 of the vote. (I don’t think simple majority should cut it — an endorsement should mean something at least.)
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Obviously, as David pointed out, there are freeping issues to be dealt with, which can be dealt with by restricting the poll to some subset of users. For example, those who have been around for a while, or a handpicked cadre of active site members, or… well, you get the idea.
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The question comes down to: Who or what is BMG?