Politics and Blogging - Does it matter? | Tina

I'm sitting in my living room watching the results to the New Hampshire primary and earlier this evening it was projected pretty early on that John McCain would take the top spot among the Republicans. And Hillary Clinton just finished giving her speech as the winning Democrat. I have a love for politics and the history of it, although truthfully I don't know a ton about it. I do know however that running for political office these days must be drastically strategically different then even eight years ago. With MySpace, facebook, blogs and youtube, information and therefore opinions have a significantly different way of traveling these days. The scary part is sometimes you don't know when a candidate is actually behind a site or not. I've been asked by a few people myself about my personal myspace page. I don't have a myspace page. I'm not a myspacer. But somebody has created a page and pretends to be me. Why? I have no idea. I wonder how many fake sites have been created about some of the current political candidates. About a year ago I went to listen to John Edwards speak, he came to Seattle to chat with bloggers and ask questions about blogging for his campaign this year. I respected him for doing that. Here's the link if you're interested. Anyway, there actually is a point to the post. I'm just curious how you think blogging and the internet has changed the way we look at politics? And if there was one candidate you think would be playing Xbox live, which candidate and which game?

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Googleman81

Jan 12, 2008 at 7:54 AM quote reply

this is a bit of a side thing but if your interested in politics and dont know much about it but do want to know more i suggest you read the book called politics by aristotle or rethoric which is connected to politics as well... so much for that. i dont think many presidential candidates have actually time to keep up a serious blog though i havent checked and i would think hillary clinton is playing viva pinata with her daughter and barack obama probably plays halo 3 and mass effect...
Googleman81

Jan 12, 2008 at 7:54 AM quote reply

this is a bit of a side thing but if your interested in politics and dont know much about it but do want to know more i suggest you read the book called politics by aristotle or rethoric which is connected to politics as well... so much for that. i dont think many presidential candidates have actually time to keep up a serious blog though i havent checked and i would think hillary clinton is playing viva pinata with her daughter and barack obama probably plays halo 3 and mass effect...
tina10

Jan 13, 2008 at 9:58 PM quote reply

I agree with Hillary playing Viva Pinata. I wonder if Huckabee is down with Guitar Hero? Nah, I just don't see it.
cvconcrk

Jan 15, 2008 at 3:39 PM quote reply

I think the internet and blogging have caused politics to be more tangible to the average person. If you wanted to voice a strong political opinion 10+ years ago, you'd probably just share it verbally with your friends, family, and coworkers, more as just conversational material than trying to make a difference. You probably thought that the only real political impact you could make was through voting, and your voice would be one among ~100,000,000. Nowadays, you can post your opinion on a blog and easily have it read by hundreds or thousands of people. You're more likely to change a few minds with that route versus the verbal one described earlier. I think the increased potential to affect political outcomes (and the general ease of information sharing made available by the internet and blogging) leads to more educated voters who take an interest in politics.
I don't know about any particular candidate / video game combination, but I can imagine most Republican candidates enjoying a FPS every now and then. Not only because of their stereotypical affinity for guns, but also because FPSs are just downright fun. As far as political figures and FPSs go, you'd certainly have to watch out for Dick "Head Shot" Cheney (yeah, that joke would've been funnier two years ago).
Glad you're back, Tina.
cvconcrk

Jan 15, 2008 at 3:39 PM quote reply

I think the internet and blogging have caused politics to be more tangible to the average person. If you wanted to voice a strong political opinion 10+ years ago, you'd probably just share it verbally with your friends, family, and coworkers, more as just conversational material than trying to make a difference. You probably thought that the only real political impact you could make was through voting, and your voice would be one among ~100,000,000. Nowadays, you can post your opinion on a blog and easily have it read by hundreds or thousands of people. You're more likely to change a few minds with that route versus the verbal one described earlier. I think the increased potential to affect political outcomes (and the general ease of information sharing made available by the internet and blogging) leads to more educated voters who take an interest in politics.
I don't know about any particular candidate / video game combination, but I can imagine most Republican candidates enjoying a FPS every now and then. Not only because of their stereotypical affinity for guns, but also because FPSs are just downright fun. As far as political figures and FPSs go, you'd certainly have to watch out for Dick "Head Shot" Cheney (yeah, that joke would've been funnier two years ago).
Glad you're back, Tina.