Joining the Political Process – Election, 2004

2004-09-17T15:57:00.000-07:00

How could I be inspired to maintain an interest in the national Presidential election that will last me through the political season? The television advertisements, newspaper articles, and online sites related to the upcoming election have been engulfing us for months on end. After a while I began to feel almost immune to them, like I had built up some kind of resistance to them.
Then came the “create a blog of your own” assignment. I was inspired to choose this topic from a CNN feature segment on political season bloggers. One notable fact was that, for the first time, bloggers were given press credentials for the 2004 national political party conventions.

Personally, I am interested in how the official blogs of Bush and Kerry are organized, utilized, and received by readers. Working in the area of public relations, I am curious to see the impact of the official blogs on this election. Will the general public rely on them for information and access the blogs throughout the election season? Which blogs the mainstream media accept as legitimate sources of information?

Key words that I hope will prove helpful in my research include George W. Bush, John Kerry, Republican Party, Democratic Party, presidential election, and political bloggers.

Online resources I anticipate serving as useful during the election season are:

Title: Opinion Journal from The Wall Street Journal Editorial Page
Web address: http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/
Brief description: James Taranto writes about national and political issues. There are other links to his writings on topics including presidential leadership and conservatism.

Title: Bush Cheney ’04 Official Campaign Blog
Web address: http://www.georgewbush.com/blog/
Brief description: The site features commentary on topics of interest in the presidential campaign from the Republican point of view as well as featured posts by key members of the Bush family, ways to join the campaign, and archives.

Title: The Official Kerry-Edwards Blog
Web address: http://blog.johnkerry.com/
Brief description: The site contains commentary on topics of interest in the presidential campaign from the Democratic perspective. There are also media, volunteerism, and where presidential candidate Kerry stands on key issues as well as blog archives.
Brief description:

Title: Election Watch 2004
Web address: http://politics.technorati.com/posts/index.html?c=r
Brief description: Individuals can post their opinions of themes related to the upcoming presidential election. The site is divided into four categories – all, liberal, uncategorized, and conservative.

Title: America Votes 2004 Blogosphere
Web address: http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2004/special/inthefield/blog/
Brief description: The site has blog links to the recent national political conventions as well as a section entitled “Political Must-Reads”. The site contains useful background information regarding the concept of bloggers being a part of these conventions.