Friday, June 17, 2005

Open Forum

Anything interesting happening?

16 comments:

Aldon Hynes said...

As I noted in my comment to the prevkous blog entry, I am down at . There are about five other people from Connecticut down at DemFest. One is Sal Liccione from Westport. He was quoted in Austin American-Statesman:


"They think we're the outcasts of the party," is how Sal Liccione, a Democratic political operative from Westport, Conn., summed up the relationship between progressives and the party old guard in his state.
Meshing the viewpoints is one of the challenges Democrats face in coming years.
"We're regrouping," Liccione said.

I'm not sure I agree completely with Sal on this. I think Progressives are doing extremely well in much of Connecticut. However, it is great to be down in Texas with lots of progressives from around the country.

Anonymous said...

State Sen. Chris Murphy will his discuss his candidacy for Congress in the 5th District on Face the State this morning at 11 on Channel 3. This and other "talking heads" shows are often rebroadcast later in the day on the CT Network.

Anonymous said...

Just noticed that Face the State will be broadcast at 8:01 pm Sunday on the CT Network (followed by CT Newsmakers and Beyond the Headlines). If you don't get CT-N, you can watch it online.

Anonymous said...

There are some comments on DeStefano's blog that they've registered "talkct.com", the day after Dan Malloy's campaign named their new blog that.

I have to agree with the posters over there... if DeStefano and his staff were really all for an open discourse, they wouldn't resort to little tricks like this.

Anonymous said...

stealing the domain name seems like more of an example of an overzealous staffer being cute than anything else. It is a pretty petty and silly thing to do.

Anonymous said...

Dear Ebpie: Maybe you’d like the Destefano campaign to put Malloy’s name on all their promotional materials, since it's not really fair to give one-sided campaign buttons, lawn signs, etc? While they’re at it, I guess they could add a disclaimer to all their campaign ads, reminding people that Malloy is running too? Heck, the Destefano campaign might as well just give Malloy half its campaign funds in the name of open dialogue!

Anonymous said...

tjj123,

I don't think it's an issue of "fairness". As was said on the DeStefano site, blogs are about discourse, and their campaign has repeatedly stressed that they are all about growing and expanding that discourse. I think some people feel that if DeStefano was truly for open dialogue, he would invite a discussion from all candidates instead of trying to silence them, because he would be confident enough in his own message. If his staff really believed that what the state needs is better ideas and dialogue, then they wouldn't be trying to limit the discussion like that.

In the end, this isn't a big deal whatsoever. As someone said on here, it was probably just a staffer. And, of course, Malloy's campaign should have registered the site themselves.

Anonymous said...

CT-Guy: Sure, I certainly understand your point. However, imho, political blogs are more about discourse between the electorate and the candidate, not the candidates themselves.

Anyway, that aside - Let's go with the 'staffer' hypothesis. Regardless of it being petty or not, one thing is for sure: Malloy's campaign really blew it on this one. For a slightly more exciting analysis, I found LonelylibertarianinCT's post on the Destefano blog.

--TJ

Anonymous said...

the malloy people have truely done a good job spinning this. they fumble the handoff and make destefano's (or his staff's) hustle play a rallying point for his campaign.

but lets be realistic, it only is an issue for people who have already taken sides.

if kerry had registered www.georgewbush.com then democrats would have loved it and republicans hated it. the same thing is true here, if you like destefano you think this is a smart move with some clear signs of who has there act together. if you like malloy you see it as an overly aggressive move.

i don't see how you can argue that it reduces discussion...malloy still has a blog - and if you want to comment you're still directed to a blog.

so if you're a destefano fan, i say good job to your boy, he showed his team is clearly the most organized.

if you're a malloy fan, i say, gee destefano how could you be so mean to legally purchase an internet site that your opponent (who you are trying to beat) was going to use (to try to beat you).

bad destefano!

Anonymous said...

I would like to take a moment to discuss why the earlier comment by "Ed" is just completely and totally wrong.

1) Bysiewicz has gotten the most campaign money from contractors of the three candidates, not DeStefano
2)He did not register talkCT as his own blog. Instead, Dan Malloy's staff failed to register the domain name for a blog they advertised for ages before it was ever up. Once it was finally up, the DeStefano people realized that it had not been registered, and took advantage of the situation. I mean, come on, if you can't even handle registering a domain name for your own blog, how do you expect to run the state? The bottom line? The Malloy people screwed up: big time. Now they are going around to various blogs, including DeStefano's, and whining about it. As a side note, I give ALOT of credit to the DeStefano people for "walking the walk" by not taking down or deleting the angry posts left there by the Malloy people. Bravo for following through with your pledge for open discourse on your campaign blog.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous makes a good point. That georgewbush.com analogy is pretty on point. If you forget to do something and another rival campaign picks up on it and makes you pay for your mistake, it's nobody's fault but yours. Somebody messed up big, and that person should stop whining on this blog and DeStefano's blog because nobody likes a sore loser.

Aldon Hynes said...

I'm off in Texas so I haven't had a chance to weigh in on the big issue of EchoDitto, our hosting company, going out and registering talkct.com to point the DeStefano blog. However, I would like to make a few comments.

Not only does it not prevent people from seeing Malloy's blog, you never could see Malloy's blog by using www.talkct.com.

Until EchoDitto registered the domain, using www.talkct.com wouldn't take you anywhere.

Now, it takes you somewhere. It takes you into the discussion about the Gubernatorial candidates.

Yes, the Malloy campaign might have been interested in expanding the discussion by registering the domain, but personally I don't think it is a good thing for active candidates to sit by waiting for other candidates to start expanding the conversation.

We're not sitting by waiting for Blumenthal or Sullivan and we're not sitting by waiting for Malloy.

I welcome the Malloy blog. I think it has expanded the discussion and even the act by EchoDitto has livened up the discussion.

Genghis Conn said...

Aldon,

Hang on a minute, I need to make sure I understand your statement. You seem to be implying your hosting company registered that domain on its own... is that true? If so, why do you let your host register domains without your say-so? And why did it happen only a day or so after TalkCT went live?

I hate to keep this going, since it's not a huge issue and probably won't matter in the long run, but I'm a bit confused.

Anonymous said...

And it is the policy of the DeStefano campaign to prevent others from "expanding the conversation," while pretending to welcome it. Sshh!

Aldon Hynes said...

genghis

As you will note in my previous comments, I am down in Texas. I am flying back today. All I know is from checking the WHOIS records that the domain was registered by one of the folks from EchoDitto, our hosting and internet strategy firm. Personally, I think they did the right thing.

For those who don't understand the internet anyone can register any domain that isn't already registered and point it anywhere they want.

One of the best examples is when Cheney misspoke about factcheck.org calling it factcheck.com Factcheck.com is owned by a domain parking company. When they heard about the mistake they pointed all traffic for factcheck.com to George Soros' website without anyone in Soros' organization knowing about it.

So, yes, the way the internet works is anyone can register any domain and we cannot stop them. I don't know who decided to register talkct.com or when they made the decision, but in this case, I applaud the efforts of EchoDitto.

As to the anonymous poster, whom I assume must be the Malloy staffer who failed to make sure that their web launch was successful attempting a poorly set up whisper campaign, yes, the DeStefano campaign is expanding the dialog at the expense of campaigns that don't seem to be able to do it effectively. Don't blame us for your failures.

Anonymous said...

I am not familiar with the article you are referencing, ebpie, but all the other sources show Bysiewicz in the lead for the number of contractors solicited.