VanWoerkom's Office Gets Framing Right, Blog Issue Wrong

                               

Last week during the whole Mike Bishop/blog/BFM kerfuffle, I fired off an angry email to my state senator, the "Honorable" Gerald Van Woerkom. In the email, I highlighted the fact that blogs are the true next wave of journalism, and that the Michigan Senate would be doing their employees a disservice by blocking access to blogs. Today I received back a hasty reply, obviously written by a staffer with too much to do and too little time on their hands.

Thank you for contacting our office with your concerns relating to employees accessing web blogs.  The Senator discourages the use of office computers for personal use.  This would include accessing political blogs both Republican and Democrat.  Again, thank you for contacting our office. Talk about missing the forest for the trees. Apparently the senator's office is concerned that their staff will spend their days goofing off reading Drudge, Instapundit and RedState, and completely misses the fact that at least in Michigan, the local blogosphere is where it's at. I also cringed laughed at their use of the substitution of "Democrat" for "Democratic." Clearly Rovian framing has filtered clear down to the state lege level. Clearly the old adage about BS flowing downhill holds true in the Republican party.