Hillary Clinton’s “Government Blogging Team”
January 8, 2008 at 10:51 am
Yep. That’s right. Hillary Clinton now says she wants a “government blogging team.”
Here’s the Senator last night at a Manchester rally, an event carried lived on C-SPAN’s Campaign ‘08 coverage:
“We’re going to get the government into the 21st century to make it more cost effective. Nobody should have to see a government waste billions and billions of dollars, see these no bid contracts nobody can explain or hold accountable.
“I want to put everything on the Internet. I want you to see the budget of every agency. I want you to track everything that goes on in your government. You pay for it. You should know about it.
“We should even have a government blogging team where people in agencies are constantly telling all of you, the taxpayers, the citizens of America, everything that’s going on so that you have up to the minute information about what your government is doing so that you, too, can be informed and hold the government accountable.”
Initial reaction? Imagine all the Viagra, refinancing, and sexual enhancement spam that blog should attract.
But broader than that, we’re all for more blogging. And we’re all for more transparency in government. And there is precedent for federal government blogging. HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt runs one, for instance.
But White House-mandated blogging? Sounds a bit, well, icky. And making government cost effective and more accountable is one thing. Reducing the size of government is the real goal. Would President Hillary Clinton’s bloggers be allowed to suggest budget cuts? If so, we’ll consider embracing.
UPDATE: Hot Air, as always, has the video.
richarda said,
January 8, 2008 @ 11:03 am
MORE taxpayer-funded flacks spouting the ‘party line’ 24/7/365 about how wonderful the gov’t. is, and should get ‘bigger & better in every way’?!?!?!
A Concerned Citizen said,
January 8, 2008 @ 11:35 am
Joseph Gobbels would be proud…. a virtual propoganda machine.
Luckedout said,
January 8, 2008 @ 11:41 am
I’d love to see her put every agency’s budget on the internet. You’d see government spending drop steadily from the outrage that these agency’s receive millions of dollars, yet are inept and unable to keep up.
As for blogging, it sounds like a propaganda machine to me. “Hey guys, be sure to blog today about the wonderful job I’m doing today!” No thanks
DrSteve said,
January 8, 2008 @ 11:52 am
Hillary, go to Thomas and look up the Coburn-Obama bill (FFATA). You’ll note it became law, and the database is online.
And funny, for some reason I don’t associate her with transparency in government…
snaggletoothie said,
January 8, 2008 @ 12:26 pm
Both of my Senators (Feinstein and Boxer) maintain websites. I can go to these to get amazingly positive stories written about them and a shitload of photos of these narcissistic broads. They do not answer questions sent by email. They will send a reply but it never applies to the question I asked. So all of this internet jazz is just another ploy to keep me at arms length. Given Hillary’s unwillingness to talk to reporters or deal with nonplanted people, I imagine this blog stuff is just her plan to ignore the citizens wrapped up with something that we might even benefit from. But the beaurocrats aren’t going to become more open and there is nothing in Hillary’s history to indicate she even cares.
MMS said,
January 8, 2008 @ 1:24 pm
Hillary already has a “blogging team” just take a look at you tube, they post vile responses to anything that is not pro Hillary.
Hellibrarian said,
January 8, 2008 @ 6:46 pm
Yeah, right. What we would end up is more shut-in lunatics blah-blahing all day long with unsubstantiated allegations. I read our town’s online forum and 90 percent of it are local nutcases. Okay, so it’s entertaining to read sometimes but doesn’t serve much civic purpose.
Francis Rose said,
January 9, 2008 @ 10:23 am
There are already a number of Federal blogs out there:
http://www.usa.gov/Topics/Reference_Shelf/News/blog.shtml
Some are better than others.
Francis Rose
Federal News Radio
www.federalnewsradio.com