We're hitting the period where political bloggers, of all stripes, become giddy with the anticipation of making that one (1) election post that's going to catapult them to the National Stage. Back when I was poli-blogging on a State and local level I thought this was grand. It was only a matter of time before the cognoscenti stumbled across my words of wisdom and wondered how in the world they didn't have me on the payroll. I also knew bloggers a lot smarter than I who bemoaned the same thing. This despite throwing support behind candidates at a way earlier stage than most, being some of the smartest, inside-baseball strategists I've met, and genuinely having the energy and drive to make that kind of job work.
Now, it's election season again and I'm sure there's going to be an entire new wave of political types who see themselves as the next Matthew Yglesias (Hopefully, minus the skewed world-view and free of the ignorance of how things actually work) or Joshua Treviño minus all of the "Malaysia mess. After 10 (ish) years of blogging on various platforms I'm here to tell you that it's probably not going to happen. Yes, you can probably put out better copy than most members of Texas' Lock-step Political Media (TLSPM) and yes, your take might be refreshing and honest and yet, you might even have some brilliant ideas for your party of choice. But none of this is going to lead to a career in politics. The fact is today's politics is all about connections and money. Despite some politicians possibly showing up to an event, inviting you to lunch or granting you an interview you really have none of these. The reason for this is simple: A politician is not going to pay you for something you're already doing for free.
However, because I've hit the "giving" portion of my blogging career I offer up the following types of blog-posts you don't want to write if you want to get noticed.
Early voting recaps: It seems that these pop up on a dozen or so blogs every year during early voting season. I understand, you've found yourself on the e-mail blast list for the local voting authority and you feel the need to broadcast this information out to your reader(s). Don't. For one, it's not necessary and second, the local media has already done it in a format that will be read by a lot more people. Secondly, unless you are conducting exit polling raw voting numbers don't say much. Of course, you can take a look at the turnout by polling station and try and determine whether or not the higher locations are favorable for one candidate or another, but this would forget that a lot of people early vote near where they work, not near where they live. Blog posts providing arm-chair analysis of early voting results scream amateur hour. This leads me to post-type #2 to avoid....
Electoral predictions: I understand the temptation here. For a while I was the uncrowned King of predicting elections. I soon realized however that there's really no benefit to this. For one, you're not a pollster, you probably haven't seen too many polls, and even if you have, no one really cares the opinion of "who's going to win" coming from someone sitting behind a keyboard merrily typing away.
Posts criticizing the endorsements of local media: For one, it give it a credibility it doesn't deserve and two, it gives it credibility it doesn't deserve.
Any post from a local organization titled "suggested blog post topic": Just. Don't.
Endorsements: This one might seem a little weird because you're thinking "I'm a blogger, I'm supposed to endorse." I would argue no, you're not. If anything it's OK to write something about an endorsement (although, I'll argue that, especially at the local level, endorsements mean zilch) especially if it's one that the local media has ignored. But issuing your own endorsement, during the primary especially, is bound to cause you to lose access if you're wrong. If you're a good enough blogger, and ideologically sound, people will probably already know your leanings on any race, unless you vote straight-ticket and then it doesn't matter anyway. I will allow for an exemption if you're crossing party lines in the general. In that case it would be a good idea to have a laundry-list of reasons why you're crossing over and lay them out logically and without resulting to ad-hominem attacks.
Posts with extensive block-quoting, poorly attributed from a media source and no value-add: Now, granted, this has worked well for some bloggers and it will continue to work because a.) it's easy and b.) people like having the media filtered for them. That said, it's also lazy, very lazy. If you're going to utilize the blockquote (and I do) then use it sparingly and make sure you're adding something to the original story.
Breathless reactions to the scandal of the day: Here's a truism for local politics: Unless someone is caught kicking dogs and slapping babies, the local scandal du jour is probably not going to move the election needle much in either direction. For example: I live in Houston, and lately there's been a lot of noise over the tax history of Mayoral candidate Ben Hall. Many have declared that "his candidacy is over" on the heels of this news. They're wrong, his candidacy was over long ago. Don't get sucked into that twaddle, leave it to the local news media that are desperate for ratings and page hits.
So, after all of this I'm sure you're asking "Well then, what the hell should I blog about?" Good question.
Local races underneath the radar of the MSM: Have a local school-board election coming up? That's a great idea. A local bond election that's flying under the radar? Easy pickings. Good political blogging, especially at the local level, takes a large amount of work. If you want to be successful you need to block out some time and attend meetings of political groups, especially candidate forums. There's bound to be something there that you key on which everyone else misses. Even if you do replicate the writings of others, at least the perspective will be unique right? (This last bit is invalid if you're a party blogger. We all know you share the same brain)
Candidate Interviews: Again, there are many bloggers doing this but there's a wide, wide gap in the blogosphere for good quality and questions from a different perspective. Get some quality recording equipment and start contacting campaign managers. Explain to them what you want to do (they'll probably ask for questions or topics in advance, I leave that up to you) and then lose some lunch time talking to candidates in your area. Whatever you do, ask good questions and record the answers faithfully. There's no need to add ellipses or Ed. Notes explaining whether or not you agree/disagree with the candidates position. Again, if you're ideologically sound your audience will know where you stand. Above all, be fair.
If you get the cross-tabs of a poll, research it, and find an error, run with it: The assumption that pollsters are either infallible or unbiased is one of the great mistakes in modern politics. A blog is a good place to point this out. If you're not familiar with the dynamics of polling it might be good to make friends with someone who is and run it by them before you submit.
When I put the brakes on political blogging I had a chance to go back and read a lot of the posts that I made. Looking back the biggest regrets that I have are doing more of the former, and less of the latter. Had I a better understanding, back then, of what the local political blogosphere could have been I definitely would have done the latter almost exclusively. As the political blog becomes more and more politicized and less and less relevant to the world I think the few successful bloggers are going to be the ones that successfully carve out a niche. Whatever your niche is, do it well and keep it focused. And whether or not you allow comments, keep them tightly moderated and on point as well. It's only going to give you a better product in the long-run.
