2006 Blog Review

After finishing our study of campaign websites, we took the time to check out the Senate candidates’ blogs.  Here is a review of some of the best and worst campaign blogs for 2006.

Rick Santorum’s (R-PA) blog, “Running with Rick”, was the most complete of the three incumbent blogs we found, as it offered near daily entries.  However, the blog does not list readers’ comments, does not offer archives, and is used primarily to attack his opponent, Bob Casey.

Of the challengers, Tom Kean, Jr.’s (R-NJ) blog shows the most comments out of any of the candidates’ blogs. Comments were both positive and negative, and in some cases arguments between bloggers evolved in the comments. 

Jack Carter’s blog  (D-NV) was also very complete.  Entries in this blog are near daily, and the blog has been around for some time.  Some comments were shown, but probably the most interesting feature of this blog is the “blog roundup”.  Every few days, someone posts a blog entry on the Carter Blog dedicated to providing links to blogs with posts related to the Carter campaign.  These entries are quite extensive and give readers a chance to find out who else is blogging about politics in general, and Jack Carter in particular.

The least complete blog we found was that of Allen McCulloch (R-NM), who only listed one post.  It is possible, however, that this is a new feature on his website; we’ll have to check back in a few weeks to see if the blog progresses at all.

While the quality of campaign blogs varied from candidate to candidate, most blogs were used for similar purposes: to present news, attack opponents, to discuss candidate’s reactions to recent events, and to provide information about candidates’ humanitarian and volunteering interests.