LANSING ? Liberal bloggers across the nation zeroed in on Michigan on Friday when it came out that the Senate servers have closed access to a liberal-based blog that has been sharply critical of Michigan Republicans. Officials said the access to “Blogging for Michigan” was closed down so it could be determined if the blog was created by a Senate employee using Senate equipment, but the blogger in question said the site is produced at her home in Shiawassee County using non state servers.
The incident focuses attention on the growing use of blogs, websites, videos and other Internet resources as a critical part of contemporary campaigning and politics.
The story was also posted to Daily Kos, probably the best-known liberal blog in the nation, and one that is holding an annual meeting at which most the Democratic candidates for president will appear. Within the first hour of its appearance on Daily Kos it had generated more than 100 comments.
Access to the blog was apparently blocked on Thursday, but Christine Barry, who runs the blog, said initially she thought it might have stemmed from ongoing problems at her server. It was only on Friday that she got confirmation from Assistant Senate Secretary Pam Nyquist that the Senate server had cut off access to the site.
Nyquist said an investigation was underway to determine if the blog was created by a Senate employee using Senate equipment. “That would not be appropriate,” she said.
Matt Marsden, spokesperson for Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop (R-Rochester), said the decision to close off access was made Bishop’s chief of staff Matt Minor. “It was fairly clear that this blog had access to Senate information off Senate servers,” Marsden said.
Access to the blog will be shut down until it can be determined how the material was accessed. “If this is something that is up and being used at taxpayer expense, that’s not right,” he said.
Barry said, however, that she is a systems engineer and is not an employee of the Senate. The blog is created at her home in Shiawassee County, and she said she uses newsletters such as Gongwer News Service, as well as press releases on Senate and House Democratic sites, for her information.
All of the video clips and other items from legislative activity come from those posted by Democrats on their sites and is properly attributed, she said. She had not been contacted by anyone on the Republican staff before access was shut down.
But she acknowledged that the incident has created publicity for the site which now has a subhead to its flag: “The site Mike Bishop doesn’t want you to see…”
It is unclear what triggered the action to block the site, though Barry said there was some reference to comments the blog had on Sen. Bruce Patterson (R-Canton) and remarks he made criticizing the state’s universities.
When Patterson made those comments during Wednesday’s session he asked that they be printed in the Senate Journal which is accessible on the legislative website.
Tom Lenard, spokesperson for Senate Minority Leader Mark Schauer (D-Battle Creek) said, “What they’ve done is said things like Right Michigan is okay, but you can’t see left leaning blogs. Right Michigan has a picture of (House Speaker) Andy Dillon (D-Redford Twp.) as the cowardly lion, but you can’t go to a website that talks about the inaction of the Michigan Senate.”
This story was provided by Gongwer News Service. To subscribe, click on Gongwer.Com
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