In this episode of WichitaLiberty.TV: Journalist, author, and blogger Bud Norman joins Bob to discuss the local newspaper, Donald Trump, and the Kansas governor contest. View below, or click here to view at YouTube. Episode 202, broadcast July 21, 2018.
I’ve noticed a new conservative blog in Kansas, Cold Friday. It describes its goal as “to provide thoughtful opinions on current events and the moral issues of the day.”
The founder is J. Christopher Pryor of Topeka. He has been published with the Journal for the Study of Antisemitism, David Horowitz’s NewsReal Blog, The Remnant, and Catholic Family News among others. He has a J.D., M.B.A. and B.A. in Philosophy. Pryor writes predominantly on issues of antisemitism, philosophy, current events and his hobbies of science and ham radio.
To view the blog, click on coldfriday.org.
This week on WichitaLiberty.TV: Danedri Herbert, also known as Gidget Southway, visits Wichita and WichitaLiberty.TV. Her blog is Kansas GOP Insider. This interview was recorded on July 27, 2016. View below, or click here to view at YouTube. Episode 126, broadcast August 7, 2016.
In this episode of WichitaLiberty.TV: A former Wichita mayor wonders what happened to Wichita’s water supply. Then, I’ll introduce you to Gidget, a Kansas blogger I think you will enjoy. Then, how can you use your smartphone to help candidates and causes? View below, or click here to view at YouTube. Episode 56, broadcast August 24, 2014.
Falsely altered photograph of Kris Kobach posted on Community Bridge BlogIn debates over public policy, words matter. But readers recognize that words represent the opinion of the writer, and as such can be incorrect, misinformed, or simply stating a preference that the reader may disagree with.
But photographs are different. When presented with a photograph purporting to convey a message, readers (viewers) don’t know if it is real or has been altered.
So when the Community Bridge Blog, a Manhattan-based project, uses a doctored photograph of Republican Kansas Secretary of State Candidate Kris Kobach, readers might be justifiably confused. Is the pasted-in message behind Kobach real, or false?
In this case the photograph is false. It’s a fake. These types of photographic alterations — thought to be funny or amusing by some, especially liberals — have no place in serious public discussion. Even if they’re a staple of MSNBC television commentators.
And when we wonder why good people are reluctant to run for public office, here’s a reason why: they’re likely to be subject to malicious and false attacks such as this.
The author of the post, Christopher E. Renner — at one time a “Linguistically/Culturally Diverse Populations’ Consultant and Teacher Trainer at the Midwest Equity Assistance Center, College of Education, Kansas State University” — ought to apologize to Kobach and the readers of the blog. That’s if he wants to be taken seriously.
Here’s the text of Renner’s post, contained in What Every Kansan Needs to Know about Kris Kobach. While I believe Renner is largely incorrect in his opinion — and his writing could use some proofreading — his written opinions are just that. Readers can choose to agree or not.
The Republican’s nominee for the job of Kansas Secretary of State, Kris Kobach, is a well know nativist extremist who makes a living by drafting anti-immigrant laws and, after they are adopted, trains officers to enforce them. If the laws are challenged, he goes to court to defend them. Quite the racket since the laws are always rule unconstitutional and in the mean time he lines his pockets with tax-payer dollars from the legal fees he racks up.
But altered photographs are different from words.
If online political activity has any value, Kansas Republicans aren’t providing much. Many Kansas Republican websites and online outreach efforts are stale and lagging behind in providing timely and quality information.
As of today, the most recent post on The Kansas Trunkline (promoted as “The Official Blog of the Kansas Republican Party”) is dated November 30, 2009. That’s coming up on three months old. If blogs have any defining characteristics, one is frequent updates with timely material. That’s not happening here.
This blog is promoted on the front page of the Kansas Republican Party website. That site doesn’t fare much better with regard to timely updates. The most recent news item is from January 25. The Twitter feed displayed there has four posts for all of 2010. The site doesn’t have accurate information about who is — and how to contact — the executive director of the party.
On the Kansas Republican Party’s Facebook page, the most recent post is from December 1, 2009. The Kansas Young Republicans Facebook page, however, does better.
Even efforts using cutting-edge technology from campaigns aren’t doing better. SamForGov — that’s Sam Brownback’s campaign application for the iPhone — has an event from November 2, 2009 as the latest campaign event. Under “Campaign Updates,” the only item is a news release from September 3, 2009. The front page of the app still displays an invitation to Kansas Days. That event took place nearly four weeks ago.
Some local Kansas Republican Party organizations do better. The Johnson County Republican Party seems to be up-to-date with useful information. The Sedgwick County counterpoint doesn’t fare as well.
The Kansas Democratic Party has a revamped blog that allows for “community bloggers,” although so far only one has signed up. The blog has 10 posts so far for February. Not exactly a fount of information, but better than the stale Republican blog and websites.
There’s a saying: “You are who Google says you are.” Google, of course, finds relevant websites based on what people say they’re looking for. But when Google (and other search engines) returns these websites with their stale news and out-of-date events, people lose confidence in the organizations that created the sites. Having visited once and finding little of value, people are not likely to return again.
This is the case if Google even returns these sites in response to searches, as freshness and frequency of updates is thought to be a major factor Google uses in deciding which sites to display to users.
As a Republican activist, I urge those in charge of these sites to make a commitment to providing fresh, timely, and relevant content. Part of how to accomplish this is to avoid delegating responsibility for the websites and blogs to “tech guys.” That’s because when it takes communication with technical support — and the possibility of receiving an invoice — to update a website or blog, the hassle factor means it doesn’t get done.
Instead, party leaders, staff, volunteers, and activists need to know themselves how to update websites and blogs. This requires that these sites be built upon technology platforms — like WordPress blogs, for example — that allow for and encourage end-user updates and maintenance. It also takes a commitment by leadership and staff to be trained, and then ongoing disciplined effort to keep the sites updated.
Kansas Watchdog reporting at Kansas Senate decides who is press and who is not may have caught the eye of Topeka radio talk show hosts Raubin Pierce and Megan Mosack, as they invited me to appear on their show today to talk about my inability to obtain press credentials at the Kansas Senate.
(By the way, isn’t it great that people in Topeka and northeast Kansas have a radio talk show that covers politics and public policy? We definitely could use something like this in Wichita.)
My appearance is available for listening at the show’s archive page under the heading “Thursday’s Show 2nd Hour”, although I think the easiest way to listen will be to click on this direct link. If all goes well, an audio file will download and start playing in your computer’s media player. After a little banter by hosts Raubin and Megan — they’re on location at a pizzeria in Overbrook, and the pizza sounds delicious — I appear a little more than two minutes into the recording.
The application form for Kansas Senate press credentials for 2010 is available at 2010 Kansas Senate Press Credentialing Application.
Previous reporting by me on this issue is at Kansas alternative media shut out of legislative access and Kansas alternative media discussed on Kansas Week. The latter story contains video of my appearance on the KPTS television public affairs program Kansas Week.
In Kansas, alternative media outlets like this blog can’t get the same level of access that traditional media has in the Kansas statehouse. My post Kansas alternative media shut out of legislative access gives details.
This week I in was in Anaheim, California on a fact-finding trip. As part of this, I asked to meet with a planner for the City of Anaheim. Shortly after we started our meeting, he asked to leave the room for a moment. When he came back, a media relations person for the city was with him, and stayed with us during our meeting.
This is not unusual, as many companies and governmental bodies have policies about their employees talking to the media.
But that’s it … in California — Anaheim, anyway — bloggers are treated as press. Not so in Kansas, though.
Bob Weeks discusses the difficulty of alternative media obtaining press credentials at the Kansas Legislature. From the KPTS public affairs television program Kansas Week on June 26, 2009. Tim Brown is the host. Randy Brown, Senior Fellow in the Elliott School of Communication at Wichita State University also appears.
Read the story behind this by clicking on Kansas alternative media shut out of legislative access.