GraniteGrok

Dope of the Week - a tad late.

Leslie Carbone is a good writer that blogs at, amazingly enough, LeslieCarbone.com  She attained what a lot of bloggers desire - access to the White House (jealous?  a bit, to be honest) for bloggers calls.

However, I think she became the victim of what has happened to us once in a while - politicians not really knowing what to make of bloggers.  Sure, if a Lefty blogger gets invited to one of these and asks "inappropriate" questions or blogs inartfully (ok, a rant) - so what: they are acting as expected.  That said, let a conservative Republican blogger do the same, they are sometimes treated worse because "hey, I thought you were on our side!" and get rather upset.

As Erick Erickson of RedState has said, many politicians on the Right don't understand bloggers - are they supporters (maybe)?  Are they campaign workers, supposed to toe the line (sometimes, but then the blogging should be secondary)?  Or are they journalists?  Erick's answer is none of the above: think of bloggers similar to a Pastor - they have a "flock" of readers that they can influence.  And based on how the blogger is treated, that circle of influence will hear about it.

Well, Leslie was treated rather shabbily as far as I can see.  The problem was not that she was invited, it was how she was "disinvited":

I dialed in a little before 11:00, got the please-wait message, and listened to the butchered music. An operator came on and asked me for my identity, which I provided, and then subjected me to a few more minutes of music. Then I heard a voice saying something unintelligible, and the line was cut off. I dialed back in, explained to the operator that I'd been cut off, gave my information again, and was connected to the conference call, which was already in progress.

I listened for around 10 minutes to the doomsday talk and pleas to "work" the Republicans who voted with the Constitution yesterday.

Suddenly, the line went briefly silent, and then a voice said, as nearly as I can reconstruct it:

"We have been advised by the host that you are not allowed on this call, so I'm going to hang up your line; please do not dial in again."

Now to be honest, she had been on an earlier call and had written a non-impressive post.  And she admits to that.  But I think she is justified with "the final thought". 

Now, if the White House doesn't want me on its calls, that's its prerogative. But kicking me off after I've been invited is a lousy way to win my support, makes them look like they don't know what they're doing, and is just plain tacky. 

Indeed!