| In another positive development for the Connecticut political blogosphere, Stamford mayor Dan Malloy has re-launched his gubernatorial campaign Web site as a blog, and he has lined up an impressive crew of contributors to the site, including state legislators Andrew McDonald, Andrea Stillman, Bill Finch, Mike Lawlor, and William Tong.
Tong, a freshman member of the House from Stamford, reflects today on his first year in office with a great piece:
In my first hearing on the Judiciary Committee, I sat right next to the leadership. I suppose I did this to be close to Andrew McDonald and Gerry Fox so they could stop me if I had the sudden urge to say something that could end my career before it started. The seat to my right was empty at the start of the meeting, reserved for the Republican Ranking Member, State Representative Arthur O'Neill. Shortly after the meeting started, Art came in quietly and sat down. He lost his mother that very afternoon, after a long illness. But he was there, doing his job. His grief was palpable, quiet but severe, and for the rest of the hearing I could only wonder how much strength and commitment it took for him to be there and to fulfill his responsibility. The first thing I knew about him was the depth of his humanity and commitment, and that was really all I could see. The fact that he was a Republican, or a Ranking Member, or maybe an adversary, seemed to be of very little value. I am certain that is a major reason why he and I were able to work so well together to pass landmark gun control legislation this session, a bill he had worked hard to defeat in the past.
In my experience, it's a pretty short hop over the party-affiliation wall to find a safe place to talk. It's even shorter within one's own party. So as we begin our conversation on this blog, I hope we'll work together to develop a shared vision of progressive leadership that transcends labels and assumptions. Not by simply conceding a point or two, but by respecting, hearing, and trying to understand one another. I hope we'll develop a kind of leadership that begins where Art and I started - as two decent and honorable human beings, doing our best to find pragmatic solutions and advance our state and its people as honestly, cooperatively and as capably as we can.
The whole thing is worth a read. Rep. Tong mentions that for many people, politician is a bad word...and I can only think that allowing more people to have a window into the work of legislators will help to bridge the divide between the elected and the represented, and remind us all that politicians are people, too...and only as different from us as we allow them to be, since we're the ones who choose who gets to represent us.
In many ways, the most significant development in the CT blogosphere in the past year has been the increased participation of our elected officials in discussions, liveblogs, and guest posts. It's great to see more elected officials getting involved in reaching out to constituents online and participating in conversations on blogs. So many of those who have chosen to engage with us here have demonstrated in a very real way how dedicated, professional, and hardworking they are...and their commitment to public service and good governance is nothing short of inspiring.
I figure this positive news about a growing Democratic blogging community is as good a time as any to mention that I'll be stepping back from a regular blogging role here at MLN to focus on my work with the Jim Himes campaign. As I've mentioned before, I've been supporting Jim since before he declared his candidacy, and I've been doing some part-time as a consultant to the campaign for a few months now. Last week, I took over as campaign manager. As you may have noticed from my lack of posts in the past week, I simply haven't had the time to keep up with regular blogging here at MLN. I'm not signing off forever, but you'll see a lot less of me here as I focus my time on building our campaign here in the 4th. If you haven't already, I hope you'll get involved! Jim is an extraordinarily decent guy whose integrity and intelligence are matched only by his enormous love for his family and country. I'm really proud to commit the next year of my life to making sure he is our next Congressman.
As for MLN, our newest MLN frontpager, CaptCT, has been a great addition to our team, and I hope other MLNers will consider stepping up to post more often and perhaps join the front-page team. Since I am MLN's only female front-pager, I particularly hope that other progressive women will get involved and post more regularly here at MLN.
If you're a lurker, how about commenting? If you're a commenter, become a diarist!
As I step back from regular posting, I'm thankful for my fellow front-pagers at MLN, especially tparty, for being so supportive. And I'll forever be grateful to BranfordBoy for inviting me to join the fp crew in the first place and for being one of my best friends ever since. You'll see less of me at MLN, but I hope to see you all at many Himes campaign events in the coming year! |
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