There have been several new blogs that have launched since the beginning of the year ranging from the good (OC Political and ThinkforYourselfOC.com to the awful virtually comment-free OCPoliticsBlog and SaveAnaheim blogs, but there’s a new offering from the students at Chapman University that warrant a look especially as election day looms closer and closer.
Chapman’s Election Watch looks to be an ideal daily read from now through election day with well-written stories and thoughtful analysis. The site is non-partisan which is a good thing. And seeing such thoughtful analysis and well-written pieces gives me great hope for the political literacy of these new voters, many of whom will cast their first vote for president this year.
The blog is entirely student-written; The Chapman Election Watch is written weekly by the students of Comm 452–Political Communication at Chapman University in Orange, CA. Our objective is to help voters make informed decisions by providing unbiased insight and analysis on the U.S. presidential campaign leading up to and following Election Day on Nov. 6. There are 20 of us in the class so we will be dividing duties as we examine communication issues from the perspective of the campaigns themselves, the mainstream media and social media. We operate on the firm conviction that a well-functioning democracy requires a clear understanding of how all the participants in the political process–from candidates and consultants to the media and voters–engage in communication to achieve their goals.
The challenge for the class and its bloggers is developing a political blog that’s sustainable past election day. Its focus is clearly on national politics so the challenge for the students who might be taking this class in the Spring term would be ongoing analysis of national politics from a local perspective. We applaud the efforts of these students and will surely be linking to stories posted in the future.
If any of the students would like to join our blog team, I’m happy to discuss this when OC Political’s Chris Emami and I participate in a panel there later this month.
Hey, don’t leave out the local blogs like letsfixlosal.com where the blogs are looking at hyper-local issues as well as state and national ones. Remember it from local communities that some of our political class rise.
For example, anyone looking at the 72nd AD should keep an eye on what is happening at lotsfixlosal since the blog has been following the meteoric rise of Troy Edgar since he first burst onto the scene backed by solid waste dollars (his first campaign was the largest amount ever spent winning local office in Los Al when he first won).
[Disclaimer: I am a prolific commenter on letsfixlosal.com and sometimes even do original blog posts]