Bush Meets With Bloggers

In our weekly budget meeting we discuss the advances in our blogs. We chat about how smoothly we are finding the transition into blogging, the personality of our blogs, and if we think it is a beneficial practice. Some advantages of blogging we have discussed include improved writing skills, preparation for web writing, and exploring topics we are interested in. Perhaps, however, there are additional advantages to blogs we have not discussed.

I recently came across a blog entitled Public Eye on cbsnews.com written by Matthew Felling. The blog discussed recent news that President Bush had met with 10 influential military bloggers last Friday (Sept. 14) to discuss the war in Iraq and General Petraeus. This interested me because as we as a class are exploring these new mediums in the electronic age, such as blogs, very influential figures in society are beginning to realize their importance. Of course the audience Bush faced was a receptive one, and the meeting may have been a simple PR tactic, but it still struck me as important. It was the first time that the president had ever met with bloggers. Felling's blog stated, "[T]he hour-long meeting in the Roosevelt Room offered Bush another opportunity to break through what he sees as the filter of the traditional news media, while also reaching out to the providers of a new source of information for soldiers, their families and others who follow the conflict in Iraq closely."

As an alternative to "traditional news media", blogging was nationally recognized by the leader of the free world. I'd say that it's a pretty influential alternative.

Here's the link to Felling's blog

Here's another link to a blog by Bill Roggio, editor and publisher of The Long War Journal, who met with Bush this past Friday.