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Dec

18

WaPo profiles “blogging Iowa newsman” ‘cept guy hasn’t blogged in five weeks


I was all set to write this lovely kudos piece about David Yepsen at the Des Moines Register.

But first, after reading today’s Washington Post piece titled, “The Scribe Who Gets The Candidates’ Vote: All Eyes on Blogging Iowa Newsman,” [emphasis mine] on how Yepsen’s blogging has brought him attention of the candidates, I noticed that WaPo doesn’t have a link to his blog. Hmmm.

I go and find it. I go to the blog.

Then I think, WaPo, WaPo, WaPo, you published this?

He is also the new-journalism king of the Iowa caucuses. Heck, if the Iowa caucuses had their own currency, the bills just might have David Yepsen’s face on them.

With his matter-of-fact newspaper assessments of candidates and their campaigns and his popular Register blog, launched for the 2008 cycle, he makes ‘em and he breaks ‘em. A positive Yepsen column is tantamount to an A-list endorsement, generating its own cycle of campaign press releases and news coverage. And if Yepsen goes negative, it can force a campaign to make changes real quick.

The “new-journalism king of the Iowa caucuses”?

You can’t write a story about a “new-journalism king” – no matter who is writing it – if they have NO blog posts in the entire month of December, ONE post in the entire month of November, and only eight posts in the month of October.

Sigh.

Sure, Yepsen’s columns are online and you can comment there. But it’s not a blog and it’s not “new journalism.” Then again, the article doesn’t include a definition of “new journalism” so who knows what the editor or writer think it is.

My guess is that this article was an evergreen piece written when Yepsen blogged more regularly.

But now, we’re less than three weeks from 1/3/08 and he hasn’t posted a single entry since 11/11/07?

The article focuses on the content of what Yepsen writes and his preeminence as a political reporter. That is a nice, fun story for folks like me. And it’s a fine, good and appropriate story right now. It’s even interesting how he garners attention from the prez candidates. Cool.

But to call him a “new journalism king” and “the blogging Iowa newsman” is not only overstating, it’s just plain inaccurate.

After my first reading, I thought, “So, what does Yepsen think about blogging”?

No wonder the article leaves that out. He isn’t doing much of it.*

*No offense intended or directed at Yepsen who seems to be, by all accounts, a very notable political reporter. The upsetment is with the WaPo’s attempt at hooking people in by calling him the blogging Iowa newsman. That’s just pandering to a demographic who will be, like me, disappointed and a little angry and a whole lot of saying, you still don’t get it.

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 10:25 am December 18th, 2007 in Blogging, Campaigning, Elections, Media, Politics, WH2008, Writing 

Comments

4 Responses to “WaPo profiles “blogging Iowa newsman” ‘cept guy hasn’t blogged in five weeks”

  1. 1 Keith on December 18th, 2007 4:53 pm

    The problem is that the Register is still the 800 lb gorilla in Iowa politics and David Yepsen, for all his chops, is not in the national political columnist league. You should see the negative mail his column gets in the the Register so he’s no God by any stretch. He’s just a decent albeit schmoozey insider (like Brent Larkin) political columnist on a paper that has a hugely inflated view of itself. Donald Kaul was far, far better as was Ron Borsellino (RIP). Borsellino’s spouse Reka Basu is also a fine, fine columnist in the Connie Schultz mode. And other Iowa newspapers simply don’t care to cultivate anyone of statewide stature. The guy who tried to write politics for the Cedar Rapids Gazette is, well, its the holiday season and I’ll let it lie. But it is the height of lazy journalism for the Post to default to what does appear to be an evergreen column that gushes in an embarrassing way. I might speculate that it may have been in exchange for previous favors the Register or Yepsen may have rendered the Post in Iowa. Just a thought.

  2. 2 Keith on December 18th, 2007 4:54 pm

    Sorry that should have been lowercase g-d.

  3. 3 Jill Miller Zimon on December 19th, 2007 9:57 am

    Wow, thanks for that comment, Keith. Bookstore owner, huh? Ever think about being a … journalist? Oh, wait… :)

  4. 4 Update on David Yepsen "blogging Iowa newsman" and "king of new journalism" | Writes Like She Talks on January 2nd, 2008 11:42 pm

    [...] I think, how did I miss all that?  Did I miss all [...]

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