Watch out Rock! Powell has been known to sucker punch reporters!

Please watch your kneecaps too.  I hear Powell may feel they are a delicacy.lol

1. Dave Chapelle no-show

2. $19,000 cash on hand as of June 30 vs. $382,000 for incumbent

3. Struts around with goonish bodyguard despite reputation for goonish behavior

4. Holds insane press conference to attack newspaper column while disputing nothing in it

5. Pisses Rock off 

         I went to Kevin Powell's Media/Public Event at Junior's Restaurant yesterday.

            My observation of the interaction between Kevin and Rock:

            Rock came in late, after Kevin's formal presentation. He got some of the printed materials, but most of them were gone before Kevin spoke.

            After the Q and A, Rock walked over to Kevin, put out his hand and introduced himself.

Kevin said hello sir. Rock said call me Rock. Kevin said I call everybody sir.

            They sat down. Kevin asked in a low, calm voice, aren't you with the Towns campaign?

Rock said, I've known Towns for 100 years. I talk with him, consult for his campaign. Rock also said, I'm supposedly the highest profile black political blogger around, on Room 8. I would like to interview you in that capacity, not as a consultant for Towns.

            This was  interesting to see, so much so that I sat down with them.

            Rock asked for a personal ½ hour interview with Kevin, anytime, any place. Kevin gave Rock his card, and told Rock to contact him so that they could set something up. Rock demanded to know time and place right then and there. Meanwhile, channel 7, and a few community group reps, and other individuals were waiting to speak with Kevin.

            Then Rock said, I worked with (some) Fort Greene community group in 1998 and 1994, where were you, Kevin?

            Kevin said, this is 2008, with a smile.

            Rock asked, why are you so aggressive? Kevin said, who is aggressive? I just answered your question.

            They both stood up. Rock kept demanding an appointment. At this point, I physically stood between the 2 of them.

            I have to say,  Kevin asked several times for Rock to clarify his relationship with the Towns campaign. At no point did Rock admit he recently received coinage from the Towns campaign.

            It made me wonder if I was witnessing Mayhill Fowler incarnate.

            Are bloggers expected to make complete disclosure, including financial payments from opposition campaigns when requesting interviews? Just asking.

Sorry Rock, but I'm with Powell on this one. Though I think you've accurately captured aspects of his narcisism, egotism, thugishnesss and general bizzarritude, I think he had the perfect right to diss you.

You are a paid consultant to Powell's opponent. While it may well behoove Powell to be polite to you, his time is imporatant to him, and talking to some white peacefreaks, or anyone else of any color who may somehow benefit his campaign instead of you is a perfectly reasonable cost benefit anlysis which he is entitled, and, in fact, compelled, to make.    

And this idea that you, or any other blogger, can compartmentalize is preposterous. The best we can do is disclose (which, to your credit, you have--Bouldin also deserves credit for this). Your opinion on Powell may indeed be valid (I think it is) regardless of your income stream, and you may be (and in fact are) capable of thoughtful and semi-detaced analysis, but campaigns have the right to regard you as a paid partisan in those instances when you've become one and to treat you accordingly.

And while this, and some of you other writings about Powell rise above questions of renumeration, your Hillary piece today reeked of being a pure campaign commerical for Towns; not that there's anything wrong with that, but publishing such stuff under your name tarnishes the brand.

Might I suggest the work you do as pure promotion (whether paid or pro bono) be differerentiated from the stuff you do for love. Pick a nom de blogue for the stuff which is product rather than art, and keep the brand name pure. The commercilas may then attract less readership, but you know what they say--he who robs my purse takes trash, etc.

You would be surprised how many bloggers use such a technique.   LOL!

Prof. Rock,

I found Mary Alice's commentary to quite enlightening and very eye-opening. As well as a recent article in the Our Time Press. David Greaves has needed a new voice like her's for quite some time.

Ultimately, your article provokes thought about an issue that many j-school instructors are debating today. What are the ethical guidelines surrounding blogging journalism? Is this relatively new media frontier bound to long-standing journalism tenets? And if not, how reliable and serious should it be taken?

I remember when Ben helmed the Daily News blog and ran an gossip item which stated a staffer of Marty Markowitz had attended a meeting for the purposes of raising funds for Bill deBlasio's run for the 13CD. Without any confirmation, he ran the item which turned out to be purely fictious. But the damage had been done to that staffer's career. There lie the inherent danger of blogging as journalism.

Which highlights the importance of Mary ALice's reporting. WIthout that 3rd party perspective, we would have had to rely on your version of events.

Ultimately, despite your very honest admissions of working for Towns, despite how little money you are taking or not, or how much of a role in his campaign you have- you could not have expected to be taken as a serious journalist at a clearly defined media event. In fact, one could argue that you went there clearly to make news rather than report it.

Your very admissions disqualify you from being taken serious as an objective journalist. Ideally, you can be best described as a popular blogger nee political consultant. At worst, you could be described as an egotistical political gossip-monger who uses his platforms to laud his friends and castigate his enemies.

For example, you clearly castigate Kevin Parker and Kevin Powell (and many of your arguments are solid), you more times than not flippantly give a pass to Kendall Stewart and Ed Towns. And you make no apologies for it by establishing your bias for them.

On the other hand, your finest moments have been when you deliver an clear analysis on presidential politics or ruminate about possible gubernatorial or mayoral runs.  Or when you report that a candidate and her young daughter have been physically threatened during the throes of a campaign.

You can't question the credibilty of Powell's campaign and ignore Town's inability to effect change in his community, much less his tepid voting record, and call yourself a jounalist. You can't question Parker's temperament and inability to deliver constituent services to Central Brooklyn and ignore Doc's complicity in Asquith's scandal.

You are not a journalist or even close. Therefore, you really had no standing at today's media event.

Lastly, the title of this opinion piece and your penchant for announcing your laurels as a way of legitimizing your standing makes it clear you've started to drink your own kool-aid.

 We've had this discussion before. Trailblazer you are. But you are still a Carib-American blogger who speaks to a predominately white, liberal, gay audience. Until you start your own blog that caters to the Black constituency of Brooklyn (and I could easily see one being started if you and Carib News put your heads together), then ultimately what you've become and are is a pain in the butt for Black politicians and a god-send for white bloggers who otherwise would have no entry into the world of Black politics.

Sadly, it is becoming clear that you enjoy your current role. When you're not demanding that people give you credit for your analysis or your attacking your enemies- real or imagined -you actually are a good read sometime. But then again, so was my new copy of Ultimate Avengers.

Neither, I rely on for the reporting of factual news or would I refer to as media.

Rock is clearly not qualified to cover this campaign, as a JOURNALIST. Disclosure does not cleanse a journalist's bias, at least not when one is on the tit.

But anyone who read Rock knows he is not operating as a journalist; he is operating as a COMMENTATOR.

Commentators also have certain obligations, disclosure bring the foremost. They cannot, or should not, pretend to the journalistic convention of neutrality. They are interesting not such much in spite of their biasses, but precisely because of those biasses.

Now, a commentator who's taken money and failed to disclose it is a problem. But a commentator who has taken money and disclosed it is a different matter. Certainly, he forfeits a few of his privledges, but once his discposure is on the table an emptor can surely choose on his own whether or not to caveat. No one in that context can blame Powell for his demurral. But really, in the matter of Parker, does it really make any difference whether Rock's ever taken a cent from Dr. Kendall or not? I mean, doesn't Parker have a right to demur from Rock as well, regardless of whether or nor Rock has any monetary bias?

In the end, money might not always be that important. No amount of money is going to change Rock's opinion of Kevin Parker. But money is a bright line.

But even there, there are limits. For weeks, Michael Bouldin has screamed bloody murder that I should reveal my "Conflict of Interest" concerning Marty Connor and Shelly Silver. And I actually came clean on Daily Gotham, for what it was worth.

The basis of my alleged "Pro-Silver" "conflict" (apparently manifiested by my comparison of the Bullfrog to a benign tumor, rather than a malignant one) would seem to be that I once worked for an elected offical whose turf overlapped Silver's. In my experinece, this is a relationship as likely to lead to conflects as to conflicts of interest. This was surely true in my case. During that time, I developed such a strong relationship with Silver's office that I am now on a list Judy Rapfogel keeps in her back pocket of people never to be hired by the Assembly Democrats. 

The basis of my Connor "conflict" is that I once worked for  Connor. This puts me in the same category as Kardon "KAS" Stolzman, who in 2006, managed Ken Diamondstone's campaign against Connor. Scott McClellan worked for Dubya and no one seems to think it disqualifies him from commenting. In fact, it is the one and only reason we have for listening to him at all.  

Anyway, the last year I was employed by Connor was 2002. This was back in the era when Steve Harrison was sending checks to the Conservative Party, so one would think Bouldin would deem it ancient history. As far as I know, the last time any member of my family, even broadly defined, drew a check from Connor or his campaign committee was in 2004. If it has happened since, I am not aware of it. One will notice that in the  2006 election cycle, Gatemouth made only rare references to Connor. Gary Tilzer, blogging anonymously, actually used the fact that such utterances were rare as another example of my perdfidy. In his estimation, I was not to be trusted because I refused to comment about my friends. But, it's been a long time since Marty Connor's put money in my purse. Surely, the statute of limitations in politics, which is defined by "What have you done for me, lately", has long passed. 

But surely, anyone comming to places like Room 8 looking for objectivity deserves whatever they get.

Really though, if Rock and I hadn't earned our battle scars in the trenches, would there be any reason to read us at all?

...is German on his mom's side, army brat on his dad's, and I think during the 80's he was probably engaged mostly in schoolboy pursuits, including pursuing schoolboys. He is a bit younger than we are. Then again, so is Obama.

But agree with Bouldin's politcs or not (and I'd say I do about 50/50 on internal Democrats stuff, and better than 80/20 otherwise), in the last few years, he has spent more than his share of time in the trenches. Like us, he may be inflicted with what Gatemouth calls "Trench-Mouth"--the insufferable arrogance of the political veteran concerning civillians. And like us, he's earned whatever lousy (pun intended--see Orwell's "Homage to Catalona") credentials being in the trenches has conveyed him. 

Oh, and my trenchant observation you just chose to quote as an example of my insight was, like much of my better stuff, mostly lifted from Michael Kinsley.

You fail to grasp the madness of all of this, dear Prof.

You attack the messenger but fail to answer the questions and then rely on your Denver roomie to defend you. And if all else fails, you resort to profanity and machismo.

Ironically, you even failed to grasp my sexuality. Typical of Caribbean machismo. Far be it for you to even consider a woman being on your playing field.

I read because I can. I respond anonymously because I can. Those are the rules which you accept when you post. Despite your protestations about anonymity, you never walk away.  You've often called Political Student a "kid" but you've never considered that she could be older than you. Remember, we're all learning every day until the day we perish.

Actually, Dear Prof., given your long record of posting, anyone can cull through your commentarys and many feuds and adopt the moniker of your many anonymous critics. How would you know if I were even the original "Political Student" unless you were a linguist? That is the pure madness of all of this. I can be the great FUSTB or the silly Keith Dawson. You have more archenemies and critics than the  Dark Knight himself.

As long as I wear the one ring to rule them all, I can be whomever I choose to be and you will be still be silly Golem searching for the voice in the dark. Therein lies the true power of the blogs- it frees the dark in all us and allows us to truly be who we want in glorious anonymity. Silly man, you still havent realized your the only one who chooses to attend a masquerade ball with no mask. 

Embrace it, sweetie. LOL

It's interesting no one has been talking about the fact that Kevin Powell is paying a firm that many prominent national bloggers work with - Progressive Strategies.

How come Matt Stoller never discloses the real reason for his crush on Powell?