John Morgan operates The Pennsylvania Progressive website. It is a site that we at CS2 recommend. In part 1 of a two-part interview John explains the ins and outs of blogging

CS2: John, I’m wondering, when did your interest in politics start?

John: Good question. Pretty much as far back as I can remember.

CS2: When did you decide you were a progressive and not a conservative?

John: The senior year of high school.

CS2: How did that come about?

John: The Vietnam War.

CS2: Is that when you turned against it?

John: Yeah. Understand, I grew up with several generations of far-right Republicans.

CS2: Including your parents?

John: Yeah.

CS: How did they take to your announcement that the Vietnam War was wrong?

John: Not well (Laughter).

CS2: What has been your political involvement since high school?

John: I was politically involved all through college. I was in student government. I worked on a congressional campaign when I was at Penn State. I was President of the Political Science Association.

CS2: What campaigns have you been involved in during your political life?

John: I don’t really remember all of them. I lost a good chunk of my life to health problems. I got active again in 2003 after the health problems. I always followed politics. Since 2003 I’ve been involved in the Howard Dean for President campaign and Chuck Pennacchio for U.S. Senate. I’ve given advice to a lot of other candidates.

CS2: And you eventually became The Pennsylvania Progressive blogger.

John: Yes.

CS2: How did that come about?

John: The Pennacchio campaign. Well, it basically evolved here on the campaign. We had a national blogger that we hired to do outreach, and he was blogging for us on all the major blogs. As part of the campaign I needed to get a blogger ID so that when he put up stuff for the campaign I could help out with the diary or respond to questions. I don’t know how I came up with the name the PA Progressive but the experience in that room whet my appetite, and that’s how it came to be.

CS2: There are readers who aren’t familiar with what blogs are. Can you describe a blog and exactly what its function is?

John: The blog is short for web log. They started out as on-line journals. Many still are-just like personal diaries. People who blog just blog about their daily lives. Political blogs came out of this. Political blogs are basically opinion columns that are interactive. The people who write the blogs are writing their own opinion. They’re not trying to be neutral or impartial. They are designed to be partisan. It’s their partisan opinion of things. Your readers interact with you. That’s the interesting part of the blog. You start building a community of interacting people who discuss everything among themselves.

CS2: It seems that with a blog you’re writing about things almost as they are happening. Sometimes as soon as a speech is over I see bloggers out there with their opinions. Do you worry, under those circumstances, that you might have gotten it wrong on the spot because you don’t have time for reflection?

John: Basically, what you’re referring to is stuff called live-blogging. Live blogging you can do during the speech. Bloggers with live blogs during the State of the Union speech were on line before the speech ended. And yes, it’s easy to get something wrong. Working in the moment it’s easy to miss the perspective.

CS2: What are the biggest pitfalls for bloggers? What about threats and lawsuits?

John: Yes. That can happen. Like anything else you’ve got to check your facts. You’ve got to do your homework. Do your research. When you write about something one of the conventions of blogging is to check your sources. We all know that there are news sources out there that are garbage. You’ve really got to make some decisions about what sources you’ll use. If your readers can go back and independently check your sources, that helps save you. I find that bloggers who don’t check their sources often get themselves in trouble. Getting something wrong or maybe misinterpreting something by not documenting it–the readers have no way of knowing that. Always be suspicious of bloggers who don’t link to their sources because that usually means that they’re not using good sources. There are pitfalls. You’ve got to be careful of things like libel, slander, defamation-things like that. As bloggers you are writing opinion which pretty much protects you, but you do have to be careful.

CS2: Do you think there’s a role to play in helping the Democratic Party become a more progressive party by the blogs?

John: I think that’s happening. The major blogs have played a very significant role in this. They’ve organized and motivated progressive Democrats. You look at the job that blogs like the Daily Kos and America Blog have done. The influence they’re wielding over the party is huge. You see congressmen, senators and presidential candidates blogging on those sites. Interacting with the net groups.

CS2: As a blogger do you have a preconceived agenda or are you just reacting to events? In other words as a progressive, I know you call yourself the PA Progressive, you want a more progressive America. Do you see everything through that prism? What would an America you’d like to see look like?

John: Of course, it would be a lot more progressive which means a bigger concentration on social issues. I believe in fiscal responsibility which I believe a lot of progressives also do. As far as an agenda, you need to establish what the agenda for your blog is. There are so many millions of blogs out there that you need to find a niche. There’s an old saying about writing: write what you know. I think that goes for blogs also. You can’t write about everything. It’s just impossible. What I’m trying to do is focus on several major areas. One area that is of major interest to me is Social Security. I write a lot about the Social Security system. I write many articles on national security issues-by far more than anything else I write on. Gay and lesbian issues are another focus of my blog. I have a keen interest in economics although I haven’t written that much about it on my blog. There’s just too much going on in the world. You’ve got to find a niche.

CS2: Does the Democratic Party run away from some of these issues?

John: Yes. They run away from gay marriage. They run away from choice. They run away from the hot-button social issues of the right wing.

CS2: What can we do to give the Dems more backbone?

John: We can remind the voters of all the things liberalism has accomplished. How every part of their lives has been affected positively by the liberal agenda. The forty hour work week, fair working conditions, overtime pay, Workers’ Compensation. These have all been causes championed by liberals. One thing we need to do is take the demonization out of the word liberal. Redefine it to what it really means. Democrats need to embrace their liberalism; that we stand for something and it is constructive. Howard Dean showed in 2004 that the online community can raise millions of dollars. It’s at the point now where major powers cannot ignore the online progressive community. If they do, they do it at their peril.

CS2: Do you see a presidential candidate among the current crop that is going to inherit what Dean built?

John: Two candidates are very actively building on what Howard Dean built. Both Edwards and Obama have very effective online presences. More so Edwards. They’re both doing fantastic jobs online.

CS2: Are these candidates that the left can be proud of?

John: Yes.