So I'm watching Chris Matthews this morning and they talked about Congressmen Twittering. They laugh smugly at the Congressmen and women that tweet (HAA! Tweet, what a silly word) about all the inane crap in their day. Then they proceed to read tweets from Congressmen derisively.
Wow, I've never heard that POV. I've never heard anyone say any, "I don't want to know what people had for breakfast!" Right, because that's all Twitter is, people talking about what they had for breakfast. Yes, if your not a professional media person, and you lay this on me, I'll give you a pass. Chris Matthews doesn't get one, he definitely knows better. If not he's an ass.
The 140 character limit lowers the mental commitment of Tweeting. Its easy, its short, its layered next 100 other people's tweets. You don't need to over analyze your thoughts before you distribute. And most people don't. When you follow someone what you typically get is a less filtered view of them. Does that filter let uninteresting stuff through. Yes. (CM mocks this is as if there's no uninteresting stuff on the news) But on Twitter its much easier to move onto the next thing compared to TV. My guess is that if you follow someone, you might get at least couple insightful thoughts from your Congressman per month. How many would you get otherwise?
Maybe Chris is worried because when I get to hear directly from my Congressmen, maybe I'll rely less on the practiced, spun, rehearsed, talking points these people swill on his show. I might form opinions of these people on my own instead relying on his biased filter.
Anything that bypasses Chris Matthews and connects me to my elected officials is good. The elitist derision of that direct contact offends me. The sheep that are managed by Matthews and others like him, are probably talking to their friends today about how stupid Congressmen that use Twitter are. Hopefully some of those people Google "Chris Matthews Twitter" and this post comes up and they choose to follow and learn more about their elected officials.
