"Bloggers push politics aside in fight against FEC; It's a case of strange bedfellows, as liberals and conservatives unite against rules that could rein in political blogs."

The Minneapolis Star-Tribune offers this report. You can find my earlier commentaries on this issue here, here and here. The election law listserv is currently having a contentious debate on the question (including the competing House bills, 1606 and 4900). You can access the postings by following this thread.
UPDATE: Writing on the election law listserv, Adam Bonin observes the following (reprinted with permission):

There is at least one (oft-repeated) inaccuracy in that MST article. Re "The bloggers were being paid by the Thune campaign, but that didn't come out until Thune's campaign made an FEC filing after the election, which Thune won".

That the Thune bloggers were paid was disclosed:

(a) in FEC filings as early as the second-quarter 2004 report: http://www.dailykos.com/comments/2005/4/4/11593/26253/61#c61
(b) in an August 9 article in the Argus-Leader: http://www.southdakotaelections.com/Story.cfm?Type=Election&ID=2713

I think I'm unfortunately responsible for leading the reporter astray on this point. Thanks to Adam for the correction.

Posted by Rick Hasen at March 20, 2006 07:02 AM