www.masbakersfield.com

I don't know if you picked up on this by reading the article, but I didn’t really get to interview our "governator". The press conference he held was not open to the public.

Being that we are a fairly new publication, we don’t have all the contacts that larger, more established organizations have. So, I was told about the conference about an hour before it happened. I'm actually really lucky I was told about it at all.

I frantically tried to get in touch with his publicist, but was unable to find a number. They don’t even have it on the official governor’s website. Very frustrating! So then I tried to get in touch with some of my colleagues at the Bakersfield Californian who were covering the story with no luck (we are owned by the Californian so we share sources and info on occasion).

So, I drove out to Bolthouse East where my dad had sent me. When I knew I had only a few minutes to get to the press conference I called him because they are one of his clients. I drove up to the security gate and they told me that they couldn’t let me in because I wasn’t on the list of “allowed” publications. So I drove back to our office.

Sometime after I returned I received an e-mail from one of my collegues at the Californian telling me that at the last minute the event had been moved out to Bolthouse West in Buttonwillow, CA. I wouldn't have been allowed in anyway because I wasn't on the list though. I got me and our photographer on the e-mail alerts from the governor's office for next time. I also found out the contacts I needed for future reference.

So, I went to the Angelides press conference at this lady’s front yard in East Bakersfield after that. He was good about taking questions. Too bad I was about to pass out because I was wearing all black and standing in the sun at the hottest part of the day! Yeah… went blank and none of my good questions got asked. Such as:

1. Mr. Angelides you keep talking about supporting California businesses, but I noticed that you have contracted out a sound company based in Washington, D.C. to handle all the speakers and microphones. Why can’t you hire one of the tons of excellent California based sound companies?
2. We saw how controlled Schwarzenegger’s press events were this morning with the list of allowed publications. This is something we’ve seen throughout his time as governor. Do you plan to be more accessible to the public as governor?

Instead, all of the other reporters kept asking the same questions which had to do with some of the biggest farming organizations announcing their endorsement of Schwarzenegger at the press conference earlier (that they all got into because they were on the list of publications allowed in). Boring! Okay well maybe it isn't boring, but seriously if everyone asks the same question do they really expect that they are going to get a different answer? Isn't that the definition of insanity? Doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result?

Well, like I said I was about to pass out. My heart was racing like I had just run a marathon because I was so incredibly hot. I started to feel really weak too. Finally, I made my way into the shade as things drew to a close.

Turns out, we were not interested in much more than a short brief on this though so I was able to use the myriad of press releases put out by the campaign and information colleagues let slip with their questions at the Angelides conference to piece together what happened. 

Click here to read the article.

Also, just so you know I'm not endorsing either candidate and still not sure who I'm going to vote for. I'll just say that I think both men are very good at being politicians.