Frequent readers of Oklahoma Wine News should know that presidential politics are (IMHO) rarely discussed in this blog. I won't deny having passionate feelings on the topic, but I try to keep them from getting in the way of keeping readers informed of important Oklahoma wine events.
Some might say that I am not trying hard enough to keep politics out of the way. In fact, I just got carbon copied on the following email to the Oklahoma Grape Growers and Winemakers Association.
To whom it may concern,
I visit your website frequently and noticed that sometimes there are links on your website that takes me to the "Oklahoma Wine News". Although I have also been to that website several times, the last few times I noticed a link at the bottom of the homepage to the Kerry/Edwards website and also a link that was titled "Bush's resume" that went on to belittle the President for his "lack of experience". Most frequently on her homepage (currently) she is critizing (sic) Oklahoma house republicans on their voting record.
I have long supported the business of winemaking in Oklahoma, as well have many of my friends and business associates. We like to enjoy wine and wine news without having someone's personal political views mixed in. She is free to have her views and website, but our concern is with the OGGWMA and the links to her website you all share.
I have contacted several of your members about this and am still waiting for an offical (sic) reply.
I would like to know the OGGWMA's position on this and if you were aware of this propaganda on the "Oklahoma wine news" website?
As you can imagine, I was pretty shocked by the tone and intent of this email. Since he never commented on any entries on my blog, I can only assume his stated goal of enjoying wine news without politics was bogus. His actual goal appears to be launching some kind of boycott against my blog. So far, it is going great for him as the OGGWMA have decided to stop linking to Oklahoma Wine News.
Disclaimer
First, let me say that the opinions expressed on the Oklahoma Wine News blog are those of the Author, Thomas Jones. These opinions do not pretend to reflect the views of my State, my Link Partners, my business associates or my wife (ok, especially my wife). :-)
If anyone has been led to believe that I represent OGGWMA or that any sites that link to my site endorse my opinion as their own, then I am sorry for your misunderstanding.
Official Response to the Above Email from Oklahoma Wine News.
I'm not sure who the 'she' you are referring to in your email is, but thanks for copying me on this email. I enjoy comments on my blog and yours brings up some interesting points. However, since several of your statements were false and/or misleading, let me address them now.
I am not a she and I reject the charge that I am most 'frequently critizing Oklahoma house republicans on their voting record'. Voting records were not even the subject of the posting that you site as so offensive, priorities were. The only mention of house republicans was in the news article linked.
This blog is solely the work of Thomas Jones and not a property of OGGWMA, WineAmerica, The Republican Party or anyone else. It might interest you to know that my parents host Oklahoma Wine News on their website, because it helps them sell their product. The probably agree with me less than you. You see, there is no comparable site on the internet that manually digs up and freely posts any Oklahoma wineries news events, and actively works to push wine tourism traffic to ALL of the Sooner State's wineries.
Links are Not the Enemy
I link to 3 kinds of sites, (1) Oklahoma wineries - all of them, whether they agree with me or not, (2) Link Partners that recognize how critical cross-linking is both to their own search engine rankings and the integrity of the entire network and (3) Sites I enjoy reading.
I don't subscribe to the naive belief that every site that links to mine endorses all of my opinions. Web sites link to Oklahoma Wine News for many reasons such as: (1) They are Oklahoma wineries and whether they agree with me or not, they know I send a great deal of traffic to their websites (2) we are Link Partners meaning they get preferred placement of their links, as a reward for cross-linking to their own sites (3) they know their visitors want as much info as they can get on Oklahoma wines and (4) some folks just enjoy reading it.
Getting Oklahoma Wine News with Less Politics
Anyone offended by the blogs and other sites I link to should consider a Bloglet Subscription to get Oklahoma Wine News by email. Bloglet gives you one-click unsubscribe or subscribe to as many email newsletters as you would like to manage. It will email you every Oklahoma Wine News posting without the extra links and ads on the website.
We also offer RSS Feeds of Oklahoma Wine News in several formats, you can easily get your Oklahoma Winery events news via Bloglines (My Personal Favorite), Rocket Reader, My Yahoo! or any number of other news feed readers.
In summary, this blog helps generates wine tourism for Oklahoma wineries, participating in email smear campaigns will generate NOTHING but division among allies.
If there are any other sore winners that would like to participate in the attack on my blog, you may want to contact OGGWMA to express your feeling, as I don't intend to publish the name and email address of the complainer.
To contact me check the top left hand corner of my blog for my email address or feel free to leave a comment!
Thomas Jones - Author of Oklahoma Wine News.
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