It's a Goverment Website...no wait it's a blog.

Monday, September 22, 2008

Has anyone else noticed that the website for the Office of Governor in Alaska looks more like a blog than a government website? When you first arrive at the site and give it a glace it does look like any other government site but just take a moment to really look...do you see it? Reading across the top of the page there are tabs for 'photos' and 'bio' those are tabs that are usually found on the personal website and if you scroll to the bottom you will find a banner that will take you to a list of comments and blessings for Sarah Palin's son Trig Paxson. In the middle where the real meat of the site should be is a roll of News items that pertain to Palin and the state of Alaska which is all well and good but wouldn't it be more effective to show whole stories? Or maybe just a little bit of the story instead of just the title? On your way over to the right hand side of the page you will see a couple more banners for different things including Palin's newsletter which we won't get into here.
On the right side of the page there are more links for pictures and even a link to a page all about the "First Gentleman of Alaska" I'm sorry but that definitely belongs on a personal site.
Now hidden down in the right hand corner you will find a few links to actual government related information you would expect to find on your state governor's website like the link to FEMA or Alaska's state budget for instance.

After writing this I thought maybe I was being to hard so I looked up the governor's website for Louisiana the state where I live to compare. Turns out I wasn't being hard at all. Turns out there isn't even one link to photos on the Louisiana site official or unofficial. Guess what else? There isn't a link to the bio of his wife! Does his wife not deserve a page dedicated to her and all her accomplishments and what about his children? No comments of blessings for them? Sure the people of Louisiana want the Jindals to live long and prosper but they also know that a government website is just that and not a soapbox for your personal life. For that you can start your own Flickr, or Blogger, or Myspace whatever makes you happy. Just remember like any other job you have to check your personal life at the door. We can all tell how well Palin has done with that just by looking at her office's website.

Governor of Alaska Website

Governor of Louisiana Website