The struggling economy. War on terrorism. Energy challenges. Supreme Court nominations. Midterm elections. There’s a lot on the policy plate for the White House, Congress and federal agencies. With so much happening in the District and the constantly churning political news cycle, it can be pretty difficult for policy communicators to stay up-to-date and informed about Washington’s policy agenda.
Whether your organization’s focus is on local or state policy issues, debates and decisions occurring in Washington, D.C. have impacts on your local- and state-level policymakers’ positions back home. Monitoring the political news coming out of Washington is an essential part of crafting an effective policy communications strategy and tactics. Luckily, The Washington Post has just made keeping up with the policy moods and positions of Beltway politics a little easier.
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This week, The Washington Post launched their new politics news portal, PostPolitics. In this redesigned section, politics news editors gather and organize the latest news from the White House, Congress, campaigns, polling data and the federal government in one location. As the hometown newspaper of the federal government, The Post has a long history of covering national politics, as well as breaking political news and analysis. At PostPolitics, visitors can read the most popular political news stories, review the President’s daily agenda, explore the debates and hearings scheduled in Congress and research the backgrounds of key policy players in the current news cycle. Reporter Chris Cillizza’s The Fix column is a must read for inside tips about what Washington is talking about right now and what they will be talking about tomorrow.
Besides PostPolitics, there are several other political news websites to keep on your radar for news about policy developments in Washington:
- Politico news stories often drive the morning political news cycle and is gaining a reputation as a breaking news source.
- The Daily Beast is a newer online politics outlet, where news stories and features often illustrate the connection between the happenings in Washington and its impact on the country’s culture and dialogue.
- RealClearPolitics aggregates political news from top news outlets from across the country and groups them by leading story topics. This site gives you the big picture view about how top political stories are being discussed outside of Washington.
- The Digg politics section can provide guidance on what the public views as important political news and issues by looking at which political stories Digg readers are promoting.
- Stateline provides political news from outside the federal government and gives readers state level political news. Organized by policy area, you can explore discussions and how policies have a local impact.
- Townhall offers a conservative perspective on the political news cycle.
- Daily Kos provides its readers the more liberal take on the day’s political news.
Instead of visiting each of these news websites daily, just add their RSS feeds to your RSS news reader. Just like tracking legislation online, this can deliver key stories, analysis and breaking news directly to you as it is published.
Staying on top of the political news cycle can help your organization use its insights to develop stronger responses to policy issues in Washington, D.C. and at home. Monitoring what national policymakers and policy news reporters are talking about will help you identify and capitalize on digital media or policy action opportunities to get your organization’s policy message and position out to the public and policymakers.
