Comments on: Politicians who get Twitter...and some who don't

Do you want to find the most interesting Republicans and Democrats on Twitter? We'll tell you what they tweet about and whether they're worth following.

[Josh.Lowensohn]

Re: the dark cloud in Palin's Twitter photo...I wonder if that's been Photoshopped or if it's what happens when she senses nearby prey.

[Josh.Lowensohn]

@chaser, could be...or maybe McCain has better things to do, like host movie marathons: http://bit.ly/KABdB

[ariherzog]

Nice collection... but how come you didn't mention Tim Ryan (http://twitter.com/timryan) or John Culberson (http://twitter.com/johnculberson)? If it wasn't for the two of them in particular, chances are most of the above wouldn't be using it today.

[wneary]

Good point about Culbertson. Anyways, as a city councilman who blogs and occasionally tweets, this was a helpful review because I think lots of us in politics are trying to figure out some ground rules and guidelines. Gives me some good ideas and models. My own prejudice is that I prefer someone like Wittman's stream if it is focused on his local constituents, though I suppose someone with time (or a staff with time) to post with national scope is doing a service too.

One thing I'm confused about is hashtags, and why do you disapprove of #tcot? I thought hashtags were a good way for people of like interests to find each other. I was thinking of trying to come up with one for my city and people who want to talk about it. What's the hashtag etiquette here?

[Jimbopaul]

John Boozman is a Congressman from Arkansas, not Virginia. I'm very pleasantly surprised that he is doing a great job with his Twitter account.

[Sam Papelbon]

i agree with the mccaskill comment. she posts a lot about issues and events she goes to, but also a lot of more personal posts about her normal life. she also talks about the st louis cardinals on occasion (saw her trash talk mccain and his diamondbacks at least once). i've enjoyed following her.

[stigmattaman]

Just stop Don. you're no good.

[RiputapanSingh]

Also worth mentioning is Governor Bobby Jindal's page - http://twitter.com/BobbyJindal
It is updated occasionally and is worth following.

[pamhh]

Re: Claire McCaskill -

Lots of followers, but she is only following 1? Not really participatory, is it?

[_pTracker]

And yes, there's an app for that.

Our product "politicoTracker Twitter Edition" makes it really easy to read any US politician's tweets, and you don't need a Twitter account, just an iPhone. http://politicoTracker.com/te

We've found around 360 twittering elected officials so far. We welcome submissions of anyone we've missed.

As of last Monday, the most popular feed among our users was Sarah Palin's, almost double Barak Obama's feed. @schwarzenegger was the 3rd most popular, followed by the state-wide aggregate feed for Minnesota. Go figure.

[zkirkpatrick]

Chuck Grassley should be on this list - totally unfiltered.