This might seem obvious -- but why is this list limited to a select number of legislators?

Is this the reporter's own arbitrary ax-grinding list?

For a paper with such immense amounts of investigative reporting potential, the Willy Week really drops the ball with transparent stunts like this.

• Annoyed in PDX

I believe that when the GBA first started, they rated all legislators in the state. At some point, not sure when, they made the decision that since most of their readers are in the Metro area, they would confine their ratings to legislators in the Metro area.

Questions about their methodology aside, that part of it makes sense.

To start off, there are some GREAT comments on Blue O.

However, among those great comments are also misinformed, angry, and inflammatory comments. Casting such a wide net isn't a way to fix the narrow and biased judging system.

You are going to get just as many angry Blue O commentators with an axe to grind as you will, lobbyists.

There are so many ways this can go wrong.

People who rely upon - and value the opinion of - a free newspaper which appears to generate most of its revenue from advertisements for prostitution (sorry, "adult friend finder connections") deserve what they get. Although at some level, I suppose that if you know about prostitution, you know about politicians (and their supporters).

The editorial standards at WW have fallen so badly you really can't take them seriously anymore. What credibility they had seven to ten or more years ago has been blown in no small part due to ridiculous things like this rating by lobbyist (?!) goof they do.

Really, Kari, you shouldn't be puffing them this way.

I have to agree with Templetone.

Thanks for the page, Kari, but I can't really think of marks to give most of the members in the categories they list. I don't know who keeps their word, who most effectively gets things done inside the building.

I will say I believe Kahl is by far the best freshman, and the remarks of Margaret Carter and Peter Buckley (W & M co-chairs) on the subject of the GOP Back to Basics budget plan were inspired.

How about finding out if you can post those W & M remarks as a column here?

If you didn't receive a survey directly from WW, doesn't responding make you a "troll" to use blogger terminology (an uninvited guest)? Kari, I think your quote from Nigel is taken out of context. It is written to those who receive the survey, encouraging us to complete the survey. No where do I read a request from WW to copy and distribute the survey to others. You can always complain about how they do it and whether or not it has any value to you, but that's no reason to mess in their tent, in my opinion. I like Sal's suggestion: do your own. By the way, Sen. Metsger tried to "twist" the survey a few years ago and let legislators survey lobbyists. That was interesting.

Kari -

I still want to see my idea from last year implemented - legislators rating lobbyists. Perhaps BO could provide a forum for that post-leg.

Mark Zusman is a great mainstream Dem, in that he conveys info. on politics whilst hiding the fact that the source is monied interests.

This is how WW introduced it's Good Bad and Ugly snarkism in 2007:

"Every two years, as the Oregon Legislature winds down, WW allows anonymous sources to rate Portland-area lawmakers. Why have we done this for 32 years?

Because there's no better way to assess the region's 38 legislators as good, bad or awful than to ask the lobbyists who know them best—and because nobody has less incentive than lobbyists to speak candidly."

Apparently WW doesn't think there's any better way to rate our legislators than to give disappointed lobbyists the chance to anonymously trash them. What better way to gather the snarky commentary that WW specializes in. When WW can't even decipher what incentives motivate lobbyists, it's time to stop calling it journalism.

Here's WW's commentary on Ben Cannon, who fell in the "Bad" category in 2007........

Cannon gets high marks for intelligence and for listening more than he talks. Some say he needs to learn to rely on others.

"Over-thinks way too much," says a lobbyist who met often with Cannon. "Trust us, Ben, we did the research."

......So Cannon is rated a bad legislator because he actually thinks for himself and doesn't automatically trust any claim a lobbyist makes? Shit, we'd better hurry out and replace him with one who doesn't think so much, and will trust everything the lobbyists tell him. That way, the citizens -- who actually vote -- will be better represented in Salem.

Thank you, Kari, for doing something to expose this snarky, worthless crap WW publishes every two years on our legislators. Zusman and crew have settled for sophomoric nose tweaking instead of the alternative investigative journalism WW once pursued. The less they matter, as the years pass, the more snarky they become in the pursuit of attention. They should go under.

I'd like to respond to Kari's post and some of the comments that it has generated. While I'm not particularly thrilled at any attempt to hijack our project, many of the comments on BO were made in the spirit of trying to create a better survey — a goal we fully support. Ours is an admittedly inexact and somewhat crude attempt to measure legislators. It's why most years, we begin by stating "Reader Beware: What follows is largely gossip and opinion." At the same time, over the years, many legislators have conceded that it has real value.

Let me clarify a few things that have been stated so far in the thread.

"Instead of just letting the lobbyists run roughshod" Yes the survey is sent to lobbyists--of all stripes. But it is also sent to journalists and Capitol staffers. In doing so, we hope to get the most comprehensive assessment of the legislators.

"Why is this list limited to a select number of legislators? Is this the reporter's own arbitrary ax-grinding list?"

The dog that wags this tail is that we're still a print publication distributed primarily in the metro area. Therefore, we just assess metro-area legislators. We could run the assessments of non-metro area legislators on the web only, but there is still a resource issue for us. So we choose to focus our efforts.

"a free newspaper which appears to generate most of its revenue from advertisements for prostitution"

I probably shouldn't rise to this bait, but this is simply untrue.

"What credibility [WW] had seven to ten or more years ago has been blown in no small part due to ridiculous things like this rating by lobbyist (?!) goof they do."

If our credibility was blown seven to ten years ago, it cannot be blamed on our Good, Bad and Awful. We have been publishing this survey for 34 years.

That's it. I'll slip on my Kevlar now.

Marc, the credibility gap which most bothers me is that all of us were supposed to be shocked that the information about Goldschmidt had been transmitted verbally at a Christmas party, therefore Kulongoski was so responsible for that not being reported that he deserved to be ambushed at a military funeral.

As someone who has worked in Mandatory Reporter positions (education and child care), I know that is baloney. When I most recently worked in child care, the employer had a form (like the forms for accident reporting, parent permission for someone other than themselves--such as a grandparent--to pick up their child, and other such forms) for mandatory reporting of suspected abuse. The procedure was to fill out the form if one spotted suspected abuse, then call the supervisor, then the supervisor would make sure all the information on the form was complete---that way, all needed information would be on paper before calling to report the suspected abuse.

It is not some fluff to be passed off at a party. I wondered why the parents and other adults in that girl's life back in the days when the abuse was going on were not held accountable, but we were supposed to believe that the Gov. was supposed to take second hand hearsay at a party and give it to authorities. If anyone actually had the sort of information used in Mandatory Reporting, they should have called DHS or whoever themselves, not made a big political flap over it.

How is that bill this session to finally make Teacher Standards and Practices employees Mandatory Reporters?
I was shocked to learn they weren't in that category already.

With regard to quality legislators, I neglected to mention other talented freshmen I have encountered this session: notably Jefferson Smith, Brent Barton, Greg Matthews.

And yes I know this is a Portland-centric survey, but if Democrats are so stupid they don't elevate Peter Buckley to either legislative leadership or higher office, it really will be time to question the wisdom of Portland Democrats (the folks who seem to think they have all the answers). Peter Buckley is a star of this session, even if he does live in the southern end of the state.

Trying to assess legislator performance based on the opinion of lobbyists is like asking jackals to rate the hunting skills of the lions around the watering hole.

Yeah, that was pretty much the bottom line. You think he was suggesting that it be fixed?

Is the axiom, "if it has no merit, ignore it", in the political lexicon, or is importance always directly proportional to air-time?

They all suck. Any more elaboration is an indulgence.

" but situational ethics has always been Kari's strength.

You can't be hepped up about the Democratic Party without it, TJ!

As a fan of BO I was disappointed by the effort to skew the results of WW's biennial rating of metro-are lawmakers. And, as someone who conducted three Good, Bad & Awful surveys for WW in the '90s, I wanted to address some of the concerns here.

First, let's lighten up on the lobbyist-bashing. Lobbyists are a dirty word until you need one to go after corporate polluters, defend the rights of gays & lesbians or advocate for the First Amendment. Not everyone is Salem is shilling for Big Tobacco. Second: like it or not, the lobbyists are often the most informed people in Salem and, with a few exceptions, I have found them to be less partisan than staffers and lawmakers, as they have to work with everyone. Third: lobbyists are only a part of the survey. When I was at WW we always made an effort to include elected officials, staffers and members of the media. In fact, the roster of BO contributors includes at least three people who (gasp!) filled out GB&A surveys for me. I'm not privy to the current list, but it's possible Nigel might be talking to, heaven help us, a blogger! If you don't like the process, your efforts here aren't part of the solution.

John Schrag News-Times Forest Grove