Google HeyJohn.org, a short-lived but curiously influential political blog, can still be seen in Google's cache.

I received a note from Jill Miller Zimon about the Ohio2006 blog, written by someone who goes by the alias Yellow Dog Sammy. He's a local artist and former attorney, a Democrat, whose identity is apparently well known among bloggers in Ohio.

This is a pretty impressive site, especially for a one-man operation. It's very rich and deep -- although I believe it proves rather than disproves my point about a local newspaper being the only logical place to find information about the truly local races like city council, school board, etc.

Someone else reminded me that alternative weeklies frequently dig deep into local races, filling a void left by the traditional daily. One example: the San Francisco Bay Guardian offers a variety of podcasts about local races. Here's an example. Also, the Bay Guardian has podcast some of its meetings with local candidates.

Finally, a note about another political blog this season: HeyJohn.org went up on Thursday, Nov. 19, criticizing John Kerry for maintaining a campaign account of more than $13 million and not donating enough of the money to Democratic candidates in a very tight election year. By Sunday, the anonymous site had been mentioned on several key political blogs, in a story by AP, on CNN, in the Boston Globe and on This Week with George Stephanopoulus -- who confronted Kerry about whether he had made large enough campaign contributions to his fellow Democrats.

Fast-forward to Wednesday -- less than one week after the blog launched -- and Kerry's campaign fund made an additional $500,000 donation to Democratic causes from his campaign account.

Coincidence? Dunno -- but HeyJohn.org disappeared shortly before the donation.