The Buffalo Pundit FAQ 1.5

1. Who are you?
I’m Alan Bedenko, a lawyer working in Buffalo and living in its suburbs. I have a wife, two kids, a house, and two cats.

2. Can I hire you as a lawyer?
Nope.

3. How can I contact you?
buffalopundit[at]gmail.com

4. Will you post items sent to you by other people?
Generally not unsolicited ones. When I take a break, I will invite people to guest blog. If you’d like to be considered, you should have a body of work that I can review to determine whether you’d be a good fit. Email me at the answer to number 3, above. You’re welcome to send me anything else you have, but I can’t promise you anything.

5. When did you start this blog?
In September 2003 as the “WNY for Wesley Clark” blog. When Clark left the campaign in March 2004, it morphed later that year into Buffalo Pundit, focusing more on local goings on than national ones. The Clark blog still exists at http://wny4clark.blogspot.com.

6. Why do you blog?
I like to write, I like to have an outlet to express my opinion, and I like to advocate for and against things. This is purely a hobby, and although I am grateful for the traffic and attention I get on a daily basis, I’d still be doing this even if I got 10 people reading it per day.

7. What are your favorite topics?
I don’t really have any. There’s so much material from which to select when writing a post, I guess it’s safest to say that whatever I post about is my favorite topic of that minute. I do tend to gravitate to posts about cars or international politics when I get bored or frustrated with more local, political topics. Which is frequent.

8. What topics get the most attention?
That’s hard to say. Sometimes I’m quite surprised by the topics that generate comments while others don’t. I do recall that a very old post about Wal*Mart, and the Ron Paul posts from earlier this year got well over 100 comments. Topics about the Outer Harbor and Inner Harbor also tend to generate interest.

9. You’ve got a big mouth, why not put your money where that mouth is and run for office if you think you know everything?
Well, I tried that and didn’t do too well.

10. What’s your take on city versus suburb?
I think that all of the communities of WNY, as defined for me by the 8th Judicial District, sink or swim together. We should be working together for solutions that will help to lift all of WNY up from its economic depression, and not pit one community here against another. The suburb/city divide is one of the most idiotic anachronisms to still attract people’s attention, and I really cannot tolerate either side claiming to be superior over the other.

11. Why did you move here?
Have you seen what real estate and day care cost in Boston or the New York tri-state area? If you have a good job, living here is a no-brainer.

12. How can I get my site on your blogroll / links?
Shoot me an email. I generally ask that you provide my site with a reciprocal link.

13. Do you suffer fools gladly?
No.  Not at all.

14. You’re just an insane liberal psychopath aren’t you?
I’m actually pretty middle-of-the-road politically. I’m neither ultraliberal nor am I conservative.  What good does it do to throw labels around, exactly?

15. Favorite Buffalo Restaurant?
Right now, it’s O’Connell’s American Bistro in Kenmore Ave.  My favorite pizzas, however, are doled out at Trattoria Aroma, La Hacienda in Niagara Falls, Siena, and, the best, Zetti’s.

16. Whom do you speak for? Myself and no one else. Nothing I write here or anywhere else under the BuffaloPundit handle is attributable to anyone except myself, unless explicitly stated otherwise.