"What are you doing?" said my husband, glancing into my office.

"Senatorial calculations," I answered absently, doing another Web search. "According to Wikipedia there were 35 US Senate elections last November. I went through their table and determined that there were thirteen new senators -- well, twelve. There's still uncertainty about Al Franken."

I put another note on my list and added, "It's been over a month since they were sworn in and we're  supposed to be all about transparent government now. I've got a list of eleven senators -- I'm excusing Minnesota's Al Franken and Illinois' Roland Burris -- and I'm going to see how many of them managed to get a Web site up in a month, or three months if you want to go back to November."

"I guess you don't think this'll be tough to figure out," my husband said.

"Absolutely not. Senate.gov has a listing, and you can Google the names, of course. In fact, I'm on my last one -- here we are. John Barrasso of Wyoming is a resounding yes. That makes ... hmm.. eight new senators with a Web site (though Jeff Merkley of Oregon admits his is still temporary) and three without."

"Who's without?"

"Senator Mark Udall of Colorado, Senator Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, and Senator Kay Hagan of North Carolina."

"Kay Hagan?"

"Yup. She has that temporary one-page listing, with phone numbers and contact information, but there's nothing available like press releases or speaking videos or Q&As."

My husband was quiet for a minute and said mildly, "You know, there's a lot going in the country and the government right now.  Maybe they're not thinking that a Web site is the top priority. The economy is crashing, there are diplomatic issues, the housing market --"

I glanced over at him as he pulled up a chair and settled in. "That was kind of my point when I started looking into this." I waved at the screen as he made an interrogative noise. "You're right -- the economy is crazy, there are still wars going on, and the peanut butter's gone bad. Kay Hagan is one of my representatives for the US Senate. I want to know what she's doing and what she thinks of these issues. It would be nice if she had voting records and Senate testimony on her Web site. I'm absolutely certain that she's representing North Carolina as best she can. But in times like these, I want a place where my representative lets me know what's going on and what she's doing."

"And warns you not to eat the peanut butter."

"Well, I know not to eat the peanut butter. But where is she on the bailout bill? Does she have any better ideas? Does she have any long-term ideas for our economy? Does she agree with President Obama on his proposals?"

"I don't know if she agrees with Obama, but she might not agree with you."

"Who cares? I'm not expecting her to agree with me on everything. I just want to know how she's representing North Carolina without having to set information traps at Google News and looking for reprinted press releases. I mean, if she just posted her press releases at senatorhagan.blogspot.com . It would take two minutes to set up the site and it's free."

"And it's non-government servers."

Sighing, I said, "You're right." I looked at Google News for a few minutes and finally said, "You know, this is all Virginia Foxx's fault."

"Who?"

"She's a US Congresswoman from the NC Fifth District. She has a Twitter account which I follow, a dynamic Web site, and a YouTube account AND a Flickr account! I saw her video about the increased national debt, I know she recently spoke about the GOP opposition to the stimulus package, I know she was at a Winston-Salem Golden Corral for an event on February 2nd, I know she felt like she might be getting the flu this past week -- and she's not even my representative!"

My husband blinked. "The flu?"

"Okay, knowing she has a bug is probably unnecessary. But look at all the rest of it. She is setting an AMAZING standard for communicating with her constituents.
And they get to communicate back -- there are comments on her YouTube videos, and people send her @virginiafoxx Twitter messages. Seeing that level of communication from her makes me want it from my actual representatives. That's what I mean when I say this is all her fault."

My husband glanced over my shoulder at http://twitter.com/virginiafoxx . "Do you want Kay Hagan to have all this stuff? The Twitter account and the YouTube and all that?"

"Not necessarily. She can if she wants to and I think that'd be great. But at the moment just a Web site. One step at a time."

"And in the meantime?"

"And in the meantime I go back to Google News and search for intitle:hagan location:nc "kay hagan" and get the news stories sent to my in-box. Like you said, there's a lot going on."

ADDENDUM: Whoops! I am informed that I left out two new Senators. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand was appointed to take the place of Secretary of State Clinton for the state of New York. She was appointed on January 23 and as yet does not have a Senate Web site. (In fact, if I'm reading the URL of her placeholder Web site correctly, she doesn't even have a Senate.gov subdomain.) Senator Ted Kaufman, who took the senate seat of Vice President Joe Biden, does have a Web site. Here's the amusing thing about Senator Kaufman's site, though: if you search Google for Senator Ted Kaufman (no quotes), you'll get his Duke University faculty page first, before his Senate Web site. Apologies for leaving those two out.