It's always entertaining when a candidate gets together with a bunch of bloggers someplace where caffeine and WiFi are served. Chris Bell did so last night at the Daily Grind in the Heights, and we proceeded to have a good conversation. Progressive Texan was among the laptop brigade, and he liveblogged the event. Stace, who has a photo, and The Muse have also written about it so far.

As Progressive texan noted, the first question Bell got was from me about whether he thought Strayhorn or Friedman was the bigger threat to take away Democratic votes from him. Bell clearly believes it's Strayhorn, and while I continue to worry about Friedman's cult of personality allure, I can't argue with that approach. One thing Bell discussed in answering my question was the nature of the polling data that we have so far. As you know, I have some problems with the likely voter models that SurveyUSA is using. I can't say what Rasmussen and Zogby Interactive are doing, but their results are generally similar to those of SUSA, so my assumption is they're determining likely voters in a similar way. It's interesting that none of these three are "traditional" polling outfits. SUSA and Rasmussen use automated call technology, while Zogby is a modified online poll. I keep wondering when an outfit like Gallup will jump in. I'd really love to know how - or if - they differ from the newer style polls.

Be that as it may, we had a loose and lively chat. I recommend you read Stace's post for Bell's discussion of immigration - I found it pretty refreshing, and I daresay I wasn't the only one at the table to think so. I believe Team Bell is planning something like this for the Austin blog crowd soon, which ought to be entertaining.

Finally, on a side note, Bell also got some good reviews from the locals in recent visits to Tyler and Amarillo.

UPDATE: PDiddie weighs in.

UPDATE: Eye on Williamson wasn't there, but he has a few thoughts anyway.