U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan has launched both a YouTube channel and a Twitter account to chronicle her work in the U.S. Senate.

For now, her last Tweet is from "the office of Sen. Kay Hagan," with updates posted by staff. Example: "welcoming a great group of North Carolinians for this week's Carolina Coffee," Barb Barrett reports.

Hagan had a campaign Twitter account last year, posting about her platform, her daily travels and occasional jabs at the competition ("This is what a Republican-run, special interest-based economy looks like," she tweeted a year ago.)

Her YouTube channel has a pair of videos so far. One welcomes viewers; the other features her biography.

"Tools like YouTube and Twitter will allow me and my office to share information about the most pressing issues facing North Carolina and our country and keep constituents updated about the latest news in the Senate," Hagan said in a statement. "North Carolinians can use these tools to keep up with me while I am in Washington and traveling across the state."

Also on Twitter:

Sen. Richard Burr's campaign

Rep. Virginia Foxx

Rep. Sue Myrick

Rep. Patrick McHenry

Rep. Walter Jones 

Update: Post includees Rep. Walter Jones' Twitter feed, which was inadvertently left off the list.  

Gov. Beverly Perdue called on state employees to think of ways to save the state money.

In a YouTube video posted Wednesday, Perdue said she is serious about wanting to hear ways the state could be more efficient.

"I want to learn from you," Perdue said. "That's what I mean when I talk about being a hands-on governor."

Sounding just a bit like a gameshow host, Perdue said money-saving tips could mean "cash prizes" or more time off for state employees. She said one state employee received $3,000 for an idea to put state phone directories on a disk, rather than printing them. The idea saved $16,000, she said.

She also took credit for leading the fight to save the state from devastating cuts in the recently adopted state budget.

"Although some employee positions are being eliminated, I know and you know that things could have been far worse without all of our efforts."

E-mail Lesson #27: If you are going to forward a YouTube video, watch it first.

An administrative aide to state Rep. Laura Wiley learned the hard way, after she sent out a video critical of President Barack Obama featuring pictures of German SS officers at Auschwitz, the Nazi death camp, Joe Neff reports.

The email, sent from a General Assembly e-mail account, eventually landed in the inbox of Adam Searing, the director of the Health Access Coalition at the N.C. Justice Policy Center.

Searing, an advocate for affordable and universal health care, said he was offended for professional and personal reasons.

"My great uncle on my mom's side — Everett Peterson — died on Omaha Beach on June 6th 1944 in Normandy fighting those guys in the photos," Searing said. "He didn't die so that 65 years later somebody could equate the evil he fought and defeated with a policy proposal to expand health coverage."

More after the jump.

   Comments (8)

* Conservative Civitas Institute finds 50 percent support, 36 percent oppose the $789 billion stimulus package in poll of 600 voters conducted Feb. 16-19.

* Gov. Beverly Perdue says $466 million in stimulus package spending on roads and bridges will create about 14,000 jobs in North Carolina.

* U.S. Sen. Richard Burr chosen to give the response to President Obama's weekly radio address; will be posted on YouTube. 

* Charlotte Observer columnist Jack Betts says voters liked Jim Hunt's "can-do approach" to education, etc., while they liked Jesse Helms' penny-pinching. 

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole's latest ad was an Internet sensation.

The ad, which criticizes Democratic rival Kay Hagan for a fundraiser hosted by an atheist, was added early Wednesday morning to Under the Dome's YouTube channel. Another copy was on Dole's own YouTube channel.

By the end of the day, the ad had been viewed 145,000 times on the Dome channel, making it the 21st most viewed channel and one of the day's top videos. It was seen another 20,000 times on Dole's channel, for a total of 165,000 times.

By contrast, the "Rocking Chairs" ad from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee has been seen a total of about 102,496 times on five different channels on YouTube.

The N.C. Republican Party's "Extreme" ad linking Barack Obama's former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, to Democratic gubernatorial candidates Beverly Perdue and Richard Moore, has been seen about 448,811 times on five channels.

Correction: An earlier version of the post misstated the numbers.

Dan Besse used YouTube to talk about his record in depth.

The failed Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor had a long history of working behind the scenes on progressive causes, but it was not easy to translate that into a 30-second TV ad.

So Besse used slightly longer YouTube videos to get the word out.

In "Dan Besse: for a safer, cleaner, more livable NC," a partly animated two-minute video, the narrator explains his work as an environmental lawyer to stop four nuclear power plants proposed for Wake County in the 1980s.

Filmed by Winston-Salem activist Frank Eaton, the video cleverly explains how Besse worked on a bill that put the financial responsibility for construction costs back on power companies — a message that would have to be diluted in a typical 30-second ad.

Since it was posted on Feb. 17, the video got 9,976 views. Besse's next-most-watched video, which shows Besse running while his achievements flash on the screen, used techniques more typical of a TV ad and was far less effective, getting only 1,016 views since being posted on Dec. 18.

The nuclear video still didn't get as many hits as Besse needed to turn around the race, but it is a model for how lesser-funded candidates can use YouTube.

A YouTube video for Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor Dan Besse got a moderate number of views, but it was not enough to help his campaign.

Richard Moore's YouTube attacks didn't work.

The Democratic gubernatorial candidate put several videos on the popular video-sharing site attacking his rival Beverly Perdue, but none of them got the viral attention his campaign needed.

The most-watched video, "Rush Hour in New Bern," backfired, costing Moore $50,000 of his own money when The Eagles objected to its use of a copyrighted song.

After it was reposted without the song, that video got 2,065 views by Election Day.

Another video, "Bev Perdue Explains Gutting the State Abortion Fund," got 909 views, while "Bev Perdue & Highway Trust Fund transfers" got 531 views.

Perdue also posted YouTube videos attacking Moore, but she later pulled them as part of her pledge to campaign positively.

Still, the videos cost next-to-nothing to make, so Dome predicts they will soon become a staple of North Carolina campaigns.

Unity Watch: The videos are still up on YouTube, and Moore did not attend Perdue's event with Gov. Mike Easley. Republican gubernatorial nominee Pat McCrory's competitors, however, swiftly smoothed over their differences.

A YouTube video by Democratic gubernatorial candidate Richard Moore attacked Beverly Perdue over a bridge project in New Bern, but the ad backfired when The Eagles objected to the use of a song.

Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton made two of the same points.

In speeches to the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner, both Democratic presidential candidates said they were appalled at the conditions at Fort Bragg.

A 10-minute YouTube video put together by the father of an 82nd Airborne paratrooper showed mold, peeling paint and broken plumbing at the barracks near Fayetteville.

Both candidates said that the conditions were not acceptable for returning veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan.

In their speeches, both candidates also said that they would work for each other, even using oddly similar language.

Clinton said she would "work my heart out" if Obama is the nominee, while Obama said he would support Clinton "in a heartbeat."