He did it, he crowdsourced it. Virg Bernero doused social media sites on Tuesday with a hot cup of gubernatorial bid mulling juice.

On Tuesday at around noon, Bernero posted to his Twitter account: �Compelled by folks around the state to run for governor. What do you think?� The tweet was almost instantly re-tweeted by the Vote Virg account, and then by Patrick McAlvey, Bernero�s former '09 mayoral campaign manager.

In his tweet, Bernero provided a link to his Facebook page where his �friends� and supporters could leave comments about whether he should run.  And it's not as if he�s going to get any �no, don�t run� posts on his Facebook page; it�s like taking a poll of your most staunch supporters and asking if they support you. 
All 20 commentors (so far) gave supportive sentiments, and 24 people �liked� the mayor�s Facebook post.

�Wow! As a Canadian and an autoworker who follows your work � the way you stood up for the working class on those awesome YouTube videos. If I had a vote I would say, �definitely.� You can speak for, and act on behalf of the working class and make a difference on both sides of the border!!� wrote Kim Pembleton.

�Run like the wind Virg! You can be for Michigan what Cory Booker will be for New Jersey � � wrote Christopher Howard, referring to the mayor of Newark.

Compare those responses to the ones local politico Joe DiSano got last Wednesday when he posted the question �Is Virg Bernero running for governor? Discuss �� on his Facebook. DiSano got 25 responses (so far), and not all of them were supportive of Bernero, and some didn�t see Bernero considering a run.

�Yes,� was the succinct response from Byrum and Fisk PR man Thomas Morgan.

�Nope. (Bernero) was in DC for the auto coalition. Mayors of Wixom, Ferndale and a bunch of other communities were also in DC, and none of them are running for Governor either. I think Virg wants to be Mayor of Lansing,� wrote Ingham County commissioner Andy Schor, positing a reasonable, but ultimately wrong, answer.

Some people were foaming at the mouth for Bernero.
�God, I hope so. I�ll definitely be on his bandwagon,� wrote Matt Wojcik.

I�d bet that this social media vetting isn�t going to weigh much on Virg�s decision whether to run � he probably made up his mind to do so months ago. But, it�s kind of funny watching the opinions of Virg�s supporters pile up, making it look like there are a whole lot of people supportin� Virg Bernero.

In an alternate corner of the Internet universe, commentors on newspaper Web sites have been largely against a Bernero '10 run, but those people probably are not "friends" with him on Facebook.