Armando's link is to my recent post about the revival of interest in a year-old post called "Right and left: my sad experience." The older of the two posts observes that "bloggers on the right link to [me] when they agree and ignore the disagreements, and the bloggers on the left link only for the things they disagree with, to denounce [me] with short posts saying [I'm] evil/stupid/crazy, and don't even seem to notice all the times [I've] written posts that take their side."
Interest in that post was revived, as I explained in the post Armando linked to, when Crank at RedState wrote about how he thought a lot about what I'd said and wanted Republicans to remember that they need to engage and include the centrists and liberal hawks who are the source of their majority power.
[F]rom one issue controversy to the next, we may find ourselves on the opposite side from some of these folks. And therein lies the temptation to go the Kos path, and dissolve into spittle-spraying rage when people who are "supposed" to be on "our side" cross over and side against us. That's the situation where we need to think carefully about how harshly we go after people's motives, their intellectual integrity, etc. A ritual bridge-burning may be fun, but that's how you end up stranded on your own island.Quoting that passage, I add: "Hardcore Democrats ought to do the same, and not just because I like people to be nice to me."
You'd think that if Armando was going to bother to link to this, he'd respond to the point that matters so much: it's dysfunctional to alienate the people you need to win over in order to gain majority power. But, though he goes on for 725 words, it's all just about how angry he is at the Bush Administration and don't I ever think about why he's so angry?
Yeah, well, but you linked to me. Don't you ever think about why your side can't seem to win elections, despite all these deficiencies in the people you are so angry at? Can't you distinguish between them and people like me, who represent the votes you need to win? I agree with you on many issues. I've been a registered Democrat since I first started to vote, in 1972. I can count on one hand the Republicans I've voted for in my life, for any office. And that's giving a separate finger to Cheney. And go ahead and make a giving-the-finger-to-Cheney joke. I would laugh at it. I watch every episode "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report." You think I'm not worth engaging, because you're angry at Bush? Are elections not worth winning because you're angry at Bush? Just exactly who is theoretically not stupid?
Oh, but, wow, a Kos link -- that must bring a lot of traffic, right? No, my friends. It does not. Less than 2% of my traffic is coming from that Kos link right now, and I've got no active -lanches at the moment. I'm getting more traffic from Google and from Glenn Reynolds' blogroll. Meanwhile, there are more than 300 comments on Armando's post. Wouldn't want to leave the echo-y comfort zone. The echo-y comfort zone of rage.
And then there's this guy, who seems to think that when I said "Hardcore Democrats ought to do the same, and not just because I like people to be nice to me" I was really only talking about how I wanted people to be nice to me. And so it goes.
Posts
94 comments:
Dealing with the Kos crowd is interesting.
I have noticed that "rightwingers" (as the Kossites label anyone at the drop of the hat) tend to have better arguments and reasoning. The Kossite's arguments too often seem to come down to "nah nah nah nah nah" with their hands over their ears.
And no, they really don't understand how to win over moderates. Instead they label someone like you as a jack-booted thug. Sad, isn't it?
It's my experience on this site, Ann, that the most vitriolic comments come from the Kos crowd. I think you posted once that the opposite was true, that we right-wingers actually treated you worse. (Quoxxo oughtta be along soon and demand hard, analytical proof.) Maybe I just see what I want to see but, regardless, elections aren't won by being angry. Take it from this former Clinton agonista who should probably be going through a 12 step program to get just get over it. We got nowhere with our Clinton rage. I think the same thing can be said about the Bush bashers.
I've had a similar experience as a blog reader. The tone of the left-leaning blogs makes me want to have nothing to do with those people, even though I probably agree with them on a large number of issues. (My voting record is quite similar to yours.) I wouldn't trust people with that nasty and self-defeating a frame of mind -- and with that idiotic an approach to recent presidential campaigns -- to manage my government. As time goes on, the New Left attitude of the 60s, the attitude of continual outraged protest, of always taking the critical, outsiders' stance, seems more and more obsolete and dysfunctional. The culture wars of the 90s were fun, but that was a mere family quarrel compared to the threats that now face our whole civilization, a civilization that university-educated people, for a generation now, have been trained to condemn while idealizing all others.
As Robert Frost said (quoted the other day on YARGB, I believe), "A liberal is someone who won't fight for his own side."
I love that in the comment thread of the Kos post you linked above, commenters started turning on Armando for being insufficiently liberal and not supporting Chavez, supporting Iraq I, etc. (which he talks about in the post, briefly).
And I don't remember Ann saying that *her* conservative comenters were worse, just the one's who tend to collect like condensation on the underbelly of sites like LGF (my words). Honestly, I have no defense for these types either.
Aren't a great many right-leaning bloggers actually reformed liberals? I'm thinking of Glenn Reynolds, Michael Totten, Roger Simon, Ann Althouse, etc.
If you've been on both sides of the debate, you probably know that reasonable people can reach different conclusions, and it's awfully hard to dismiss a position as "stupid" when you've taken the same stance in the past.
Pete said..."It's my experience on this site, Ann, that the most vitriolic comments come from the Kos crowd. I think you posted once that the opposite was true, that we right-wingers actually treated you worse."
No. I've repeatedly said that the left treats me badly, and anyone reading the comments here can see that on nearly a daily basis.
Oh, Steve just reminded me! Yes, the LGF minions were much more abusive to me than any of the lefties have ever been. That is definitely the case! That was when Charles Johnson indicated to them that they should attack me, and they did. I don't harbor any fantasies that rightwingers have a special program of catering to me or that any current kindness proves anything more than a clear perception of self-interest. As for the lefties, I'm mostly complaining about their failure to see self-interest. But, personally, I like civility and rationality, whether it's a means or an end in itself.
Truly: Armando's post was not itself an attack on me. It was an attempt to explain why the nastiness exists in other posts. That's why I felt moved to answer him. I ignore the outright attacks. There is no use giving them attention. It only makes it worse. I've definitely learned that.
Another thing about Kos is that they've built their popularity out of a certain tone, which excites their readers. Where is their self-interest: in keeping and building their readership or in helping Democrats get elected? There's a real conflict of interest there, and Democrats should be very worried about it.
I find it interesting that a link from Daily Kos doesn't generate much traffic for you. I wonder how the click-through compares when, say, Glenn links to a lefty blog.
So many people keep on saying "Kos" and "the Democratic Party" in the same post (occasionally here, more often in other blogs). Just how representative of the left in general or the Democratic Party in particular do we feel Kos Kommenters are? I don't know if I'd label them as "representative" at all; it seems to me as though they're just a marginal group, albeit a really loud one.
Is it really fair to saddle Democrats with the weight of the Kossacks? It seems to me like they're the embarrasing uncle the Dems would like to lock in the attic; they're related by blood, or in this case by being on the same side of the political spectrum, but really, they're no more related than that.
While the intelligentsia kernel of the left is rooted in objectivism
Uh . . . do you perhaps mean "objectivity?" Objectivism is generally considered pretty darn right-wing these days. Ayn Rand and all that.
And I'd dispute the characterisation of conservative vs. liberal arguments, but I'd also dispute the argument that all the good arguments are on the Right too. It's just that you won't find good arguments on the Daily Kos, because arguments are not their thing. Rage is.
It seems to me like they're the embarrasing uncle the Dems would like to lock in the attic; they're related by blood, or in this case by being on the same side of the political spectrum, but really, they're no more related than that.
I hope that's correct. I don't think it is, though -- major Democratic politicians, like Ted Kennedy and John Kerry, have basically endorsed Daily Kos by putting their own postings up on there, haven't they? Admittedly, those two are from Massachusetts, but there are probably other politicians who have done the same. On the whole, I think there's a sense that DKos represents the authentic, frustrated, impotent rage of a substantial slice of their base -- indeed, what in better times might have been the best part of their base (young, politically engaged, etc.)
Kos is all about his fifteen minutes and some short term cash. The Dems already have his readers' votes, but they'll always take more money.
Kos can't moderate his shtick without losing dollars.
If I were trying to brand a new left of center blog, I'd try to get share in the center, and then, and only then, drift left.
That's Dean's and the the Dem's problem. They can't hold share in the middle.
"It's fun."
That says it all (from the Kos poster). Not all Dems, but certainly the crowd over there, is all about fun, anarchy, behaving badly with no retribution. Bush is their perfect foil; if a Dem got elected, they'd be lost.
As for mainstreaming their hate, Al Gore is over in Saudi Arabia today denouncing his country to our "allies." Kos would be proud. http://powerlineblog.com/archives/013130.php
Conservative bloggers link to you to say they agree. Liberal bloggers link to you to say they disagree. You want the left to engage you.
You are a lifelong democrat just temporarily forced to vote for Bush.
Let's flip that around.
How frequently do you link to liberal bloggers on liberal issues to agree with them on "liberal issues"? How frequently do you link to conservative bloggers to disagree with them on "conservative issues"?
When honest, earnest, liberal commenters in your own threads ask you to look at the various legal posts that would apparently contradict your beliefs, how often do you look? How often do you not look with explanations of "oh that person is partisan", or "I don't have time to do the research", or "you would have to pay me to do that legal research?"
When "liberal" bloggers that are widely read and respected and have a background in journalism, or the law, and that are quoted and sourced by the NYTimes or the WAPO bring up objections to the policies of this administration, how many posts have you devoted to examine their cases?
When "liberal" law professors write letters and petitions to the administration about their policies, how often do you post on those letters and the legal issues that are contained in there?
Conservative bloggers link to you to say they agree. Liberal bloggers link to you to say they disagree.
You rarely engage with liberal commenters or liberal bloggers or liberal law professors.
What is the simplest explanation that would explain these observations?
You claim to be a moderate, although at other times, you proudly run to be voted "conservative blog diva".
How would Occam characterize you? How would your therapist characterize you?
Ann, embrace your inner republican, embrace that you are a privileged, white woman with a prestigious job that lives quite unlike 99% of America. It's okay and you will feel much less conflicted about your self.
Re Henry's theory that posters on Left sites simply represent a younger crowd - I've been surprised at how frequently posters I assumed were still in high school were older than my mom. Part of the reason Sheehan is so excruciating is because she sounds about fifteen.
The need to imagine they are bravely facing down a Nazi-like foe means that it's super important for even people like Ann to sport fangs. I have no idea why they don't feel silly yet.
Amazing how much brain research there has been recently that go a "fur piece" to explaining some of this.
The "Journal of Personality and Social Psychology", for example, has published research about how mediocre we are at actually evaluating the tone and meaning of e-mails (and I think one can reasonably extend the point to other types of cybercommunication, at least for the purposes of discussion). A "Wired" reporter ponders this today.
HAH!--vh: vctmnes
(Of our hard-wiring? Or what?)
I think it's the right-wing crazies who function as the crazy aunt in the attic: eveybody knows she's there, she's basically under control, every few years she gets out and runs around naked in the back yard and they drag her back in.
The Kos problem - the generalized problem of dishonest rage and dissent - that's more like a termite problem. For the whole country, unfortunately, not just the Democrats.
"....I’ve noticed the exact opposite. While the intelligentsia kernel of the left is rooted in objectivism, the philosophy of the right, seems to me, to be steeped in religious precepts....."
Hmm, what precepts do you mean? Certainly alot of religious rprecepts such as "original sin" are more than jsut religious doctrines.
I think that liberals have a flawed and overly optimistic view of human psychology. I think they often discount human nature or just refuse to acknowledge it. Instead liberals rely on a sense of relative justice and relative fairness (a mostly emotional point of view). As long as everyone is in the same boat both culturally and economically) then things are okay. Thus, liberals will be satisfied with a poor society as long as everyone in the society is poor (i.e. equal).
Conservatives on the other hand reject relative fairness as a sham and instead accept the notion of a truth (or original sin if you want to be religious).
Democratic societies tends drift left because the liberal arguement is mostly based on emotion and most humans tend to look to their emotions first and their reasoning second when deciding issues.
But Armando, you're simply restating what drives us crazy about your approach:
We disagree with the analysis, on substantive grounds, that the Bush administration is as supremely, uniquely evil and incompetent as you insist. And it is usually impossible to get the kinds of people who read your site to engage that disagreement honestly.
Honesty: that's the key. It's not tone. It's substance, related to intellectual honesty.
It isn't that we love W, or praise all he's done. It's just that we see a lot of ambiguity and dilemmas in the decisions he's faced - and that any president would have faced.
It's quite confusing. I always thought my left was all about embracing ambiguity. But in this new political context, any serious admission of ambiguity - on the Iraq war decision and dilemma, especially - would mean for the average Kos reader that total outrage is perhaps not justified. And they can't handle that.
That's how it seems.
I found Armando's apology quite gracious, and I think it should be viewed by commenters here in the spirit in which it was intended. I personally don't see the implication that his only his tone is a justifiable one, at least not in this particular comment.
But then, I could be wrong.
(And y'all really should check out that Wired article.)
Maybe at Kos they work off the theory that rather than catching flies with honey, it's best to use piles of rotting flesh and excrement.
I say let them enjoy their excrement, rotting flesh loving flies, I'll hang out with the honey loving flies.
As far as the speculation about KosKids being indiscrete due to youth and that youthful commmenters are more likely to be left-leaning, I think the opposite is true, when I hear left-leaning commenters I hear people trying to hold onto past hippie glories, and when I hear right-leaning glories I hear people with open eyes who have grown up since the Reagan Revolution.
But that's just my opinion, ignore it or accept it at will.
I do fine Armando's assumption that this whole post was just a whine about being bashed by the left instructive.
And I love how quxxo attempted for most of a post to sort of sound reasonable (and no lengthy quotes or links, that must be a record) only to devolve into the usual accusations of racism and worse privilege (since when has achievement, and the fruits of achievement been a dirty word)
And I know quxxo will claim that he wasn't calling Prof. Althouse racist when he said, "Ann, embrace your inner republican, embrace that you are a privileged, white woman with a prestigious job that lives quite unlike 99% of America. It's okay and you will feel much less conflicted about your self." but Republican, privileged, and white woman are all lefty code words for racist nowadays.
Also the majority of Americans of every description live in middle class comfort or better, but the left has to try and stir class conflict (and smother those conflicts in racial tension sauce) so everyone that's a homeowner or professional becomes white, privileged, and worst of all Republican.
Henry:
I actually agree with you, and not because I consider politics a 'circus' but because it's something almost sacred to me.
I don't apologise for being a tool of the vast right wing conspiracy :), but I'd like to think that I always pay folks on the other side of the fence the basic courtesy of assuming until proved otherwise that they are decent and honourable people who hold their views in good faith.
Now that doesn't mean all political discourse has to be reduced to bland, group therapy mush. My left-wing friends and I have profound and fundamental political differences, but you've got a draw a line when blogs give space to folks heaping obscene abuse on Martha-Ann Alito's wife for crying during the hearings or 'joking' about poisoning Justice Stevens.
There may be nothing more annoying than use of the word "heh," like that, Armando. It's smug to the max. it just makes me want to wash my hands and disengage. It captures the moral superiority that is so off-putting. It sure as hell better be backed up by being 100% accurate, capeche? And beleive me: you're not talking to anyone here who knows less about all this than you.
The Iraq war is the center of it all, of course.
Yes, to the extent that the Republicans and conservative analysts were and are willing to confront the fact of the dilemma tne situation presented in 2002 and 2003, there was greater intellectual honesty there.
I would agree that the Republicans should have been more honest at contronting doability and consequences. I'm angry at W for that. But on the central issue: more honesty.
Again: The situation presented an unsolveable, no-good-solutions dilemma; you and the Kos-left pretended it did not and that there was and is absolutely no conceivable justification for it.
I (we) disagree strongly on that, which leads to major disagreement on how we should talk about and deal with the situation given the irreversible reality that we're there.
Andrew S would disagree that there was a potential justification for the war? That it was a dilemma? The fact that you say that means you're not hearing me, for whatever reason.
Oh: Maybe you don't use "evil." But the tone and equivalent words are everywhere on the Kos left. I don't see the point in denying that.
It's all about separating one's rage at W from a dispassionate analysis of what we faced and face as a nation. The Kos left has decided to stop doing that.
twm -
No.
The question you asked on Iraq is the beginning of an endless debate. But at least it's a beginning. Glad to have you on board. Probably the first step would be sorting out what you believe was said to push the war from what was actually said, the meat of the arguments actually made.
On "evil" and its uses at Kos: whatever. My characterization of the "Kos left" is perhaps sloppy; I don't mean to indict the site, but the personality and approach to politics I see in the people drawn to that rage at the site.
PS: Yes, these have almost all been civil in comparison to the times I've tried to post a comment, at Atrios for example. "Why don't you stop humping Bush's leg" is a typical starting point.
Not at all. I am saying that our tone does not spring from thin air and that it would be helpful to the discussion, if one is really possible, to acknowledge from where our tone stems.
I think the problem here, though, is that back in the 90s, when it was the Right that fed off of vitriol and vituperation, they said pretty much the exact same thing. The fact that you are pissed of for a reason does not make that reason at all compelling to other people, any more than the fact that today, Muslims are rioting in large numbers on account of a few cartoons published in a Danish paper pushes the rest of us towards iconoclasm. If anything, it provokes an opposing counter-reaction.
Now, it is helpful to acknowledge whence your tone stems. But I suspect it's not helpful to your side.
And was what was said then accurate?
There's no one answer to the quick series of questions you pose here. Some things were accurate, some things were inaccurate, some things were accurate so far as they went but lacked precision, some things were weighted more heavily than they should have been and so forth.
Another small point, I suppose, but it matters to me, is that within an array of answers, the inaccuracy--or imprecision--of one does not necessarily mean all the others are likewise inaccurate. This is where I tend to have a bone to pick with SOME of my more-left brethren.
Just as, on the other hand, the tendency to assume that because ONE answer is accurate, therefore it's more likely all the other ones are as well. That's my the bone I'd pick with SOME of my more-right brethren.
(Clearly, I'm part of the vast mediocre-middle. ; ) )
But you blame daily kos managment for some individual writings from a community of thousands of people.
Is that fair? I say it is not.
I can understand your point of view, though it's not where I fall. I guess I'd feel more comfortable with your stance on this particular point if, given that everyone's clear that there are abuses, some sort of clear comments policy was posted stating that such egregious excesses are unacceptable. That they're wrong. That the site hosts not only don't support those excesses, but disapprove of them.
Absent something like that, don't you think it's possible for others to have a certain point when they say that a tacit approval is being extended?
(And no, I'm not saying you should have a policy. I'm just explaining why and how it's possible to be skeptical as to how disapproving of egregious excess the hosts are.)
And like I say: IMO, the tone springs from endlessly internally supported dishonest/inaccurate substance.
I don't find the Left Blogosphere any more 'angry' than the Right Blogosphere. I think the confusion largely arises from mistaken attribution of ideological colors.
RIGHT: Tim Blair, LGF
CENTER: Instapundit, Althouse, Andrew Sullivan
LEFT: Daily Kos, Atrios, Crooks and Liars
Tim Blair's commenters are way more nasty than Daily Kossacks (Blair site was the only one, so far, to actually ban me for ideological reasons).
But because, in United States at least, Iraq War is the ultimate ideological lithmus test, all those centrists bloggers are automatically classified as right-wing.
But from my experience, an average Daily Kossack is way more tolerant and moderate than an average Tim Blair's redneck. It's just that the latter ones are quite rare, whereas Kossacks are VERY numerous.
Armando, I understand your point about substance driving your tone. But what is your response to the observation made by Professor Althouse and others here about the counterproductive EFFECT of that tone?
The problem is that the moderate voters you need are driven away by your hyper-angry tone (and by "you," I don't mean just you, but all the angry bloggers and commenters at places like Kos and DU.) To me, all that political vitriol is the Internet equivalent of the three-year-old who throws himself on the supermarket floor and screams because he wants candy, and then is genuinely surprised when the tantrum doesn't get him what he wants. But perhaps you see a rationale for the "tantrums" that I am missing.
Wouldn't it be worthwhile to strive for a more rational tone if it would help get you closer to the political victories you need? Or do you disagree that angry invective harms your cause politically by driving away voters who aren't quite as angry as you are?
Armando: Thanks for commenting. You have a different tone when you stop by here, and of course I prefer it. "Well, the fact is daily kos is not only a Democratic site, it is a rabidly partisan site committed to electing more Democrats." Please note that my comments are sincerely meant as advice on how to get more people to vote Democratic. I have a problem with the Kos presentation, and, as I've said, I think your interest in your own success as a blog conflicts with the interest in winning elections. You must know you have this problem.
Re the notion that privileged white women are destined to go Republican: You have no idea how funny that notion seems from my vantage point in Madison, Wisconsin, which is full of privileged white people who are horrified at the idea of voting Republican. Like many of them, I've spent my whole life voting according to my perception of the common good, and not for my own interests. I was doing that when I voted for Bush too. You may think I got that perception wrong, but I wasn't doing it for myself. My proof is that I've only ever voted for five Republicans in my life, Bush & Cheney, Ford and his VP (I remember who it was, but you don't care, do you?), and one other, not a presidential candidate.
Re how "my therapist" would categorize me: When did you stop beating your wife?
Henry, re detached and bemused: Aptly observed.
Re whether my commenters have been rude to Armando: I think there's more rudeness in this thread addressed to me.
No, my friends.
Awwww. You're my friend too, Ann.
Cheers,
Victoria
"So far Daily Kos has not damaged anything."
The whole approach to politics lost the 2004 election. Beyond that, maybe not much.
Well, moderate voters like me may not spend a lot of time at Daily Kos in particular. (It's quite true, I don't go there -- I have tried, and I just can't stand it.) But we hear plenty of the same sort of thing from such public figures as Cindy Sheehan and Michael Moore, and the more lurid Kos posts do tend to get reprinted and passed around by more centrist and right-wing bloggers -- so we see at least some of it.
Anyway, you didn't really answer the question. Do you think the vitriol helps you with anybody who isn't already committed to your cause? I'm not talking about influencing political leaders here -- I'm talking about influencing more moderate Democratic voters. These are the voters you need to enlist, if you ever hope to make the political leaders do what you think they should do. Isn't it something of a waste to make the most prominent and active Democratic blog into a place where moderate Democrats can't stand to go, instead of a place where constructive political growth might actually occur?
Regarding the liberal vs. conservative commentators debate, I've wondered if the difference is that conservatives, on average, are just older. So much of the vitriol, whether from Kos or LGF, reads like it's written by very young people.
It's possible.
But I've been a Conservative all my life, and am only 30 now.
I haven't changed that much in character since I was 7, although my personality has changed a bit.
IMO, your character determines your world view, but your personality determines your politics, so it's not easy to see how some people could change quite a lot.
Or perhaps, it may have something to do with the oft-quoted adage (Winston Churchill was it?), that said,
"Politics is not meant for the young"
Cheers,
Victoria
"The substance of what the Bush Administration has wrought is what has inspired our stridency and shrilness."
I don't buy this at all. The shrillness started immediately. It preceded 9/11, and barely missed a beat even then. It's like watching Muslims get "shrill" about the Danish cartoon, but not about terrorists who actually desecrate Islam. It's that same disconnect I feel from the Left - the outrage is so tendentious it's very difficult to take it seriously. The fact that I agree with some of what they're saying doesn't outweigh that sense of exasperation and embarrassment.
Some of the reasons I supported trying to liberate Iraq overlap with the reasons I supported Clinton's Kosovo operation to end genocide. I don't think this makes me a "right winger" whatsoever. I'm pretty sure (although I can't prove it) that if a Democrat president had invaded Iraq, many of the partisan Republicans who support it under Bush would be strongly opposed to it under a Dem.
I like bloggers where I don't sense this partisanship over principle going on.
On the extreme partisan sites, who even knows what "left" and "right" means sometimes. For example, take a look at these threads of comments at DailyKos over a story that an Israeli is now wondering if Israel would be better off with Saddam still in power. Reading many of the Kos Kids' comments is bizarre because it felt like I was reading a bunch of Kissinger-style right wingers. They sound like they believe America should support evil dictatorships for stability in the region, and that Arab and Kurdish peoples in Iraq are not able to handle democracy. My guess is these commentators are taking this position simply because Bush is a Republican.
Here: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/2/9/195923/8209
Example: If Goerge W Bush is Jesus Christ...Like all the Wingnuts Think Maybe he can Bring Uday and Qusay Back from the dead,return Saddam to power and we can forget this entire misadventure.
Geoduck, I agree with you that the Republicans are better than the Democrats at projecting a voter-acceptable tone. (I don't agree with you at all that moderate and right-leaning voters value tone over substance, but that's a separate subject.) Case in point: it was the Democrats who put Michael Moore next to Jimmy Carter in the presidential box at the Democratic Convention. It does not seem to have occurred to anybody how poorly this would go over in the heartland. I am not sure the mistake has been acknowledged yet! If you, Geoduck, don't agree that it was harmful, ask yourself what the left's reaction would be if Republicans ever seated Ann Coulter next to George Bush Senior during a convention, and I think you'll get the point.
I don't think the question is whether today's Democrats have a political tin ear. They certainly do. The question is, why aren't they seeing the problem, recognizing it, and fixing it? I mean, the three-year-old I mentioned earlier eventually figures out that tantrums don't result in candy. Why don't the political activists get it?
Mr. Whatsit -
It's a tiny quibble, but that incident is an example of a time when the Dems ever so slightly got the shaft on a story passed around the media. I believe it was more moment-related than that; it was not a planned thing.
It was just Saint Carter not understanding how damaging the image could be for the party. Hard to blame him, actually, given how lauded Moore was all week, out of camera range.
2) For those who argue that the righties supportive of the White House or Congress are more politically inclusive then lefties - several examples of White House road kill come to mind. The most recent is Bruce Bartlett. (Paul O'Niel, Colin Powell, Larry Wilkerson, ect., ect.,
That's the White House playing hardball. I don't think most conservatives or "righties" are now writing them out of the Right. To some degree, they might do so for Powell, on the grounds of his support for affirmative action, among other things -- he's a moderate, after all, and that is his appeal. But on the other hand, Bartlett is even embraced by some righties, for providing a principled conservative argument against the Bush administration. Now, they may not be "righties who support the President," to the extent they embrace Bartlett (for obvious reasons), but those who do support the President aren't exactly casting them or him out into the outer darkness.
What's more, reducing conservatism to support of the President ignores the quite public and quite marked schism between the President and his conservative base over the Miers nomination. (And, to a lesser extent, the Myers nomination.) If the Right decided to kick people out just because they disagreed with the President or failed to support him in this or that endeavour, there would be practically no Right at all.
Armando,
Your justicfication for your tone is that it is the inevitable result of Bush's actions in his presidency.
So what are the possible conclusions someone who doesn't already agree Bush's presidency is so awful? Why, that you've already wrtitten them off as too stupid, narrowminded, or evil for you to be willing to engage them civilly. Your tone tells everyone who voted for Bush that you're unwilling to engage them, that you will sit back with your Truth and wait for them to realize the errors of their ways and try to understand you.
That tactic, of course, worked so well for the Republicans in the late '90s, when they took the same tone about Clinton, when everything they said about Clinton was predicated on Clinton being incompetent and immoral. Why not try to duplicate the Republican's 2000 electoral "success" in 2008 by acting like the president-hating impeachers of 1998 in 2006?
As justified as you may believe the tone to be, as right as it may feel, it is foolish politics.
I don't think the question is whether today's Democrats have a political tin ear. They certainly do. The question is, why aren't they seeing the problem, recognizing it, and fixing it?
Honestly, I don't think the tin-ear is the problem. Because frankly, Bush has a bit of a tin ear himself. Or more than a bit of one -- I still cringe whenever I hear "Homeland Security." Karl Rove is there to catch a lot of these errors, but a Rove is not enough. A tone fit for polite society may be a necessary, but it is not a sufficient condition. For that, they need policies that people can actually get behind, and (at the moment) need to build up their credibility on foreign affairs. Voters aren't that stupid, after all, not so stupid that a few pretty words is enough to win them over.
and learn how to fight dirty like their opposition while running an election.
Heheh-- this is a low blow, but considering widespread allegations that pets and dead people voted overwhelmingly for Democrats (again!) all over the country in the last election, and the recent bit in the news about Democratic Party operatives slashing Republicans' tires to keep them from getting to the voting booths . . . shouldn't we say "learn how to fight dirty more effectively" or something? Because they fight plenty dirty already. For another example, on the other side, recall the Greens' complaints that Democrat activists repeatedly sabotaged their attempts to get their candidates on the ballot.
Here's a nice little post and comment string;
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/2/13/113252/771
It's not obscene, for the most part, though the commenters keep calling people like me and most of us here fascists.
But what amazes me most is how these people have absolutely zero idea where I'm coming from, or the people they mention by name as emblematic of some imagined "cult of Bush."
No concept of what makes the people they attack tick. None. Zilcherino. Assume the absolute worst, ascribe to their political opponents the most impossibly foggy-headed worldviews conceivable, do no investigation of the details of why, say, Andrew S is criticized pretty heavily these days, and stop thinking. (The post is about an alleged tendency that the minute somebody criticizes Bush, he becomes a vilified traitor, a "liberal.")
Incidentally, if I can be contentious for a minute: when Democrats mention the Swift Boat guys as so illustrative of Republican dirty tricks, it tells me a lot of how they think about conservatives.
So for some reason, out of the blue, dozens and dozens of otherwise upright citizens start obeying commands to sign on to an utterly dishonest attack ona presidential candidate? Because... Rove told them to? There's no chance any of them actually meant what they were talking about? Rove controls all; all Republicans respond to his commands?
What bizarre world do you live in, I want to ask.
Geo, you write: "The Democrats don't know how to fight back, and fight back hard."
The more you guys shout that it's not that Americans reject the message of the Democrats it's that the message isn't reaching them (i.e., the Democrats aren't vicious enough/mean enough/strident enough) the more strident, vicious and mean your party and your party spokesmen become.
From that old LBJ “daisy” election commercial, to the constant accusation that Republicans "hate black people" (see the overwrought Katrina rhetoric of the left), to the accusations that Bush tacitly approved of the lynching of James Byrd, the list of vicious left-wing smears on Republicans goes on and on.
The amusing thing from this Republican’s perspective is that you guys miss the point so completely and so self-destructively that we Republicans can point it out to you day in and day out without any fear that you’d actually reverse course. So we Republicans see the Democrats as having, over the past 30+ years, alienated voters with their pettiness and viciousness, lost ground, decided it was because they weren’t petty and vicious enough. So the next election Democrats get more petty and vicious, lose more ground, and decide it was because they weren’t petty and vicious enough… ad naseum.
It’s like an invulnerable Goose that lays the golden eggs. I hope and pray you disagree with me on this =)
Incidentally: my reading of the reason the Dems didn't "respond mroe quickly" to the Swifties: whatever the merit of the other charges, it was because Kerry had been caught in a decades-long, very, very odd tale about secret trips into Cambodia, and CIA guys giving him lucky hats.
None of his Swift Boat friends supported that story. Unless something has come out or still comes out out that I don't know about, it was simply an undeniable bit of strangeness that would have been impossible to explain without coming across as a complete weirdo. Far better to affect a generalized sense of outrage than respond to the specifics on that one.
He actually in early 2004 gave a reporter a "reluctant" glimpse of his lucky hat, and there is absolutely no reason to think the story is true.
Am I wrong about that?
If not, the guy's a certified nut-job, or at least that's how it would have come across.
The Democrats don't know how to fight back, and fight back hard. The Dems need to sell their tone as moderate, talk code to the base, and learn how to fight dirty like their opposition while running an election.
I'm an Ohio voter who's open to voting for either party, and Bush's social conservatism turns me off.
The reason I dismissed Kerry is because, unlike Andrew Sullivan, I was unconvinced Kerry would have as strong a spine in foreign policy as Bush. I feared a Kerry win for Democrats embracing Michael Moore might derail elections in Iraq, which is something I vowed to myself would be the deciding issue of the campaign no matter how many things about the GOP I disliked. I think I was right to have feared that given the actions of Democrats since.
Dems actually do fight hard and dirty. However, it won't be until they start instilling confidence that they can be trusted with national security that I will open myself to voting for them again. They have pushed me into feeling like I have to vote GOP when I really don't want to become a Republican.
"Iraq and Bush's Debacle divided this country. To pretend otherwise is not honest. whether Bush was right or wrong, that is what divided us."
I think there would have been antagonistic approaches to American foreign policy after 9/11, no matter who was President. I think that will be true for a couple of decades, at a minimum. Your inability to differentiate between an alternate point of view and "dishonesty" is more than a little worrisome.
To a substantial extent, I think modern "progressivism" is less a true political philosophy than it is an assertion of a social class position. Many people hate Bush (for example) for the same reason that they shop at Whole Foods: it sends a message to the people with whom they want to identify.
So, if you disagree with them on any point, it is not something to be discussed, but rather a sign of your failure to really be a member of the inner circle...almost as bad as shopping at Wal-Mart or going to a NASCAR race.
vbspurs said...
Maybe I seem to be one of the "good" ones because I'm not one.
Yawn.
Stop this incessant backtalk about not being a conservative already, else I'll delete my Althouse vote for "Conservative Blogress Diva".
Cheers,
Victoria
It's that time again when Ann pretends she is a moderate, all evidence to the contrary.
(note to XLax who accused me of racism, wtf? Ann should be proud of her accomplishments, but Ann should not pretend as she often does that she has her finger on the pulse of America. Today, 61% of America does not approve of the way George Bush is doing his job. Ann constantly claims that it is us rude and vile leftists that are out of touch with what America wants in terms of safety, religion, civil rights, etc. My point XLax was merely that being a well off lawyer, owner of an $800,000 home, professor, in a college town that is called to speak on TV and called to speak on NPR is not the life of 99% of America, and Ann doesn't show that she is looking to see what that life is like. This is not racism and this is not class warfare. This is about Ann. She and her echo chamber says that us terrible dems will never win another election, but she forgets that Bush lost the popular election in 2000, and Bush won by the slimmest majority in 2004. Think purple state. Think that almost one of every two America ns voted AGAINST Bush. Although Bush received a majority of the popular vote: 50.73% to Kerry's 48.27%, it was—percentage-wise—the closest popular margin ever for a sitting President; Bush received 2.5% more than Kerry; the closest previous margin won by a sitting President was 3.2% for Woodrow Wilson in 1916. In terms of absolute number of popular votes, his victory margin (approximately 3 million votes) was the smallest of any sitting President since Harry S. Truman in 1948.
Kudos to you Ann, truly, but you make a mistake thinking that everyone thinks your way.)
Geoduck2 (and, btw, I now have the correct pronunciation forever burned into my brain's ear!!!):
Notice how "moderates" are not much bothered that Powell has been chased out of the administration.
I'm not bothered by that, but not for the reasons I think you're implying. I'm not a fan of Colin Powell's, and haven't for going on 15 years. It's possible that others feel similarly.
Moderates don't drive people to the polls. Moderates don't register voters.
I'm not sure you could provide proof for a statement as flat and blanket as this, dear Geo, with respect.
Moderates don't pass out political information or volunteer their time for political parties.
Same as above, with an additional point: If you're a moderate registered as "no party" or "Independent," the two major parties aren't all that interested in help, frankly, especially if you're not willing to change your registration. So that may be just a bit of straw man, unintentional, I'm sincerely sure.
And, trust me, it doesn't go over real well if you say you want to simultaneously campaign for Dem X and Repub Y. Whether passionately for both or not.
In fact, moderates rarely even vote in primaries.
In many places, again based on their registration, they're not permitted to do so. Again, this needs to be put in context.
They sometimes don't even vote in off-year elections.
A lot of Americans, period, don't do this. Heck, many of them don't vote in the on-year elections--and that's regardless of how they're registered or what they think of themselves as.
And you know, there are a lot of PASSIONATES who don't vote either, for one reason or another.
I don't think any of these things, per se, can be used to definite "moderates."
I'm wondering if, perhaps, there's a tendency to view "moderate" as an exact synonym for "lukewarm"? I'd really have to question that--and would gently suggest you ponder that notion. I know quite a few passionate moderates.
For myself, I've been accused of lots of things over time, for good or for ill, justly or injustly, but never lukewarm. (I'm NOT saying that's what YOU were doing.) And I know that I'm neither particularly special nor unique.
Just the view from my place(s) in the spectrum.
Re: "Whole foods"
Well, let's not forget the "crunchy cons." I know some of them, too.
Not to be too snarky Geo, but I couldn't really let this pass:
"4) The Republican party has a noise machine that is supported by right-wing think tanks, talk radio, Fox News, and presses like Regency. The Democratic party has very little to support its talking points. There have been some interesting arguments that talk radio helped fueled the Congressional elections of 1994."
New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, CBS, ABC, NBC, NPR, AP Press, Chicago Tribune, CNN. Even the Wall Street Journal (if you stay away from the OP-ED pages) sprinkles in the points.
I'm not sure if you left those out on accident or if you really believe them to be apolitical entities. For some of us on the right, we think the balance is slowly starting to budge from far-left-tilt to not-so-far-left-tilt.
ShadyCharacter,
You describe my move from Democrat to Independent perfectly. They couldn't have alienated me more if they had been trying.
Perhaps some of the moderates here
here who spend more time villifying
democratic foibles and defending
republican boners could tell me what
separates them from the conservative
republicans who claim a 'moderate'
position.
Uh, let me take a wild guess. They're not conservative? I strongly suspect that their views on social policy (e.g. affirmative action, gay marriage, church-state relations, etc.) diverge significantly and consistently from my (conservative) views, or the views of the Republican base. The same is probably true of their views on economic policy (e.g. welfare, wealth redistribution, taxes, state intervention generally). At an even higher level of generality, they probably don't want the same kind of society most conservatives do. Not that there is uniformity among conservatives -- we do not all emerge out of a single tradition, after all, and there are various flavours of conservative anyhow -- but there is a family resemblance, I think, among conservative attitudes which people who are self-consciously not conservative simply do not share.
Ann says: "I've repeatedly said that the left treats me badly, and anyone reading the comments here can see that on nearly a daily basis."
What Ann does not say is that she constantly dishes it out, too. She prods and chides and sneers. And then when someone gives in response, it's soooooo unfair and mean.
Gimme a break, Ann.
You can't take what you dish out. THAT is your problem.
The majority of "conservative" bloggers discussed here are either libertarian, libertarianish or ex-liberals whose world views were changed by 9/11. Reynolds, Sullivan, Simon, etc., thankfully have no patience for the Ann Coulters and LGFs of the world, and they are generally going to be civil even when debating people with whom they disagree. (I think we libertarians tend to be more polite because we know SOMEONE's gonna disagree with us at least half the time...) I think the only outright conservative blog I read is The Corner at National Review; although it drives me crazy half the time, at least it's generally well-written and congenial. And the same can be said for The Plank at The New Republic, for Kevin Drum, and many other liberal blogs.
For me, what makes Kos, Atrios and their ilk unreadable is twofold: their absolute hatred for and condescension towards anyone who doesn't drink their kool aid; and their irrational and reflexive self-loathing. It's easy to figure out a Kossack's position on any issue: just pick the one that portrays America and/or Western Civilization in the worst light. (But don't question their patriotism.)
Why would anyone waste their time thinking about why Armando is so angry? It's not like you'd be able to have a rational discussion with him about it. Understanding and empathy have to be two-way streets. People who call for beheadings over cartoons don't deserve it, and neither do people like Armando or Ann Coulter. Irrational fanatics don't make good debating partners.
Well, I don't know, Andy, but I'd charactize some of the conversation with Armando on this thread as rational.
Surely I'm not the only one?
Well, I don't know, Andy, but I'd charactize some of the conversation with Armando on this thread as rational.
Surely I'm not the only one?
Oh I would agree -- he has carried himself quite well here.
Andy - This truely isn't meant as snark, but the Corner doesn't have comments, so its hard to make the argument that it is congenial. If you only look at Markos and the frontpagers you will find congeniality. It is in the comments sections where all of the offense seems to be coming from. Its impossible to speculate as to what the Corner's comments section would look like if they had comments.
Ann - One theory as to why the link from Kos has not generated much traffic (Armando, correct me if I am wrong) - Armando's post was in a diary and not on the front page (as most of Armando's writing was for the past year). This would account for far less readers seeing the post (even though it was on the rec list in a bar on the page).
word verification: eafrtd - ear full of turd
b.d.c.: I think you missed a few there. You might want to go back and check. You wouldn't want, you know, to be misunderstood.
Geoduck2:
Yeah, Webb's bid is interesting, isn't it?
In ways not just confined to this, the midterms are shaping up in ways to promise quite the narrative. And the denouement? Stay tuned ...
vh: pvfuyy
"Flatulent phooey to scatalogical key board play."
The really strange thing is that there were several hundred comments on KOS and none of them seemed to be about this. There was one comment that referenced Althouse. Plenty of rage, little focus. In a way it reminds me of a star trek convention. Lots of vitriol for what? I do like Armando's responses though. And I think he's been exceedingly civil on Ann's blog. I want to read more of his writing. Read more of his writing.
Maybe I just see what I want to see but, regardless, elections aren't won by being angry.
This is so true for me. I will not vote for an angry person. Indeed, one of the reasons I was SO delighted that Russ Feingold beat Mark Neumann two senate cycles ago was that Mr. Neumann came across to me as so very very angry. (I still have the Kovalic scooby-inspired cartoon on that race result somewhere).
George Bush, say what you want about him, does not come across as angry (Cheney does, though). To me at least. That doesn't mean I'd vote for him, but I won't NOT vote for him out of hand.
Of course, I've given all of $25 to a political candidate in my 40+ years of life (to Mayor Dave way back when). Rude republicans and demon democrats won't care what I think.
Wah! Kosians didn't click on me, they are bad bad people! I am going to draw all sorts of conclusions about them! Wahhh!
* The lower the stickiness of a blog, the higher the relative traffic value of a link from that blog to the blog being linked. In other words, a blog where there isn't much to do besides visit (no comments, few or no special pages, short articles), will cause a higher percentage of its traffic base to visit a blog that it links than will a blog with high stickiness (diaries, long articles, polls, comments, arguments, many special pages, etc).
* High traffic right-wing blogs, such as Andrew Sullivan, Hugh Hewitt, Real Clear Politics, Powerline and especially Instapundit (among the top seven right-wing blogs, only Captain's Quarters and Little Green Footballs have comments), tend to be less sticky than high traffic left wing blogs. Among the top seven left-wing blogs in terms of traffic, Dailykos, Atrios, Political Animal, Wonkette, Smirking Chimp, Political Wire and Talking Points Memo, four of the seven have comments, and Dailykos, twice as trafficked as any other blog according to some measurements, is perhaps the stickiest blog of them all. In fact Dailykos is so sticky, I can tell you right now without equivocation that being linked by in a post by Atrios does a lot more for MyDD's traffic than being linked on a front-page story by Dailykos, despite the enormous traffic gap between the two sites. (The two huge spikes in the link were on days when Atrios linked us,. By contrast, we were linked five times on front page Dailykos articles over the last month, but you can't tell what days those are, can you? Further, as I write this, we are experiencing a third major upsurge in traffic, once again courtesy of Atrios).
* The lower stickiness of top right-wing sites, especially Instapundit, can lead to a complete domination of the right-wing blogosphere by the "one big story" if the top bloggers are all pushing one story. Glenn Reynolds in particular, who does not have comments or special pages and who rarely comments on a subject beyond "xxx has the goods on this one," or "indeed," can send the traffic of any blog he links skyrocketing to a degree no left-wing blog can even come close to matching (and he links other blogs a lot). Right-wing blog traffic, and the articles people tend to read on any individual right-wing blog, has a remarkable correlation to the interests of the top-right wing bloggers, and Glenn Reynolds in particular. That is why, in the title of this article, I called the right-wing blogosphere a top-down operation.
To make a long story short, the lower stickiness of top right-wing blogs compared to top left-wing blogs leads to greater message consistency in their half of the political blogosphere than in ours (I can show anyone extensive site meter statistics to prove this). This consistency helps stories from the right-wing blogosphere reach the national media more often than those from the left-wing blogosphere. This seems to mirror the left and the right in other mediums as well.
Ann,
I would like to introduce your blogroll as Exhibit A. I quickly analyzed your blogroll by comparing it to The Truth Laid Bear top 100 blogs by traffic.
Now blogrolls tend to not be updated with great frequency. Regardless, they are supposed to represent blogs that teh blogger reads.
Your blogroll, reveals that you do not have a terribly diverse, or terribly moderate, or terribly representative group of blogs.
I classified the blogs on your blogroll and the blogs in the TTLB system as red, blue, or I can't tell. I took almost no time on each blog, if I had never visited it, I just chucked it out. Some of my measurements could very easily be in error, both type 1 as type 2.
On your blogroll then....
Easily Identifiable Blue Blogs: 2
TalkingPointsMemo
Wonkette
Easily Identifiable Blue Blogs:Red Blogs: 21
AmbivaBlog
Asymmetrical Information
Betsy's Page
Conservative Brotherhood
Daniel W. Drezner
Dynamist
Instapundit
Kausfiles
La Shawn Barber
Memeorandum
Michael J. Totten
PoliBlog
Right Reason
Right Wing News
Sissy Willis
Stephen Bainbridge
The Anchoress
The Plank
The Truth Laid Bear
Vodkapundit
Volokh Conspiracy
Political Blog on Blog Roll That Neither Side Wants
Andrew Sullivan (Is he pro-bush, or anti-torture? no one knows!)
You also apparently do not visit many blogs from the TTLB 100, you only blogroll 4 of the TTLB 100 blogs:
Blogs on Blogroll from TTLB Top 100: 4
1 Red, 1 Blue, 1 that cannot be told
10) Instapundit.com 145989 visits/day (2)
23) Wonkette, Politics for People with Dirty Minds 65520 visits/day (34)
25) Andrew Sullivan | The Daily Dish 59646 visits/day (14)
49) The Volokh Conspiracy - - 28695 visits/day (11)
There are 51 easily identifiable blogs on the TTLB 100 that you do not blogroll:
TTLB Top 100 Easily Identifiable Political Blogs Missing from Your Blogroll:
2) Daily Kos :: Diaries 685115 visits/day (50599)
3) Daily Kos: State of the Nation 651303 visits/day (4)
6) Michelle Malkin 289647 visits/day (1)
12) Eschaton 131736 visits/day (12)
14) Crooks and Liars 110247 visits/day (23)
16) lgf: skiing through the revolving door of life 106394 visits/day (6)
17) Common Dreams | News & Views 105774 visits/day (53)
19) AMERICAblog: Because a great nation deserves the truth 96187 visits/day (484)
20) AMERICAblog: Because a great nation deserves the truth 96187 visits/day (49)
21) Power Line 90163 visits/day (5)
26) firedoglake 53646 visits/day (72)
27) The Washington Monthly 47136 visits/day (19)
41) Hugh Hewitt 41020 visits/day (9)
44) MyDD :: Direct Democracy for People-Powered Politics 35351 visits/day (71)
45) The Smirking Chimp 34865 visits/day (676)
46) Captain's Quarters 32136 visits/day (7)
47) Blogcritics.org: Blogging - A Paradigm Shift of How We Disseminate and Communicate 31804 visits/day (37370)
48) Blogcritics.org: Superior Bloggers on Music, Politics, TV, Film, Books, Sports, Gaming, Science, Tec 31715 visits/day (136)
50) Hullabaloo 27067 visits/day (45)
51) Cox & Forkum Editorial Cartoons 26382 visits/day (27)
52) RedState - Conservative News and Community 26071 visits/day (94)
53) RedState - Conservative News and Community 26071 visits/day (30228)
54) RedState - Conservative News and Community 26071 visits/day (44778)
56) RedState.org 23665 visits/day (11034)
57) PoliPundit.com 22725 visits/day (73)
58) Treehugger 19824 visits/day (468)
59) Pharyngula 19596 visits/day (121)
60) TalkLeft: The Politics of Crime 19413 visits/day (60)
61) Drudge Retort: Red Meat for Yellow Dogs 19366 visits/day (3940)
62) Taegan Goddard's Political Wire 18195 visits/day (214)
63) Jesus' General 17611 visits/day (88)
64) onegoodmove 16070 visits/day (617)
65) Rathergate.com 15700 visits/day (5086)
66) Xiaxue.blogspot.com - Everyone's reading it. 15514 visits/day (5271)
69) Wizbang: Explosively Unique... 14719 visits/day (22)
70) WizbangTech 14719 visits/day (12625)
71) Wizbang Bomb Squad 14719 visits/day (3923)
73) Expose the Left 14588 visits/day (100)
79) Gateway Pundit 13418 visits/day (122)
80) Riehl World View 13155 visits/day (230)
81) andrewcoyne.com 12789 visits/day (327)
84) Ace of Spades HQ 12538 visits/day (50)
85) The Jawa Report v3.0 Beta 12152 visits/day (29)
86) This Modern World 12135 visits/day (123)
87) Unclaimed Territory - by Glenn Greenwald 11541 visits/day (143)
88) Pandagon 11210 visits/day (51)
89) Belmont Club 11106 visits/day (241)
91) TBogg 10752 visits/day (183)
94) The Counterterrorism Blog 10494 visits/day (82)
95) http://iraqthemodel.com/ 10075 visits/day (41)
96) Right Wing News (Conservative News and Views) 9729 visits/day (33)
Ann, as measured by your blogroll, your view of who is left or right, or who is moderate, or extreme, or what the nation wants appears to be highly skewed.
Your claim that red bloggers blog you to agree with you and that blue bloggers blog you to disagree with you appears to correlate highly with your choice of blogs that you read.
Maybe I seem to be one of the "good" ones because I'm not one.
Don't ever quote me again, here or anywhere, you obsessed, noxious, and humourless little person.
About 3 to 9 months ago, if I recall, you wrote to Kevin Drum to ask
him to link to you. You didn't bother to blogroll Kevin, but he has a
good character, and he has taken to reading you.
How liberals link to you:
Search for Althouse in Kevin Drum's posts
Five links. Apparently, Kevin reads you, follows your links, and discusses your topics.
Five links
Apple Woes
5 Aug 2005 by Kevin Drum
Via Ann Althouse, the Washington Post answers a question today that's been on
my mind for a while: why do Red Delicious apples taste so lousy these days?
I could swear they used to taste better in my childhood,...
Political Animal - http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/ - References
Our Booming Economy
30 Nov 2005 by Kevin Drum
Ann Althouse takes the New York Times to task for suggesting that there might be
a gray lining to today's news of healthy economic growth. Her commenters heartily
agree. The droopy old Times is just trying to bring...
Political Animal - http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/ - References
The M&M Test
6 Oct 2005 by Kevin Drum
Ann Althouse on Harriet Miers:I have yet to see a single piece of writing by Harriet
Miers dealing with an issue of constitutional law or even anything purporting to
demonstrate the analytical, interpretive skills required to serve on. ...
Political Animal - http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/ - References
Introverts and Extroverts
6 Nov 2005 by Kevin Drum
Ann Althouse informs us that the most emailed article at The Atlantic's website
this week was Jonathan Rauch's "Caring for Your Introvert," written two years ago.
The title is a bit of a misnomer, though, since Rauch's advice,...
Political Animal - http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/ - References
Earning Your TV Time
18 May 2005 by Kevin Drum
Via Ann Althouse, here's a fascinating free market solution to the problem of
child obesity: a new kind of shoe.The shoe ? dubbed Square-eyes ? has a unique
insole that records the amount of exercise a child...
Political Animal - http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/ - References
How you link to liberals:
Three Links to Kevin, One of which is thanking him for listing you, one of
which came via Sully, and only one of which really discusses a
non-blogger issue.
"Several non-liberal blogs that I read daily or almost daily."
26 Dec 2005 by Ann Althouse
Thanks to Kevin Drum for putting me on this list: I periodically get email asking
me for a list of good conservative blogs. In fact, I got another one just yesterday.
Around these parts, we consider "good" and "conservative" to be ...
Althouse - http://althouse.blogspot.com - References
"The reason I'm mad as hell over Katrina is precisely because I'ma ...
2 Sep 2005 by Ann Althouse
Andrew Sullivan writes: Kevin Drum wants to say that the difference between
conservatives and liberals is that liberals believe in funding organizations like
FEMA or the Corps of Engineers and conservatives don't. Nuh-huh. ...
Althouse - http://althouse.blogspot.com - References
WaPo on HuffPo and some blogging advice.
18 May 2005 by Ann Althouse
Kurtz also quotes Kevin Drum:. "I guess I don't get it...250 contributors? And 65
posts on the first day? (83% by men, BTW, just to toss another match on the whole
women-in-blogging thing.) Is anyone really going to plow through all ...
Althouse - http://althouse.blogspot.com - References
Cites to Kos: 16
Cites to Atrios: 3
Cites to Kevin Drum: 3
Cites to Talkleft: 2
Cites to Matthew Yglesias: none
Cites to Joshua Michah Marshall: none
Cites to digby: none
Cites to tbogg: none
Cites to firedoglake: none
Cites to Americablog: none
Cites to patriotboy: none
Again, your behavior indicates that you ask for things from liberals
but that you do not reciprocate. It also indicates that you do read
many of the top liberal blogs.
How is this moderate behavior?
You say that liberals are mean to you. You say that you want liberals to engage with you. You say that liberals should reach out to you. You say that you are a moderate.
You say a lot of things, Ann. But simple observation proves otherwise. You talk the talk, but you do not walk the walk.
Have a goodnight.
Quxxo,
You do love to go on about Bush's low vote count.
Are you aware that only one Democratic Presidential candidate in the last 60 years has won more than 51% of the popular vote?
Since you seem to love statistics so, I thought you'd find interesting.
I'm sure you'll put Bush's vote count in proper historical context the next time you mention it.
Armando HAS been very civil on this thread. I don't generally find him to be so at kos. But I'll be honest: I rarely, if ever, head that way, for the same reason I don't go to powerline, malkin or atrios. There are bloggers whose political views don't blind them to reality, and there are those whose do.
Look, maybe I'm in a weird position: I hate the attitude and editorial stance of the NYTimes and the LATimes, but at the same time you couldn't pay me to watch a blowhard like O'Reilly and I don't think I could make it through Hannity and Colmes without wanting to take my own life. And there are blogs that make me feel the same way, on both the right and the left. I'd like to think there are a lot of people who agree with me, but everyone claims that the silent majority is on their side, so I won't.
I know I don't want to hear any more about how Bush let people die in New Orleans because they're black. I know I don't want to hear any more about how Kerry didn't earn his medals in Viet Nam. Etc., Etc., Etc.
Re the blogroll: There are plenty of big right wing blogs that aren't on the blogroll.
I'm confused, David. I shop at Whole Paycheck, when I can afford it; I shop at Wal-Mart and Sam's more often, and love pretty much every redneck sport, including NASCAR. I am a gun owning lesbian who drives American cars--nothing under 6 cylinders, thanks--and subscribes to the New Yorker and Wired. I don't have a cookie-cutter identity, so I can't figure out how my politics should work under your "we hate Bush because that's what the cool kids do" formula. I must have it all wrong; I oppose him on principles, effectiveness, and policies. Huh.
My Whole Foods is in the only Republican majority district of my city. All the Land Rovers and Beemers in the parking lot with W stickers throw a wrench into the works, too. It sucks when people don't fit into simple little categories.
Do you have a nifty little formula for the "we love Bush because that's what patriotic Americans do" crowd over at Wal-Mart? Or is this identity-politics theory only for "progressives"?
Regarding Quxxo's interesting classification:
You identify Ambivaglog as red.
As red??
OK, that says it all.
I thought, Quxxo, that a lot of your stuff was just for posture and for effect. Which is why I bothered to bait you back.
Now I know that you either are either completely inable to make fine distinctions or actually believe, as a philosophical stance, that it's preferable to avoid doing so.
....
It also indicates that you do read
many of the top liberal blogs.
How is this moderate behavior?
Whoops, that should be:
It also indicates that you do NOT read
many of the top liberal blogs.
How is this moderate behavior?
Sorry for any confusion.
(shorter vbspurs: I want my mommy!)
Regarding Quxxo's interesting classification:
You identify Ambivaglog as red.
As red??
OK, that says it all.
I thought, Quxxo, that a lot of your stuff was just for posture and for effect. Which is why I bothered to bait you back.
Now I know that you either are either completely inable to make fine distinctions or actually believe, as a philosophical stance, that it's preferable to avoid doing so.
I am sorry Puppy Chow, but you are a disingenous idiot.
I said I ranked them all very very quickly and that it was quite likely I had let type I and type II errors in.
But yeah, I have no doubts that ambivaGlog is a red blog. Oh, you made an innocent typo? Well let's flush the rest of your argument down the toilet too.
But as for ambivablog, looking again at her site, I realize I have no clue as to what she is. Her blogroll says conservative. Her posts say Jewish. Beats me, I was mistaken to think that I had been there before. So you're right puppy chow, my numbers were all off:
Corrected numbers (a sincere thanks to puppy chow for the catch)
Easily Identifiable Blue Blogs: 2
Easily Identifiable Blue Blogs:Red Blogs: 20
Which is why I bothered to bait you back.
Ha Ha! Puppy Chow admits she is a troll!
reader_iam,
You took the time to READ Q's post? You are so well-intentioned, and I am in awe.
quxxo:
Just to save time, do any of your lengthy screeds contain anything approximately in the vicinity of a point? Apart from snide bitchiness directed at Professor Althouse, buried under pseudo-statistical sludge that is...
Now that's another distinguishing feature of the echo chambers of both the loony left and the rabid right: politics as a religious cult complete with elaborate doctrines, law on comprehensible to the elect, and (best of all) brimstone-scented anathema for heretics.
I inherited my Republican voter registration and have maintained it to help decide Republican primaries. However, as I've gotten older, I've found myself becoming more and more a bleeding-heart, flaming liberal. With that, the people I'm most disappointed with are the Democratic party and John Kerry. If Bush is so bad and incompetent, how come Kerry couldn't beat him? By comparison, Kerry is the incompetent one, as evidenced by his call from Switzerland for a filibuster, and conflicting - in the wrong direction - votes on Gulf War I and Gulf War II. And he almost won!
It's easy to sit back and blame Bush for everything, but hard to look at yourself and see what you could have done differently, and what you can do going forward to enact the change you want. But we're all in this together, and endless bickering gets nothing done.
Even though I'm liberal, I read Instapundit (and Althouse, among others) because they are witty and easy to read, and avoid most hard-core liberal blogs because they abrasive, impossible to follow, and I feel like I've learned nothing after reading a 1000 word post.
Semanticle: "a tepid and passionless middle"
You think that extremism is needed for excitement and that those of us with moderate views are not passionate about it? I feel sorry for you if your senses are so dull, and I feel sorry for the world that there are so many people in it who don't value moderation.
Semanticleo: "a tepid and passionless middle"
You can see the dullness of Semanticleo's senses that he writes like that: tepid and passionless -- as distinguished from all those people who are passionate but tepid and those who are passionless but not tepid. Even you boring assumptions are weighed down with redundancy.
First found on a tombstone in a Cornish graveyard : "All things in moderation and moderation in all things, including moderation. I think I overdid the moderation."
or
"Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess.” Oscar Wilde
But the truth is Ann, that you are not a moderate and you do not share the views of the American middle. At best you are center right.
I do understand how blogrolls become out of date.... If you can afford the time, please do update your blogroll, I am sure we are all interested to find out what a moderate reads.
For quxxo and other harpies of the MoveOn crowd, anything starboard to Chomsky is fascism. For them, "moderate" is Howard Dean.
Verification Word xxoid: A follower of quxxo; also a skin irritant
Geo, I won't belabor the point beyond what you've already stated. The New York Times may not have a large readership in relation to the country, but news agencies around the country (such as the local papers and TV Affilliates) take their queu's from it. Anyone in the business knows this to be true.
Beyond that, ABC/NBC/CBS do indeed have a large viewership.
Quxxo -
Serious question: do you honestly hope to affect the thinking of people here?
Because if so, I have some serious advice.
Semanticleo wrote:
Do the echo chambers of both the
looney left and the rabid right
require a tepid and passionless
middle to balance the equation?
I reply:
If "passion" means the left-wing of the moonbat heaping obscene abuse on Samuel Alito's wife, while the right-wing yucks it up when Ann Coulter "jokes" about poisoning Justice Stevens then (to paraphrase James Thurber) I say to hell with it. That simple.
While I disagree with Professor Althouse on all manner of things (some of which has drawn exquisitely civil return fire), "passionless" and "tepid' aren't two adjectives I'd choose to apply to her.
I have to agree with Elizabeth - it is hard to put liberals and conservatives into neat little packages. However, I think that Daily Kos is appealing to many liberals because of the ease in belonging to the club. It does not take much effort or intelligence to spew hatred. It takes a lot more work to make a rational argument. This is, of course, history's never-ending battle between the forces of reaction and the forces of reason. Kos is part of the forces of reaction and the populists will go there when they need mob support.
I don't think, however, that all liberals operate on pure emotion. Certainly there are some on this board (such as Elizabeth) who try to make logical arguments for liberal position. In the end only liberals who attempt to make rational arguments will be successful because it is the logical arguments that sway the pragmatic middle (people like Althouse) into voting for them.
Currently, in this country, conservatives have the grip on pragmatism, which is why they are winning elections and why people like Althouse are voting for them. The NSA story is a perfect example of this debate. Sure, it could be argued that bush operated illegally when spying on Al Qaeda operatives in the United States. That line of argument, however, is not the pragmatic reasonable argument, this especially understandable when you hear democrats say thing like, “we are glad Bush is spying on Al Qaeda, but……”
I don’t see it changing anytime in the future. Despite the valiant attempts from the Elizabeth’s of the world there are virtually no liberal pragmatic ideas. Liberalism is spent. All the current pragmatic ideas reside on how to reduce the negative effects of 20th century liberalism. No one is arguing that increasing government power is better for the country. The battle is now between maintaining the status quo (liberals) and reducing liberalism. This is why you don’t hear about ideas from liberals, all you hear is “Bush is taking money from the poor,” or “Bush hates blacks..” these are not ideas, they are emotions.
I'd like to add my agreement to Elizabeth's comment. Fortunately, few of us are pure ideologues. Most of us are bundles of contradiction. In my case, I consider myself liberal on many social issues, conservative on most fiscal ones, and strongly believe that the nation should be defended. Therefore, I find much to dislike about both political parties. However, we do not have a multi-party parliamentary system in this country. It would be self-defeating to give my vote only to that rare politician who shares every nuance of my political thought.
Since we must pick and choose, and the choices available are not always comfortable ones, reasoned argument is far more likely to get my vote than shrill invective or ad hominem attacks.
Interesting discussion. I'm not a Democrat, personally, and I decided some time ago that the political divide in this country was not between Right and Left, but between people who care when the president lies and people who don't.
I wasn't a fan of Clinton, and had serious problems with a number of his decisions while in office; it invariably bothered me when he said things that weren't true.
I think it's fair to say that George W. Bush has been at least as dishonest as Clinton, and a good deal more incompetent (cf. his recent abysmal rating on national security from the 9/11 Commission). I fail to see how one can be politically honest or politically astute without acknowledging the Bush administration's organizational and ethical failings. When I see "conservatives" give Bush get a pass for reckless, unethical behavior that would've earned Clinton firestorms of abuse - or worse - I can't take them seriously; it seems to me to be, as Glenn Greenwald called it, a cult of personality.
I see Bush loyalists as people who admire in Bush what they'd hate in a Democratic president. That sort of double standard is irrational and dangerous, and it does indeed make me angry; I don't see any reason why it shouldn't. And while some folks on the Right may sincerely have no idea how anyone could legitimately be angry at the Bush, many others complain about this "anger" simply because they think it'll marginalize the opposition.
I respect people when they have a reasonably consistent standard for ethics. And by "consistent," I don't mean "standing by the ____ party come hell or high water." I mean having the same standard for the behavior of friends and opponents. If the Right could manage this, it might not earn my agreement, but it'd at least earn my respect. I'm not holding my breath, though.
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