QOD

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1. RickJ19958 says:

   May 9, 2008 at 8:12 am

   Not as much as we all hope.

   In 2004, I had a pro-Lee blog that was moderately successful. There were no Minner blogs at all to my knowledge. What I learned is that blog readers aren’t, by and large, on the fence. People come here to state their opinions, not have them changed.

   Even when news is broken on a blog, it isn’t a story until fossil media reports that a blog found something out.

2. Jason330 says:

   May 9, 2008 at 8:26 am

   On a local level I agree. Blogs are openly partisan so they are easy for the fossil media to dimiss. Which is a laugh becuase the fossil media is openly partisan (favoring the incumbent party).

   On a national level, blogs have graduated. TPM, Kos and some others wil have significant impact.

3. Rebecca says:

   May 9, 2008 at 8:44 am

   Blogs serve as a quick way for a “community” to communicate. That is a good thing and helps campaigns, but you don’t always know who you are communicating with. What you do know is that everybody here is motivated. One way or another.

4. Steve Newton says:

   May 9, 2008 at 9:01 am

   I agree with the above about the intellectual influence of blogs, but would suggest that Ron Paul has proven that blogs could be a fund-raising proposition beyond anybody’s wildest dreams.

   What I cannot figure out is whether that was a unique event or can be formularized and repeated.

5. RickJ19958 says:

   May 9, 2008 at 9:28 am

   Steve-
   Excellent point about fundraising. That hadn’t entered my mind.
   As for national blogs having some impact, I’d say it isn’t much more than the local blogs. As soon as the ideological bent is apparent, they are more about reinforcing ideas than changing minds.

6. Dana says:

   May 9, 2008 at 9:37 am

   Some of us — including me — misoverestimated the importance of the internet in the 2004 campaign; I thought that Howard Dean would win the nomination.

   If the partisan left blogs had had more strength, either John Edwards of Barack Obama would have clinched the nomination early, while, on the GOP side, Fred Thompson would have won.

7. anon says:

   May 9, 2008 at 9:46 am

   The resistance of the MSM to the disruption of its narrative is remarkable. I read a post by Kos months ago explaining mathematically why Hillary couldn’t win, but the MSM didn’t start playing that tune until a week or two ago.

8. RickJ19958 says:

   May 9, 2008 at 9:51 am

   anon –

   The problem is that while the Hillary can’t win stuff was out there months ago, so was the Barack can’t win

9. RickJ19958 says:

   May 9, 2008 at 9:52 am

   anon –

   The problem is that while the Hillary can’t win stuff was out there months ago, so was the Barack can’t win story. There is not a reliable method of seperating wheat from chaff.

10. Sagacious Steve says:

    May 9, 2008 at 10:02 am

    I think that the top blogs at the national level will play and are playing a huge roll. They are breaking stories that the MSM has either ignored or not judged newsworthy.

    Talking Points Memo breaks stories almost daily, and some of them ultimately make their way into the national discourse.

    HuffPo recently broke the story of McCain confiding to people that he didn’t vot for Dubya in 2000. It has now been verified by two additional sources. That might not sit well with the W supporters McCain has fawned over this year, and so it will likely have an impact.

    Since McCain has coopted so much of the national press with the Straight Talk Express and down-home barbeques, it will be up to the best blogs to detail how at odds McCain’s portrayal of himself as a straight-shooter is with his many interventions on behalf of powerful lobbyists, political fundraisers and personal friends.

    Blog away!

11. FSP says:

    May 9, 2008 at 10:05 am

    Most people who read blogs already know who they’re voting for.

    Breaking news will be the blogs’ biggest impact, locally and nationally.

12. Steve Newton says:

    May 9, 2008 at 10:20 am

    FSP: “Most people who read blogs already know who they’re voting for.”

    I agree. But on the other hand, from two entirely different perspectives DeLiberal and FSP have been influential in increasing transparency, which doesn’t necessarily benefit a specific candidate.

    I think right now blogs can hurt a politico more than they can help.

    Case in point: the negatives in the DE blogs on Windpower opponents and their hijinks are slowly making their way into the mainstream political discourse here, but at the same time I don’t think that (for a single example) all the positive posts in the world here or at DWA are going to gain Hartley-Nagle a single vote.

13. liberalgeek says:

    May 9, 2008 at 10:23 am

    I view blogs as a testing ground for reporting. Half of our content here is provided by our commenters who act as stringers. Sure, some have agendas, but everyone does. As the medium becomes more rich (video, audio, etc.) the MSM will look to blogs for “raw” coverage.

    I also think that some bloggers are paving the way for their futures. Jason has honed his argumentative skills here. Dave Burris has begun to lay the groundwork for a political career and Dana Garrett… well I’m sure he’s preparing for something.

    Bloggers of today will be influential movers and shakers in the next 10 years. You can already see it in the national scene and I believe that that trend will become more localized. Would Mike Matthews have been able to co-host a radio show if he didn’t have a blogging history? Mat Marshall would be working at Dairy Queen this summer. Mike Protack might have actually been the Republican candidate for Guv.

    As for the insinuation that Obama would have already landed the proverbial knockout blow if blogs had influence, I disagree. Dana, I don’t think you have spent much time around these here interwebz. There are a huge number of pro-Hillary sites out there that are just as influential as the pro-Obama sites. Check out Taylor Marsh from our blogroll for just one of them.

14. Dana Garrett says:

    May 9, 2008 at 10:36 am

    One of the “experts” that the NJ quoted 2 – 3 years ago in an article about blogs got it right in my view.

    He said that blogs rarely have a direct impact on issues/candidates, but they can “create a buzz” around certain issues/blogs which the MSM can pick up and make huge.

    I do think that out own NJ has felt some competition from DE blogs and that’s why they added the capacity for readers to write comments; blogs written by their own staff; and now a blog hosting capacity for readers to write their own blogs.

    Whatever gets more people reading and involved…it’s all good.

15. anon@example says:

    May 9, 2008 at 10:57 am

    Blogs bring the power of the group mind to take apart bullshit talking point arguments. Five hundred people reading a blog will provide an instant-reaction force that just cannot be beat.

    Since the GOP has the juiciest and biggest bullshit talking points, that explains why lefty blogs are dominant.

16. FSP says:

    May 9, 2008 at 11:25 am

    “Blogs bring the power of the group mind to take apart bullshit talking point arguments.”

    Case in point: The most recent “press release” from the Delaware Democrats.

17. RSmitty says:

    May 9, 2008 at 12:22 pm

    Damn…we almost reached kumbaya [sp?]. I blame anon@example and Burris. Damn you Burris! Jason! Heel your dog!

    HuffPo recently broke the story of McCain confiding to people that he didn’t vot for Dubya in 2000.

    Holy crap! McCain and I have something in common besides our registration. I’ll go 0ne better…didn’t do it in ’04, either and I have no regrets.

18. cassandra_m says:

    May 9, 2008 at 12:48 pm

    If blogs had widespread influence, John Edwards would be the Dem nominee right now.

    The political blogs can act as a force multiplier in getting an already like-minded community to get organized around a candidate or issue or even party direction. There are places around the US where candidates are making remarkable use of blogs and the Internet to maximize their support — Donna Edwards is exhibit A and there are lots of others (including Bill Foster, the Dem who took over Denny Hastert’s seat). And all of these folks are building on the Howard Dean legacy of the remarkable on-line organizing and fundraising that started it all. (Howard’s difficulty was in taking all of that online energy and translating it into RL votes.)

    It is dangerous, I think, to talk about blogs as a news source. As noted before, people like Josh Marshall are doing real and quite original news reporting (and often sourced better than much of what you see in the WaPo or NYT), but this is not the blog norm. “Raw” information from blog sources means that blog readers always need to remind themselves that they are the editors of this info now and have to invoke the appropriate tests of credibility. What blogs can be very good at, I think, is analysis and critique of published news and opinion and if you take a good look at the content of the best of the national blogs, that is most of their content. You can encounter some pretty fine minds out there who are not especially interested in the current press narrative, and it strikes me as pretty healthy to turn oneself loose from the press hive mind.

    You can also encounter interesting stuff that you won’t get in any press whatsoever – the kind of review and analysis of poll date from places like Election Inspection, Pollster.com or even the mighty Polano’s place is amazing, even if arcane. But this kind of information and analysis by people who care about real data is hard to come by unless you want to subscribe to the polls (for the cross-tabs) and do the math yourself.

    One thing that I am hearing recently (from the NPR news I listen to and from the occasional TV news venue) is that apparently these new programs are hearing from plenty of folks who read the lefty blogs these days. Tim Russert admitted the other day that not only is McCain not getting the kind of attention over Hagee that Obama has received over Wright, but also that he has gotten a lot of email about it. Gwen Ifil this AM on the radio took a question from someone who had the same question. And I’ve heard the same critique pipe up quite abit in the past month or so, so perhaps the lefty blogs may push the traditional media to stop using the right’s talking points as their reporting baselines. Maybe the pushback won’t gain much ground (and this will be really hard with McCain), but you can hear it from reporters that it is happening.