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Mr. Scherer's piece is interesting, but it left me with an uncomofortable feeling; I feel like it's trying to sell a wider liberal audience on this "liberal blogosphere" -- as if the ~1,500 bloggers who attended could really represent the continuum of progressive opinion.
I think they're likely being used by the Democratic Party notables, who think if they do some meet-and-greets with these folks, that it'll yield electoral dividends later. I mean, that's what politicians do. But there's something, I dunno, faustian about this whole enterprise.
Like those 1,500 can pretend to be insiders; or maybe they already are insiders after a fashion; like C-list insiders getting a turn on the red (or blue) carpet. They get acknowledged by the powerful, get flattered by the acknowledgement, and are perhaps brought on board by the party powerful. Scherer's last lines made me think that...
The YearlyKos community may not be her most natural constituency, but it is also unlikely to be her enemy. All she has to do is keep showing it respect.
Yeah, Clinton kisses their asses and maybe they quiet down, get to pretend to be kingmakers, or queenmakers. Clinton's still a DINO, and if those 1,500 don't get that, how liberal are they, really?
Two things stood out to me -- Clinton's talking about reading the blogs; does she really read them? Or does she have some subordinate read them and sum them up to her? Yet people ate it up with a spoon, like the popular kid noticing some geeks -- "Oooh, she's reading us! Yay!" One could almost hear the fluttering of butterfly wings in their stomachs.
And then the booing of Kucinich. What the hell is that all about?? Kucinich was right when he said...
Why don't people vote?" Kucinich asked, rhetorically. "It's because they don't think there is much of a difference between the two parties."
And they boo him because of that? Either those 1,500 don't get it and/or else they were already co-opted by this event, or were already co-opted going into it. I worry when professional journalists get too close to the rich and powerful, that it hampers their objectivity; I should think people would worry even more when bloggers do it, because those powerful players are really just using them for their own ends. And that booing of Kucinich had to be music to Clinton's ears, showing that their plan was working.
The Democrats definitely have an edge on the GOP on the Internet; this feels like an effort by the Democratic Party mainstream to capitalize on that advantage, rather than anything particularly progressive.
