Letters to the Editor
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Thank God Edwards wasn't stuck with you.
Granted, what I have seen of your blog isn't quite as vile as stuff Amanda Marcotte has written, but it is still extremely wrongheaded on so many issues and downright embarrassing regarding disability rights.
Edwards is better off without you.
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Susan Nunes -
Can you post a link to one thing which Lindsay Beyerstein wrote which is "wrongheaded"?
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Being Progressive Means Never Having to Say You're Sorry?
Where is it written that being on the liberal team grants a free pass for all behavior? I'm as liberal as anyone, but that doesn't mean that I think anyone who professes to be a liberal is automatically in the right.
Amanda Marcotte was the wrong person for the Edwards job precisely because she is in grave danger of becoming, if she isn't already, the left's Ann Coulter: mean, vicious, and laden with opinions while being simultaneously unburdened with facts or any sense of decency.
Beyerstein characterizes Marcotte's enemies as "trolls," a demeaning term meant to dismiss them as ignorant ranters. Yet the volume of vituperation that Amanda's recent Salon piece unleashed should make it obvious that Marcotte's detractors are numerous and far from ignorant---they are Salon readers after all.
Words, and actions as well, do have consequences. A fact that the blogosphere seems to be having a difficult time accepting.
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No big loss.
Amanda Marcotte and Steve Gilliard are the worst we have to offer on the Left. They're shrill bomb-throwers whose respect for the First Amendment ends with anyone who dares to disagree with them. Fortunately, very few people give a shit about bloggers. For my money you can't beat balanced, mature commentary such as that which is found on TalkingPointsMemo.com. Facts and insightful commentary...potty-mouths and shrill shills need not apply.
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And the trolls are now infesting the Letters section
So many of the "Democrats" bashing Amanda and Lindsay here sound a lot like the folks notorious for jamming the "Democrat" phone line on C-Span, only to out themselves as Republican pranksters the moment they cut loose with GOP talking points.
Thanks, Lindsay, for an excellent piece. I especially liked this part of it, because it sums up what the Democrats and their base should be doing:
-- In my opinion, though, the real lesson of the Webb campaign is how effective bloggers can be when they're outside the campaign. I think the candidates who benefit the most from the netroots are the ones who can inspire bloggers to do their work for free. They create unpaid, unofficial surrogates. Webb is a netroots success story because his team captured the imagination of independent bloggers and online activists.
It was always clear that the netroots adopted Webb, not the other way around. His people figured out a way to make the relationship work. Throughout the race, besides hiring Feld and Chernila, his staffers also diligently cultivated relationships with bloggers outside the campaign. The Webb team started taking the pulse of the larger blogosphere before the Democratic primary -- and their candidate's primary victory was due, in part, to intense Internet support. --
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a view from the hinterlands
Upon reading the announcement, my partner Darcy said, "I hope the Edwards campaign knows what it's in for."
"I'm sure they do," I said.
from Arvin Hill's Carnival of Horror:
http://arvinhill.blogspot.com/2007/02/cold-turkey.html
(see the comments)
"After pondering this little dust-up, I believe the Edwards Campaign saw this as a two-fer. Props from the netroots for the hires, and when it all goes south, a Sista Souljah moment for Edwards. Even the most marginal campaign talent could've choreographed such an Aaron Spelling-ish drama... so Edwards probably hatched it himself.
Edwards is certainly calculating enough to have generated the event. The Earnest Candidate, having spun plates with his fellow entertainers, Donohue & Malken, delivered a pitch perfect FUCK YOU to the potty-mouthed, left-leaning Dem bloggers standing between him and the nomination because of his Pro-Bush, Pro-War, Pro-Death vote in The Senate. Anyone who thinks that kind of opportunity just happens probably believes in dragons and unicorns."
You say "Bob" offered you the job before Marcotte. I wonder if he would've been less likely to offer you the gig if your blog had a more sober-sounding title that would've made you less of a potential target for right-wing wrath. Please don't misunderstand me Lindsay: I'm not suggesting the tactics of persons like Donohue are acceptable, or that you need to be defensive about your blog's name; rather, I expect that Arvin's "two-fer" hypothesis is sound, and was intended to apply to you as well. Bob's lack of concern about your ongoing blogging only reinforces this.
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Scary story
The Internet seems to have made politics even more small-minded and bitchy than I ever thought possible.
But, you know, I do believe that the right is slowly poisoning itself to death with biliousness.
These attacks they make don't really support the ideals they're claiming to defend.
They're subverting all of their own ideals.
I'll bet they're drinking a lot more now. Alcohol and biliousness go together like, um, defeat and regret.
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Foolish Know-Nothings, All
AS A longtime reader of Pandagon, please let me inform you that, if you claim that Amanda Marcotte is 1) an untalented writer or 2) a mean spirited person, or 3) a nut job, ALL you are shouting is that you have never actually read PANDAGON.
You are giving yourself away as a Know-Nothing Ass.
Please stop embarrassing yourselves; acquaint yourself with the material under discussion. Amanda Marcotte is a humourous, humane, generous, thoughtful writer, both skilled and prolific. You may not agree with her, but characterizing her as "the Ann Coulter of the Left" is quite simply ridiculous.
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KMTBerry
Amanda - is that you?
I've read Pandragon, she's a talentless boring hack who mistakes abuse for radicalism. The majority of posters are an embarrassment of ass-kissers.
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re:Why I refused to blog for Edwards
You were much smarter and wiser than the bloggers who took on the position, or for that matter smarter than the campaign which hired them.
The whole escapade was nothing if not predictable, at least to anyone who could look past the initial thrill of it all, their own self interest, and vanity.
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KMTSockpuppet
She's definitely a talentless hack who has a junior high school vocabulary. And her writing after her dismissal has gotten even more self-involved than usual.
At least some of the attention whores on the Internet can write....