... there is a headline from a Mike Madden column that says:

Obama is a Muslim

Headlines like that and passing on rightwing talking points regarding Obama's fundraising decisions makes me reconsider renewing my Premier membership to Salon.

...that this should come from a politician instead of Salon. Count me among those not planning to resubscribe.

Bloomberg's stock just went up with me.

First sentence..

I was overjoyed when they started their online edition, and I even paid for it when they started charging. Then I watched with sadness as the quality slipped (Judith Miller). Now I pointedly avoid patronizing the NYT. Fortunately, right around the time the Times was ignoring the exhortations from its own ombudsman to clean up its act, I discovered Salon.com. It was full of insightful, well sourced articles and op-eds. Its readers posted thoughtful and well written comments.

Alas, all things end. The current quality of the posts is sad (Alex Koppelman), cutting and pasting from the drudge report is hackery of the lowest level. And, there is obvious bias evident in everything from picture selection to headline copy. The curiously infrequent post from Joan Walsh are generally dishonest or irrelevant. It is necessary to wade through pages of troll comments to read any worthwhile comments.

So you can add me to the growing number of once faithful readers who will be going elsewhere for my political/world news blog fix. I'll be over at Benen's Carpetbagger Report or Fireldoglake.com

Sincerely,

Winkandanod

Here's what Joan Walsh said about Salon in the Columbia Journalism Review in 2005:

"We put ourselves on the map with solid, fearless reporting that no one could shoot down. The commentary is great, but I don’t think it’s primarily what we’re known for, and it’s certainly not want I want to be known for. I want us to be known for our reporting."

Full Article: http://www.cjr.org/the_water_cooler/joan_walsh_on_losing_subscript.php

What happened, Salon?

I kinda like Bloomy, even though he's not doing much of a job as mayor.

Yeah, I'm enjoying Carpetbagger more and more. Since you reminded me to check over there, I just took a look, and it's almost like Steve's reporting on an alternate reality where there's a lot more going on... Like Scott McClelland's testimony about Rove this morning.

People threaten to leave Salon all the time because of perceived bias, or the trolling in the letters, etc etc., and that all just makes me shrug. But today I feel like Salon has left me really uninformed. It's disappointing.

His First Amendment violations during the NYC GOP convention notwithstanding, yet another example of why I'm (generally) proud that Mike Bloomberg is my mayor. (And, yes, I'm proud that Hillary Clinton is my senator.)

But as a pretty serious Obama supporter -- both in talking to my friends and in my past and projected financial contributions to his campaign -- I'm at a loss why all the anti-Clinton trolls here are now becoming anti-Salon trolls. I'm not a premium Salon member because I want to read all the pro-Obama bias I can get from the other blogs I read regularly -- and with which I almost invariably agree. I'm a subscriber here because I want intelligent writing with an opinion, even if it doesn't immediately fit into the narrative I have in my head for Obama. I realize that people detecting a pro-Clinton bias here would now be overly sensitive to a perceived anti-Obama bias now that she's dropped out, but (a) I don't really see it, or (b) see how these kinds of comments help improve the atmosphere or the coverage.

There's a reason people like me visit Salon, listen to NPR, and read the New York Times: we're more interested in intelligent reporting and writing than in lockstep thinking. I want message control and focus of goals from my candidates and my party, not from my sources of information and entertainment. Confusing the two is what got us Faux News and Rush Limbaugh in the first place.

winkandanod. Many of us are already here (eg., The Carperbagger Report etc.) It has been sad to watch Alex drive the War Room into the ground, with no one at Salon doing anything about it.

Nice post Alabama.

Here are some alternatives:

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/

http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/

http://firedoglake.com/

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/

"I'm at a loss why all the anti-Clinton trolls here are now becoming anti-Salon trolls."

DAB, many of the "anti-salon trolls" are long-time customers of this site.

Many of us AST's are too familiar with the Pro-Hillary stance from Salon's staff in recent months. Many of us AST's have been dismissed as koolaid drinking cultists. (I really do miss you, LOLCAIT and CYTHERA45)

Many of us AST's see little critque of John McCain - a man who we have been told we know all about, and thus we shouldn't be focusing are attention on his flaws and flip-flops. All too often we AST's see the same Hillary/Rightwing talking points critiquing Obama and little on McCain. I don't mind discussions that help us better understand who Barack Obama is, but after the recent primaries, this magazine still needs to be reminded that Obama is no longer Hillary's opponent.

On Dan Abram's show last night, a quote by McCain was discussed. It was about how he didn't love his country until he was a POW. In the context of the rightwings sliming of Michelle Obama, why hasn't Alex made an effort to bring this to the War Room?

Why must this Pro-Hillary magazine continue to disect Obama's electibility? And if that is going to continue, I will not resubscribe to a service that continues to damage my candidate with headlines that say: Obama is a Muslim.

Warning: No Koppelman, Clinton, Obama, Walsh, Salon or even McCain bashing in this post.

The media cannot convince paranoid old Jewish folks that Obama is copacetic. Only respected, non liberal Jewish leaders can counteract these Muslim, anti semitic, anti Israel rumors.

So, hooray for Bloomberg. May many other Jewish leaders, including Joseph Lieberman stand up against the awful whispering campaign that was launched by right wing Jews.

Even my right wing rabbi finally had enough and gave a sermon last week on not judging people based on innuendo and rumors.