Just saw on C-SPAN that Patrick Hynes, who is behind the right-wing site Ankle Biting Pundits (aka CrushKerry.com), is a Republican political consultant.
Honestly, among so many of the major right-wing blogs are the same old people who have been in the political world for so long, while on the left I see people who are honest to goodness outsiders who are becoming a part of the political class (a year and a half ago, I - for instance - was working at a mortgage company).
Why has the right had to astroturf the blogosphere?
Oh come on…what about Schaivo, or flag burning or steroid use in baseball or mucking up the environment or taking from the poor and giving to the uber rich or…oh…I see your point now…
Grassroots Conservative Blogs
Oliver wants to know if there are any.
This Modern Republicanism is failing America and is despised by the world. What on earth would they blog about? Uplifiting the poor… Fixing our Broken Education System…Health care for everyone?…Fixing our Broken Criminal Justice System ? Cleaning the poison from our Air , Land , and Water?…. Ahh , sadly no,.. the GOP are the Party of War ( as Rove once said )… not much else to blog about.
This is an interesting question, OW. On the one hand, I believe there are undoubtedly many independently run, ‘grassroots’ conservative blogs out there. (Here is one that I’ve read a bit.) On the other hand, we are all aware of the origins and scope of the RWNM. They’ve been building this thing for so many years now, it stands to reason that for every actual grassroots progressive or liberal media venture, the wingers either have some entities already built to match it, or they can hatch them like cockroach eggs (like winger blogs, for instance).
However, knowing what we know about conservative command of political discourse in our country (primarily through the corporate media), I think their presence in blogs, grassroots or not, is just a case of piling it on. Still, it’s great to see that some of us out here are willing to fight the good fight in the face of such odds. It sure is fun for me.
I forgot about Schiavo…did Jeb manage to get that conviction of Michael yet? Because anyone who is against charging Michael… supports killing young women and mothers. I’ll try and find a Conservative Grassroot Blog and get the latest.
Dude…look around.
Right Thinking
Right Thoughts
Paratrooper
This is the way I’ve always seen it.
There’s a lot of right blogs (like Patrick Ruffini). The basic point of all their posts is “The left is batshit crazy!”
There’s a lot of left blogs (like OW). The basic point of all their posts is “The right is batshit crazy!”
There’s a lot of whiny centrist blogs (like BuzzMachine). The basic point of all their posts is “Both sides are batshit crazy, and we’re stuck with them! AAAAHHHH!”
There’s some thoughtful centrist blogs (like The Moderate Voice). The basic point of all their posts is “Ok, so, the other guys are busy saying how crazy one or the other side is. So let’s just ignore them and have an honest discussion about stuff that matters.”
The last ones are the ones I like most.
wizbang, indcjournal, rogerlsimon, hubris, wizbang, just off of the top of my head …
You named wizbang twice.
Perhaps the condescending, patronizing arrogance of leftist blogmeisters, and their equally unfriendly posters scares o
wizbang - a very interesting place…I thought it was the South Park of blogs…
(Screwed up the post)
Perhaps the condescending, patronizing arrogance of leftist blogmeisters, and their equally unfriendly posters scares off all but the hardiest of professionals and semi - professionals.
I’ve had some incredibly boorish, ill - mannered, and downright evil treatment at the hands of liberal at several blogs, including Plastic.com and going back to ABuzz. Liberals just do not take dissension well, and they have zero sense of humor.
Ditzy trolls on conservative blogs are treated much (yes, I said much) better than conservatives on liberal blogs.
One of the reasons the blogosphere appears to be predominantly rightist may be because they are more civil. They pound liberals in their text, but not in their comments — at least not as often as lefties pound on conservatives.
What are you going to do now? Prove me right? Come on!
pionar:
So, LGF isn’t much different than Oliverwillis.com in that respect, then?
And Frank_D, as an ex-longtime member of Plastic.com, I think it’s unfair to call it a “liberal blog.” It’s an “online community” populated mostly by blithering idiots (mostly of the liberal persuasion, granted) and run by a schizophrenic asshole named Carl. It’s not so much a “blog” as a Slashdot clone infused with Carl’s pseudo-grandiose theories on online community-building. As such, it’s not correct to call it “liberal” or “conservative.” It is the sum of its members. Most of whom are extremist gasbags, at least when it comes to questions of politics.
Frank_D, I think what you call a troll and what others call a troll are two different things. I’ve gone to right-wing blogs (LGF is funny to read), and the liberals on there are treated like crap for just stating a view that’s not in the conservative view.
LGF is disgusting in their hatred of Muslims. Anytime a Muslim commits any crime (especially against Israeli Jews) it merits a blog entry.
At least this blog hates ideas, and not people (well, except GWB. And Cheney. And certain OW trolls).
Actually, this site is much better => http://www.mugu.com/cgi-bin/Upstream/Sowell
I didn’t really mean to call plastic.com a blog, per se. Your description is extremely accurate. Nonetheless, it is populated by crude amd ill - mannered boors…
Also, I was referring more to posters than authors.
Tell the truth: Is LGF typical? Or are most conservative blogs more civil and tolerant than liberal blogs?
Not to change the subject, but by and large the conservative voice in any debate or discussion has always seemed to me to be more civil.
Put bluntly: liberals fight dirty.
Thomas Sowell wrote a book attempting to explain why: The Vision of the Anointed Check out the link or a free peek.
Frank. First you tell liberals that they dont fight ( ‘handed their balls in during vietnam’ )…. and now you say we ‘fight dirty’. Well we can’t be both eviscerated peaceniks and violent cretins at the same time, can we?
evrgreen: Does the word sophistry mean anything to you?
“Fighting dirty” in a rhetorical sense in a duel of typewriters, is hardly the same as being prepared for armed conflict against our true enemies.
Please note that I didn’t call liberals either violent or cretins , two words you apparently do not understand.
Better luck next time.
neoconsrloopy:
You “hate” certain people who comment on this website?
As for LGF, I stopped reading it a couple years ago, when it became clear that most of the commenting base was utterly ignorant. But it seems pretty short-sighted of you to claim that it’s somehow “hateful” to track atrocities committed by Muslims (especially against Israeli Jews) rather than simply reporting facts about a certain group of people.
A glance at LGF’s frontpage right now (again, discounting the comments section, which is pretty awful), reveals nothing “hateful” at all. A few posts about the President’s speech, some torture-related posts, some anti-leftist posts (which, by your own standard is, if “hateful,” hateful only of “ideas,” which you yourself have condoned), a post about an Israeli soldier convicted of manslaughter, China, the WTC Memorial, Checkpoint Charlie getting bulldozed, a few open posts, etc.
So really, unless you want to get into the merits of the commenters (in which case I could point to any left-wing blog like Kos or Atrios and find dozens upon dozens of truly nauseating filth, so I doubt you really want to start that particular shouting match), I think it’s kind of unfair to call LGF (or, at least Charles Johnson, who does the “blog posts” you refer to) particularly “hateful” toward Muslims.
That being said, the commenters there keep me away pretty much all the time.
One difference between commenters on liberal blogs vs. conservative blogs that is glaringly obvious:
If a conservative dies (Ronald Reagan, Barbara Olsen) or is inflicted with a potentially fatal disease (Laura Ingraham), there’s usually a fair number of commenters who fall all over themselves with glee.
Conservative commenters, however, extend prayers and wishes for recovery.
This whole “liberal blogs are all like [x], but conservative blogs are all like [y]” is almost as tired as hack comedians with their “white people are all like [x], but black people are all like [y].” Giving dissenters a ration of shit in comments isn’t exclusively a liberal or conservative trait; it’s a function of the mood of the blog owner/moderator and the other commenters. I’ve seen blogs that welcome dissent and blogs that crush it at both ends of the ideological spectrum.
(But I will say this about schadenfreude: while liberals aren’t shy about expressing their glee at the death or illness of a conservative icon, I’ve never seen one express a wish to kill said icon. I can’t say the same about conservatives, at least on Free Republic and LGF - there are some bloodthirsty fuckers over there.)
Ryland: You seem to be guilty of your own sin. I try my best to qualify my statements about left wing blogs, by referring to the blogs I’m familiar with, and using adverbs like “some”, “most”, or “mostly”.
As far as schadenfreude vs. “bloodthirstyness” is concerned, there is a distinction without a difference: The people the lefties are talking about are involved in real - life suffering. The righties will never do the things they are talking about: hanging, shooting, etc.
Hey Vincent, how about the story about the imam on Saudi TV on LGF right now? That’s pretty bad. To take a guy saying that Muslims will win converts by being role models, not by standing at a podium shouting hateful rhetoric and turn it into a guy saying that Muslims want to take over the country is pretty bad and racist.
Hold on.
A conservative posts on a liberal site and receives insults.
A liberal posts on a conservative site and is treated respectfully.
Conclusion: conservatives are more respectful than liberals.
Anybody see a hole in the logic?
Quake…Its the same leap that allows HIM to be ‘rhetorical’ while taking every liberal response as ‘literal’.
Pionar:
It’s “bad and racist?”
It seems to me as if the point of the post is to examine what the person is saying (”But also notice: he supports the same end. The only debate is about the means.”). Is it now “hateful, bad, and racist” to interpret and discuss the meaning of what someone has publically stated, if that person happens to be Muslim (or Jewish, or Christian, etc.)
I mean, the curator of this very website routinely claims that anyone who walks into a courthouse and starts shooting is somehow connected with or inspired by Tom DeLay, despite a stunning void of evidence, based solely upon a particular interpretation of DeLay’s words. Is that “bad” and “hateful” too? Or is that particular brand of interpretation and discussion somehow more acceptable because the person being discussed is a White Republican rather than a Saudi imam?
I don’t necessarily agree with LGF’s take on this particular matter. In fact, I’d like to see more Muslims getting out there and publically denouncing “the Muslim who makes do with breaking the wooden podium, with screaming, and with patronizing, condescending rhetoric that ‘Islam is coming, and it will change the face of the earth.’” So I disagree with LGF on this. But just because I disagree with them does not make the comment “hateful, racist, and bad.”
vodkapundit, rightwingsparkle, instapundit, ace of spades, a small victory …
Oliver : You are correct. I inadvertantly named wizbang twice in my prior response. In the wonderful construct of a Sen. Durbin apology, I apology IF you took offense to my remark.
On the other hand, it seems that myself and several others have managed to show that there are a variety of grass roots conservative blogs out there. I suspect that if you wandered outside of mediamatters, kos, atrios, and drum now and then, you might know that.
I went to a blog thats run out of my home city, run by conservatives. When I pointed out that a memorial held for a young female soldier was used as a political rally by the governor I was attacked by multiple conservatives. With each attack I ended up defending myself against insuinuations that were not in my posts. Each conservative attacked me for something different and the author finally told me to go away I was too distracting.
freerepublic.com regularly edits out liberals from their message boards.
michelle magalagadingdong also edits out liberal posts
balloon-juice conservatives continually attack the liberal posters, even though the vast majority of the liberal posters are well spoken and trying to encourage further debate
even here the conservative posters either ignore the original questions or just attack OW for being a “bush-hater” without ever addressing the issues. Even when given thoughtful arguments they tend to batter that down with irrelevant myths, until most of the liberal posters just quit responding, because in responding they’d have to wade through a multitude of inane “you’re just a bush hater” rhetoric that doesn’t solve anything.
As for this topic, I believe that what OW is looking for is actual conservatives that have tossed the Bush tripe aside and are looking for a REAL conservative movement within politics. Most of these blogs mentioned are just bully pulpits to bash the left, including 60% of the posts on Balloon juice.
OW may be reactionary, but thats why he’s popular.
Um. Well. If your’e opposed to bully pulpits used to attack one’s political enemies, why are you here?
OW may be reactionary, but thats why he s popular.
Among hard-line, take-no-prisoners, our party right or wrong, no compromise partisan domgatists, sure.
Anyways, what about right-thinking, winds of change, Eject! Eject! Eject!, tacitus (I think someone already mentioned it, but whatever), or some of the much lesser-known ones like Stereo Describes my Scenario (which is part of Oliver Willis’ much-maligned “Conservative Brotherhood)?
Frank_D is funny - he starts the post like this:
“I try my best to qualify my statements about left wing blogs, by referring to the blogs I m familiar with, and using adverbs like some , most , or mostly .”
Then finishes with this:
“The righties will never do the things they are talking about: hanging, shooting, etc.”
But then we have all these abortion clinic murders etc…the will ‘never’…heh-
Despite the fact that I have probably been the nth person to claim to be like kryptonite to Oliver Willis, I think my presence here can do some of you some good, especially as regards some understanding and recognition of what’s up with the grassroots right. The Conservative Brotherhood is such a creature. Look us up.