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Have The Netroots Gone Insider?

Last week's "Blog Lunch That Backfired" with former President Bill Clinton netted Jane Hamsher of Firedoglake some national attention on MSNBC yesterday.

The brief segment with Keith Olbermann was about as substantive as most of the blog entries written after the lunch, but the host did ask one good question of Hamsher: Are the blogs at risk of becoming too insider and losing their grassroots appeal by dining with Democratic powerhouses?

"I don't know that the grassroots nature of the bloggers can ever be totally co-opted," Hamsher answered. "One of our strengths is that we have thousands and thousands of readers showing up every day ... holding us accountable for what we write.

"So it's hard for us to get insider without taking a lot of guff for it. But that is a danger, and I think one of our strengths is people who live outside of Washington, D.C., and bring that perspective to it. There's a whole host of people trying to keep us honest."

Being aware of the threat is half the battle, so Hamsher deserves praise for recognizing and publicly acknowledging it -- something that in my experience most bloggers have been loathe to do. But insider lunches and photo ops with a former president whose wife is expected to run for president herself in 2008 remain a bad idea if bloggers hope to maintain any credibility as independent thinkers rather than political tools.

According to Peter Daou, the blog guru for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, more blog lunches are planned. The bloggers who are invited certainly should accept if they can -- as a journalist, I would jump at the chance for a sit-down with a former president -- but they should don their skeptic's hats, ask some tough questions and report back with something other than flattering comments about the former president's lovely eyes and brilliant political acumen.

Posted by Danny | 11:36 AM

Comments

Memo to Peter Daou: Next luncheon, showcase your diversity, not your interns. Jane Hamsher has run out of blackface.

Fen | 09.22.06 01:14 AM

Oh, PLEASE. "Keep Jane accountable"? Whenever anyone DARES to disagree with her royal highness, she bans them. She famously ripped one commenter up one side and down the other for "trying to spread dissent" in her kingdom, and shuts down comments when the heat gets too great.

"Keep jane accountable." Tell me another one.

Ryan O'Connell | 09.22.06 06:44 AM

God help the rightside of the blogosphere if George Soros opts to give lefty bloggers a clothing allowance.

BumperStickerist | 09.22.06 07:24 AM

"But insider lunches and photo ops with a former president whose wife is expected to run for president herself in 2008 remain a bad idea if bloggers hope to maintain any credibility as independent thinkers rather than political tools."

Well, that's an assumption of their goals that I don't think is necessarily warranted. Many bloggers on the left don't even claim to be independent thinkers. They are actively and openly activists for the Democratic Party. With Kos chief among that group. There's nothing wrong with that, in and of itself, but it would be wrong if that's who they were but pretended otherwise. It's all about truth in packaging. If they don't claim to be independent thinkers, I don't think we can use that as a standard to hold against them.

I believe the independent thinker model is one more common to the right side of the blogosphere, and more blogs there use that self-definition. Holding them to the standard you mention above would make more sense.

I see it as an apples and oranges thing. Not all blogs seek to remain on the outside. Some are designed to fight the fight from the inside. Just because blogs can be exercises in journalism doesn't mean all blogs are exercises in journalism, or want to be.

kcom | 09.22.06 06:59 PM

"One of our strengths is that we have thousands and thousands of readers showing up every day ... holding us accountable for what we write."

Yeah right.

Even people who generally agree with the FDL perspective are banned if they post something which critisizes a post, or something in the post; and accused of "spreading dissent."

She is famous for her capacity to hold a grudge. Forever. So anyone who wants a place at the insider A-list blogs would not dare to confront her, publically. Witness what happened to Liza Sabater of Culture Kitchen, who dared to critisize her publically for a) posting an image of Joe Lieberman in blackface on the eve of the CT primary and b) drawing attention to the fact that there were only white bloggers meeting Clinton in Harlem (of all places).

Check out this post by David Ferguson (Trex). The 2nd to last paragraph originally read:

"So, Liza, dear, before you go assailing your betters [...], maybe you should head back to eighth grade English and, you know, learn to spell and to write in a linear fashion. Although judging from your other posts that I read, mediocrity may be a chronic condition for you."

But then it was amended, with not even an acknowlegement that telling people to mind their betters is in any situation, condescending -- and when directed by a white (southern - from GA!!!) white man is racially loaded.

In the comments attached to the thread, many were deleted, until the next morning when some "prominant" bloggers like Pam Spaulding showed up to critisize. Shortly thereafter, the comments were simply closed.

So what was that she said about accountability?

orca | 09.25.06 08:02 AM

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