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The Co-Opting Of Daily Kos?

News that the readership of Daily Kos is declining prompted this explanation from Instapundit Glenn Reynolds: "Kos has been pretty thoroughly co-opted and become part of the Democratic establishment himself, which no doubt makes the site seem less fresh and interesting."

I don't entirely agree. It's hard to argue that Kingpin Kos is part of the establishment when he regularly ridicules the leaders of the Democratic Party for a lack of backbone in fighting President Bush and the Republican congressional minority. Instead, he has helped create a new establishment, one whose leaders fashion themselves as outsiders bucking the system but who have gained influence within the system.

That said, Daily Kos is less fresh and interesting than in the past. But that's because Kos hasn't been as active there. He has stretched himself thin by taking on columns for establishment media outlets like Newsweek and The Hill. He's also the father of two children as of April.

My take on the declining numbers at Daily Kos: The Kos brand is languishing because the blogger is the brand and the blogger has more than his blog to feed these days.

UPDATE: Kos has responded to all of the chatter about declining readership by posting monthly page views from July 2002 through this December. Unique visitors usually are the more telling statistic about Web traffic, however.

"Let me be the first to declare -- once again -- that yes, this site has jumped the shark, and did so years ago," Kos added snarkily. "In fact, Bill O'Reilly put the final nail in the coffin this past August. So move along, there's nothing left to see but rubble."

Posted by Danny | 12:55 PM

Comments

I think the site has just kind of gotten boring. Blah, blah, Rove, Fitzmas, impeach BushitlerMcHaliburton, and oh, yeah, Cheney is so evil the devil went legit. Feh. It's all been said, and there is nothing to show for it but a weak, ineffectual majority in Congress that is spectacularly unpopular.

While Kos is critical of the Democratic establishment, he is partisan without principle, which he admits. Too many of the diarists are either weepy or over the top.

Now that Bush will, in fact, slip off the stage unscathed, the war will continue no matter who gets elected, and the most likely Democratic president will be a rehash of old rather than progressive politics, what's the appeal? The big problem is that Kos emerged to be contra Bush. Winning big will kill it dead.

Dave Eaton | 12.29.07 10:42 PM

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