Disagreeing with the Captain
Ed has a post referencing his new Daily Standard column and asks if we all can't be a little more civil. I agree with that. One sentence in his post really struck me as odd:
Say what?!
Republicans are in a majority in DC because of the actions of folks like Reagan, Gingrich and Limbaugh. And I guess you could give some of the "credit" to liberals such as McGovern, Carter and Clinton for helping to show how badly liberalism screws up public policy. In fact, the best explanation for the ascendancy of the GOP is that the inevitable collapse of welfare state policies provided the voters with the reason to seek an alternative. At that point, credit Reagan and Gingrich with seizing the opportunity and Rush for providing the alternative voice to the MSM.
I don't think any individual bloggers do much of anything to change the debate or the course of political history. If Glenn, Hugh or the Powerline guys didn't blog, other bloggers are already there to do what they do. Their absence would only change the stats, not the message. For proof of this, simply look at Andrew Sullivan. He was a force on the conservative side in the early days of the blogosphere. He changed sides and the audience moved on to others. Can anyone really argue that he changed many minds when he started changing his own? I don't think so.
If one of the influential bloggers on the right should lose credibility, due to the Miers spat or something else, the audience will simply move on. There are far too many voices posting every day and e-mailing friends and family for lost credibility on the part of a few bloggers to derail the conservative message.
We got to this position of controlling the levers of power through the efforts of people like Hugh Hewitt, George Will, Charles Krauthammer, George Bush, Ken Mehlman, Tom DeLay, and the various bloggers and grassroots organizers weighing in on vital policy issues every day.
Say what?!
Republicans are in a majority in DC because of the actions of folks like Reagan, Gingrich and Limbaugh. And I guess you could give some of the "credit" to liberals such as McGovern, Carter and Clinton for helping to show how badly liberalism screws up public policy. In fact, the best explanation for the ascendancy of the GOP is that the inevitable collapse of welfare state policies provided the voters with the reason to seek an alternative. At that point, credit Reagan and Gingrich with seizing the opportunity and Rush for providing the alternative voice to the MSM.
I don't think any individual bloggers do much of anything to change the debate or the course of political history. If Glenn, Hugh or the Powerline guys didn't blog, other bloggers are already there to do what they do. Their absence would only change the stats, not the message. For proof of this, simply look at Andrew Sullivan. He was a force on the conservative side in the early days of the blogosphere. He changed sides and the audience moved on to others. Can anyone really argue that he changed many minds when he started changing his own? I don't think so.
If one of the influential bloggers on the right should lose credibility, due to the Miers spat or something else, the audience will simply move on. There are far too many voices posting every day and e-mailing friends and family for lost credibility on the part of a few bloggers to derail the conservative message.
posted by Stan at 1:08 PM
1 Comments:
The bloggers and pundits and beltway types who attacked Bush and Miers really do seem to believe they were the ones who got him elected and that's why he has to check in with them first before he nominates to the Supreme Court, declares war, etc, etc, etc. Isn't it odd that these "strict Constitutionalists", "originalists" disagree with the Constitution about that?
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