The Crowbar

At least that’s what the ever-so-pleasant bloggers over at the DailyKos would have you believe. Seriously. Remember back in February when Jindal did the official Republican response to Obama’s first Really Important speech to the nation? He used the DepressantStimulus bill item “volcano monitoring” as an example of wasteful spending. Obviously volcano monitoring isn’t very stimulating to the US economy, but the minor backlash from Alaskans shows the root of the federal spending problem – that the locals are addicted to Uncle $am’s hordes of cash instead of paying for their own (God forbid) volcano monitoring. BUT, I digress. The DailyKossaks, never shy about beating an undead horse, use their Moral Superforce to berate Jindal about the volcano monitoring thing. Michael Lazzaro concludes that Jindal is a “dumbass” because he prefaced ‘volcano monitoring’ with the phrase ‘something called.’ Typical Kossack Kondescension. Barbara Morrill believes “we shouldn’t be too hard on Jindal, since he apparently didn’t understand what the words “volcano” or “monitoring” meant.” Klassy. Jed Lewison says Republicans “think there’s no point in protecting ourselves against natural threats like volcanoes or hurricanes.” Hmm. I think Republicans also do the same thing they do every night… try to take over the world! Feel the love.

Huffington Post blogger and thedailybanter.com editor Ben Cohen has a very low opinion of Libertarians. In his March 24th blog post entitled Libertarian Madness, Cohen is quite upset at British Zoologist Matt Ridley for claiming that African governments are, at best, poor managers of economic development for their respective countries.

Libertarians wield an unusual type of intellect, mostly born out of borderline autistic personality traits, enormous self confidence and a complete lack of connection to reality.

And he thinks that Reason journalist Ronald Bailey is an idiot:

The interviewer from Reason, Ronald Bailey contributed his own idiocy to the discussion…

Why Cohen thinks it is acceptable to treat another person thusly and still claim the moral high ground remains a mystery . Ad hominem there, Mr. Cohen.

Robert Kuttner at American Prospect has ten “radical” progressive “remedies” that America “needs.” Unshockingly, Kuttner fails to mention exactly what he wants to remedy. I suppose it’s capitalism, freedom, and personal responsibility? Here they are:

1. Use Direct Government Loans to Refinance Mortgages
2. Put Insolvent Banks into Government Receivership
3. Nationalize the Federal Reserve
4. Pass a Tobin Tax
5. Put Tax and Regulatory Havens out of Business
6. Enact a Carbon Tax
7. Pass Comprehensive Pre-Kindergarten and High-Quality Child Care
8. Guarantee Workers the Right to Join a Union
9. Provide Health Insurance For All
10. Use Very Large-Scale Public Works

Allow me to translate:

1. Spend & More Government Control
2. More Government Control
3. More Government Control
4. Tax & More Government Control
5. Tax & More Government Control
6. Tax & More Government Control
7. Spend & More Government Control
8. Destroy Basic Rights
9. Spend &  More Government Control
10. Spend & More Government Control

Oh, boy, I can’t wait.

The following list is based on Technorati rank, Alexa.com rank, and educated guesses on my part. The list is in descending order of influence. Enjoy! 3/27/2009 UPDATE: Missed Krugman’s blog and Americablog. They have been added. WashingtonNote and Oliver Willis dropped off the 10 worthy mentions list. Top 20 Liberal Blog/Op Websites

1. Huffington Post | wiki | about Founded: May 9, 2005 Founder(s): Arinna Huffington, Kenneth Lerer Editor: Roy Sekoff Note: Originally competed with Drudgereport.com but that didn’t work out so well so it morphed into a left slanted news/opinion site. -
2. Democratic Underground | wiki | about Founded: January 20, 2001 Founder(s): Democratic Underground, LLC Editor: David Allen Note: DU and the internet are very mum on who actually founded it, it is known for the extreme vitriol of some members. There is also scant info on David Allen. Odd that for such a popular site there is surprisingly little public info available. I’d like to know more about Mr. David “Mysterious” Allen. -
3. Daily Kos | wiki | about Founded: May 26, 2002 Founder(s): Markos Moulitsas Zuniga Editor: Susan Gardner Note: Major conflict erupted on the site between supporters of Hillary Clinton and Barry Obama during the the 2008 US election primaries. -
4. The Daily Dish | Andrew Sullivan | wiki | about Founded: September 2001 Founder(s): Andrew Sullivan Editor: Andrew Sullivan Note: Sullivan says he is libertarian conservative, but he endorsed Obama in the 2008 election and Forbes ranked him the 19th most influential liberal. -
5. Talking Points Memo (TPM) | wiki | about Founded: November 12, 2000 Founder(s): Josh Marshall Editor: Josh Marshall Note: The site was a big pusher of the manufactured scandal of the firing of nine US Attorneys who were inappropriately protecting Democratic interests. TPM won a Polk award for it’s efforts. -
6. Think Progress | wiki | about Founded: February 28, 2005 Founder(s): Center for American Progress (CAP) Editor: Faiz Shakir Note: Thinkprogress.org is the friendly face for the hard left CAP think tank. -
7. The Conscience of a Liberal | Paul Krugman | about Founded: September 17, 2005 Founder(s): Paul Krugman Editor: Paul Krugman Note: Krugman is also one of the most influential liberal economists. Krugman favors Keynesian economics, using the shaky school of thought to justify bad policy: direct economic intervention through governmental deficit spending. -
8. Crooks and Liars | wiki Founded: August 2004 Founder(s): John Amato Editor: John Amato Note: One of the first political Vlog sites. -
9. Wonkette | wiki Founded: January 2004 Founder(s): Nick Denton, Ana Marie Cox, Choire Sicha, Alex Pareene, David Lat, Ken Layne, John Clark Jr, Jim Newell, Megan Carpentier, Sara K. Smith, John Fruhlinger Editor: Ken Layne | also Note: Wonkette is significantly more vitriolic than most of the popular left wing blogs. For example they “jokingly” wished for Chief Justice John Robert’s death when he was hospitalized in July 2007. -
10. Glenn Greenwald | wiki Founded: October 2005 Founder(s): Glen Greenwald Editor: Glen Greenwald Note: Glenn took a hard left turn in 2005, which he blames on the Bush administration, Karl Rove and the Valerie Plame affair. -
11. Washington Monthly | Steve Benen | wiki Founded: January 25, 1999 (thecarpetbaggerreport.com) Founder(s): Steve Benen Editor: Steve Benen Note: Washington Monthly is a political mag founded in 1969, but, as of August 24, 2008, The WM website/blog is the new home for lefty blogger Steve Benen, formerly of thecarpetbaggerreport.com. -
12. Kevin Drum | Mother Jones | wiki | MoJo wiki Founded: January 24, 2003 Founder(s): Kevin Drum Editor: Kevin Drum Note: Like John Kerry, Drum was for the Iraq war before he was against it. He was previously at Washington Monthly. Before that Drum blogged at is own site, Calpundit. -
13. Pharyngula | wiki | about Founded: June 19, 2002 Founder(s): Paul Zachery “PZ” Myers Editor: PZ Myers Note: Myers was expelled from the screening of the Movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. An active atheist, Myers blog has the tagline, “evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal.” -
14. Matthew Yglesias | wiki Founded: January 10, 2002 Founder(s): Matthew Yglesias Editor: Matthew Yglesias Note: yglesias.blogspot.com was the original home of Yglesias’ blog. The Harvard grad was editor of the Harvard Independent prior to venturing into the blogsphere. -
15. Firedoglake | wiki | about Founded: December 2004 Founder(s): Jane Hamsher Editor: Jane Hamsher Note: Hamsher co-produced Natural Born Killers and has worked closely with Glenn Greenwald. -
16. AMERICABlog | wiki Founded: April 2004 Founder(s): John Aravosis Editor: John Aravosis Note: Americablog outed gay conservative Jeff Gannon (James Guckert’s pseudonym) in 2005 and disrespectfully published Gen. Wesley Clark’s cell phone records in 2006. Aravosis is also a gay rights advocate. -
17. Feministing | wiki | about Founded: April 2004 Founder(s): Jessica Valenti Editor: Jessica Valenti Note: Feministing was started while Third-wave feminist Valenti was working for NOW to give a voice to the younger feminists who were being shut out by the older ones. -
18. Truthdig | wiki | about Founded: November 29, 2005 Founder(s): Robert Scheer, Zuade Kaufman Editor: Robert Scheer Note: Barbra Streisand and 299 other people protested Scheer’s firing from the LA Times in November 2005 right before he and Kaufman started Truthdig. -
19. Informed Comment | wiki Founded: April 21, 2002 Founder(s): Juan Cole Editor: Juan Cole Note: Cole was denied a teaching appointment to Yale in 2006 because of his controversial viewpoints on his blog. -
20. Digby’s Hullabaloo Founded: January 2003 Founder(s): Digby (pseudonym) Editor: Digby (pseudonym) Note: Her real name still unknown, “Digby” of Santa Monica, CA showed up in person in June 2007 to accept an award on behalf of the progressive blogsphere at the Take Back America Conference in DC.

10 Worthy Mentions

• Open Left | wiki | about Founded: August 8, 2007 Founder(s): Chris Bowers, Mike Lux, Matt Stoller Editor: Chris Bowers -
• John Cole’s Baloon Juice Founded: January 2, 2002 Founder(s): John Cole Editor: John Cole -
• MyDD Direct Democracy | wiki | about Founded: April 18, 2001 Founder(s): Jerome Armstrong Editor: Jonathan Singer -
• Shakesville | wiki | about Founded: October 5, 2004 Founder(s): Melissa McEwan Editor: Melissa McEwan -
• Atrios’ Eschaton | wiki Founded: April 17, 2002 Founder(s): Duncan Black Editor: Duncan Black -
• Pandagon | wiki | about Founded: November 26, 2001 Founder(s): Jesse Taylor Editor: Amanda Marcotte -
• Talk Left | about Founded: June 1, 2002 Founder(s): Jeralyn Merritt Editor: Jeralyn Merritt -
• Democrats.com | about Founded: September 27, 2000 Founder(s): Bob Fertik, David Lytel Editor: Bob Fertik -
• The Brad Blog | wiki | about Founded: January 24, 2004 Founder(s): Brad Friedman Editor: Brad Friedman -
• Obsidian Wings | about Founded: November 26, 2003 Founder(s): Hilary Bok (Hilzoy) Editor: Hilary Bok (Hilzoy)

Update 3/22/09. I’ve deleted this list because it was innacurate. I did further research which greatly impacted the list. I’ve redone it and written a new blog post entitled the Top 20 Most Influential Liberal Blogs.

I’ve decided to take a new direction with my blog. I believe there is a great need to counter the arguments coming from the left blogsphere of the internet. I will be focusing on this task in hopes of forcing the left to re-examine themselves and dispense with that vitriol which leads to such polarization. I’ve been watching the left blogsphere for awhile and I can tell you that their biggest fault is their exclusion of contradicting evidence. Also, when they feel challenged hard they will always work themselves into an emotional state that is almost like a seizure – I’m not kidding about that. When that state is reached, there is no reaching them with reason because they feel like a cornered animal. This is why they react so strongly, they’ve lost their ability to reason. Should be interesting at the very least.

They just make no difference whatsoever in political debates. I was debating some guy on Twitter about whether Jon Stewart is funny. He got insulted because I said that Stewart’s audience of “millions” (it’s actually 1.5 mil/night or so) were probably ill informed. I thought about searching for relevant demographics to prove my point but I stopped. I realized that nothing I was going to say would sway this guy’s opinion, even if I got out the facts, because it had become emotional. I guess the guy is a big fan of Stewart, who I think is a below average comedian. Of course he says things that are occasionally funny and he does have good points. But, on the whole he comes across as awkward and condescending in that snarky, arrogant way that many self-described liberals have when they are putting someone down. The Daily Show reminds me of a bunch of high school jocks (liberal/democrats) laughing it up, making fun of and bullying the nerds and geeks (conservative/republicans). Yeah, it’s really great program, Pah! Anyway, the truth is that facts will always be second to emotions because humans are primarily emotional beings. I think this is conservatives’ greatest weakness in the political arena. They tend to think the facts will speak for themselves. The sooner conservatives wise up to the fact that facts don’t matter, the better.