Billmon:
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Did light a couple of sticks of incense, though.
Blessed be.
Back to Main
April 7, 2006
WB: Holy Cow
Comments
i missed this so if anyone cares to fill in the blanks by all mean spill. is kos coming to a booksigning near you?? i will forgo forging thru a mass of progressives to be in the presence of the almighty here in seattle this weekend.
Posted by: annie | Apr 7 2006 8:48 utc | 1
I was surprised to see a (not very good) caricature of Markos on the cover of the new NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS (27 April 06) — and a review of CRASHING THE GATE as the lead article (by Bill McKibben). The article is as much about the progressive blogsphere as about the book.
The Kossacks have been touting notices of the book, so I thought there’d be some headlines about this prominent endorsement — but so far, nuthin. I can’t see how an outsider can post comments at dailyKos, so have been frustrated at shouting the news over there. Perhaps someone interested could break the silence?
Thanks.
(Miss Billmon’s frequent postings, glad for the Bernhard backup. Whiskey Bar and Moon of Alabama are on my check-often list.)
Posted by: mudduck | Apr 7 2006 16:10 utc | 3
mudduck, consider it posted on kos. it may fly by in the diary frenzy, but i did just post it.
Posted by: conchita | Apr 7 2006 16:38 utc | 4
What a terrific article. One of the best I have read…
Posted by: Volvo Liberal | Apr 7 2006 17:00 utc | 5
Ok, let’s link it:
NYRoB: The Hope of the Web
…
Their point is that the Republicans have prospered by ignoring ideological consistency. They’ve held together a disparate coalition that ranges from right-wing evangelists and other promoters of conservative moral values to big businesses dependent on federal subsidies and tax cuts, each of whom realize they will get more of what they want by cooperating in joint efforts. A Democratic majority in the House and Senate would protect abortion rights even if individual senators were wobbly on the issue. “No one’s narrow agenda is served by being in the minority,” they write. “A governing majority would mean far more for everyone’s pet causes. Let the party be the party, with the movement outside looking in.” They represent, to use Dean’s favorite applause line, “the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party.”
Jerome and Kos also want to end the reign of the Washington-based political consultants who, they insist, have lost dozens of campaigns and squandered hundreds of millions of dollars. Their exhibit A is Bob Shrum, who had already managed, and lost, seven Democratic presidential campaigns when he was hired to run John Kerry’s in 2004. They especially dislike the Beltway consensus that Democrats should concentrate on the states where they hold an advantage. Along with Dean, they advocate a fifty-state strategy, arguing that the party can build national momentum by contesting even impossible districts, identifying new Democratic voters, and encouraging them to contribute money and campaign work along the way.
…
Well, just for the sake of balance here’s one of the very first reviews (January 22nd) for Crashing the Gate via Pandagon:
Plastic Pitchforks and Magic Wands
“In all honesty, I imagine that any given person will find at least two but no more than three of the book’s six chapters more than skim-worthy. And in fact, those of us who care about the future of the Democratic Party and who believe that its success would make America a better place, will find Markos and Jerome’s assault on the DC political consultants who preach and demand trepidation and who have produced electoral failure after electoral failure, both compelling and important. In fact, I wish the entire book were focused on failure after failure and the complete and utter political mismanagement by the Democratic Party’s establishment of DC political consultants. But alas, this one good idea is but one chapter in a tome that is by parts, ill-considered faux-progressivism, anti-Republican screeching, and pretend populist rabble-rousing.”
caleb, you obviously have an axe to grind with dailykos. and chances are i might feel the same resentment towards that community had i received the responses your diary about ben domenech received. but honestly i do think you need to look at this with a wider perspective. you wrote a diary admitting to and excusing plagiarism. i don’t know what kind of response you expected, but plagiarism is not something writers live with easily, at least writers who care about their craft, even at so small a level as a commenter on a blog. i have written diaries on kos that have flown by. others have been subject to the “diary police” for various reasons. others get recommended. i admit there are short comings to the community at dkos, but i do believe that what is happening there is relevant to us all as part of a nascent movement. i believe in giving credit where it is due; while i may not always agree with kos, i do find the site to be an invaluable resource for information, news, etc. and lately i have been encouraged by the increase of interest in activism and participation in actions. and as far as the blogs spawned from kos, well the evidence is on your monitor this very moment. need i say more?
Posted by: conchita | Apr 7 2006 18:21 utc | 8
conchita,
First off this nothing you said changes the validity of jedmunds critique.
Secondly, we could play “Caleb is not a perfect person” all day, but that does not change the fact that this:
“you wrote a diary admitting to and excusing plagiarism.”
…is a straight slander without context. Is that your intention? If so, please give some links out if you want (just make sure that they’re not one which only “trusted users” can see), or quote whole entries I made. Take exception to any position I took.
Finally, I’ll just point out that there can be some good found in almost anything. Hitler gave us the VW. Worth the the price of the third reich? Not so sure. Dailykos may or may not be “that bad”. I may or may not “regret” the Dailykos. (for the record I don’t, I just regret what is being perpetuated NOW)
Everyone gets to have their own opinion I suppose.
Conchita
Thanks for getting the word over to dailyKos! I was excited to see Markos on the NYRB cover and couldn’t wait for his and Jerome’s reaction. St. Mark’s Books in NYC’s East Village must have gotten their NYRBs earlier than others.
Actually, I had an e-mail from Kos himself, after I wrote him privately. So he and Jerome know.
Concerning the adverse review posted above, opinions differ. Some people don’t like sliced bread. Note and go on. No need to fight.
Posted by: mudduck | Apr 7 2006 22:00 utc | 10
caleb, i wondered a couple of days ago why you would come out so strongly against dkos and looked at your profile. i don’t remember if the comments were in the hidden comments, but will go back and look again. fwiw, i thought a couple of people did go overboard in criticizing you, but others expressed their disagreement in the context of a community of writers. i will send the comments to you and your post as well, but for the sake of the rest of this community i think it better if i send them to you directly rather than take everyone through a discussion on this. my email address is vze3cskcatverizondotnet if you would like to write to me directly.
Posted by: conchita | Apr 7 2006 22:07 utc | 11
Sounds good conchita. I’m not looking to hijack the thread either. My email address is cgilbert001 at hotmail.com
conchita, my comrade from the north
i read dkos relatively regularly & i also find it without much merit – that is to say – other than a few regular writers ; hunter, georgia susan g – i find little of substance to read – in fact at times i find it smarmy in the worst possible way
we may pât each others backs here from time to time but the mutual self regard between writer & public on dkos i find demeaning
i know i shall get a wack over the head by groucho for thios – but their almost implicit faith in the redem^ptive capacity of the democratic party is beyond me – they are all criminals – with extremely rare exceptions
but then i have difficulty sometimes telling atlantic & harpers apart & think they are like wordsworth & longfellow – the same poet who changes his name at half time
seriouslly – what i find for the most part at dkos is casuitry café & otherwise – here at moon i find information & information & real human beings impacting daily to that information
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 7 2006 23:02 utc | 13
caleb, i will write to you tomorrow. on my way out the door again.
r’giap, i hear the criticism of dkos. i guess i have set myself up as its defender and i will do this, as well as accede to the weaknesses of the site. i posted about it and the blogosphere in general last week and for the reasons i cited then i will do it again – tomorrow. the title of mckibben’s article makes the point on its own – “the hope of the web”.
Posted by: conchita | Apr 7 2006 23:45 utc | 14
conchita
it might be just the old militant in me but i see in dkos a strange melting of ivyleague comportement & kindegarten polemics which have to be held within the wittgensteinian cadre – that is to keep your criticism of the parliamentary process, judiciaries, treaties etc as something that can be redeemed by “good men & women”
this american empire has gone far beypnd this point & the utter banlruptcy is underlin ed & emphasised by lieberman – he is the rule not the exception
there is such an utter & deep criminality to all the processus of the congress, the judiciary & the presidency & it is implicit in the system itself & is amplified by its history – this recent history is only it more ugly & open face
& it cannot be fought by a church – broad, full or otherwise & that is how i find dkos a church with a wish to homogenise the opposition & that implies singularities of the powerful
we are a relatively small crowd here or a mob as debs is dead would say but there is no homogeneity whatsoever . certainly there are convergences & this is not surprising with what is being faced & of course we have common cause buit we are entirely different human beings
that is not so obvious at dkos where all their infantile rules & regulation mirror the beast we are living within – perhaps they need that to administer their public – i do not know – i am a simple commenter & it is difficult for me to determine the practical necessities that a site like that need
this is just a friendly difference of opinion my comrade from the north but i do not see my hope reflected at dkos
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 8 2006 0:28 utc | 15
@RG:
“It might be just the old militant in me but i see in dkos a strange melting of ivyleague comportement & kindegarten polemics which have to be held within the wittgensteinian cadre.”
WHACK!
The comments are sophomoric, infantile and banal(with the exceptions mentioned). It’s top-down management all the way; peasants and patricians.
Might be a good way to raise money. Bout all it is, in my opinion.
If you want to look at a real horror story look at MoveOn.
3 major campaigns a week(Normandy, Stalingrad, Berlin, by the adverts), 4 radio buttons to select, send us $250. A blog that allegedly solicits ideas and has 30,000 posts.
The long march begins with the first step, and the hell with the shoemaker.
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 8 2006 1:27 utc | 16
Fuck dkos. There are some wonderful writers and much breaking news can be found there however, markos is an idiot.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 8 2006 3:48 utc | 18
uncle $scam, have to admit that you have said most of what i have to say already. i do not go to dkos for kos, but i do go for georgia10, susang, meteorblades, and at times hunter, dallasdoc, jerome, bondad, armando (yes his legal analytical read is on top), bob johnson (i laugh to write his name), mary scott o’connor (how can you not love her spirit), empty wheel, kagro x, and others who came before and those who will follow. do not take me wrong, i applaud kos for starting it, wish him well for doing what is meaningful to him, but his views on the war in iraq, on feminist issues, on the 2004 election fraud, are lacking and his posts do not offer what the other front pagers bring. meteor blades has written two brilliant pieces that i know of this last week (particularly the migration diary), maybe others that i have not. that alone makes it worth going there for me.
i have had a few glasses of wine and this may not be the best time to post, but i will make a stab. i love moon of alabama. there is a depth to the posts here that come from years of learning, direct experience, a cultivation of interests in history, philosophy, economics, literature, at times a rarified merging of all. at kos the pace is different, the samplings less dense, but it is where i go to find out what is happening in my government today – regarding the issues that are important to me. at the very same moment, moon of alabama commenters are discussing the current mid-east or european political scenario in the context of history. i get so much from both places – and other sites and the constant flow of emails that i receive from various list-serves. as with most journal reading, i have sorted out which authors speak to me and choose which topics i wish to follow. dkos is a valuable source of moving information and i find good, passionate writing there. there are other positives, but those will wait until tomorrow after the wine has worn off and hopefully, there will not be extreme embarrassment in its wake.
Posted by: conchita | Apr 8 2006 5:21 utc | 20
My thoughts above, poorly articulated, were primarily about the ability of blogs to be used to politically organize people, and the internet generally as a device of political organization. And I don’t see much happening on that front that’s productive out there.
Sure they’ve got good writers, commenters, etc over there at dkos.
But it’s like going to Yankee Stadium.
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 8 2006 10:14 utc | 21
i have had a few glasses of wine and this may not be the best time to post
This is a bar after all, so I think that would be a perfect time. And judging from others drunken – often extremely good – ramblings at times, maybe there is something to that old “in vino veritas”.
Posted by: a swedish kind of death | Apr 8 2006 14:32 utc | 22
conchita my comrade from the north
like our slothrop i too am chastened – for forgetting meteorblades & empty wheel alone & our jérôme i deserve a crack across my tender knuckles
perhaps i have developed such a disdain for the democrats i pass right over some of those ‘local’ issues when i shouldn’t
but broadly i do not spend time there because there is something that is absent – the constitutive horror of the empire
& like anni i’m glad to see uncle back
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 8 2006 17:41 utc | 23
By way of introduction, I am ever on the lookout for a new billmon post, and sometimes I drop by here to see what you all are up to.
I’m going to get Conchita’s back on this issue. For a regular gloss of the news, I think dKos is excellent. The diaries are filled with erudite niche scholars/practitioners who lend credibility. As the community has grown the potency of the intellect has been diluted somewhat; this is the regression to the mean that is a natural part of things. So, we skim.
Some seem to have a resentment towards Markos, others towards the big names on kos who may have dissed them. I have never been a noticeable entity there (or anywhere else in the blogosphere!) and I don’t have any ego in this game. I just pick and choose which discussions to enter and let the rest float by. (Diaries about how people have treated politicians who post are an automatic “skip,” for example.) Markos himself is kind of a cocky guy who I think hasn’t had his ass thoroughly kicked, which is necessary for some people to develop empathy or even a good awareness that others’ points of view may have merit.
He did a pretty good job with Colbert. I swear, Colbert seems so smart and quick, it makes me wonder if all the interviews are set up.
Posted by: Lisa | Apr 8 2006 20:55 utc | 24
kos at least demoted armando and DhinMI, the problem is that he let them rule the place for about a year turning many many long-timers off the site … it was picked on the front-page but the fact that kos was so loyal too a nasty cuss like armando says a little bit about the guy.
as for the book, what kos/armstrong fail to focus on is that it is OUR DEMOCRATIC POLITICIANS who hire these consultants and yet this go without discussion. yes heroin is bad, but in a discussion of not doing heroin, one should at least discuss the user.
Posted by: jg | Apr 9 2006 2:05 utc | 25
Yeah, I’m not a big fan of armando at all, he is a smart ass and I would punch DhinMI in the kisser if we were to ever meet on the street/bar, what have you…what pompous ass-hat’s they are.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 9 2006 2:21 utc | 26