Today's LA Times has a front page article on the efforts of Josh Marshall and the TPM crew to bring the story of the firing of the US attorneys to the fore. But beyond the remarkable story of the impressive journalism involved, the article's author — Terry McDermott — has a really good grasp of how they did it, and how the interactive nature of the blogosphere can work in such stories. It's something I'm always trying to explain to traditional journalists and they always have a hard time understanding, and I think the description here is quite good:
Blogs can top the presses
Talking Points Memo drove the U.S. attorrneys story, proof that Web writers with input from devoted readers can reshape journalism.
[]
The bloggers used the usual tools of good journalists everywhere — determination, insight, ingenuity — plus a powerful new force that was not available to reporters until blogging came along: the ability to communicate almost instantaneously with readers via the Internet and to deputize those readers as editorial researchers, in effect multiplying the reporting power by an order of magnitude.
In December, Josh Marshall, who owns and runs TPM , posted a short item linking to a news report in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette about the firing of the U.S. attorney for that state. Marshall later followed up, adding that several U.S. attorneys were apparently being replaced and asked his 100,000 or so daily readers to write in if they knew anything about U.S. attorneys being fired in their areas.
For the two months that followed, Talking Points Memo and one of its sister sites, TPM Muckraker, accumulated evidence from around the country on who the axed prosecutors were, and why politics might be behind the firings. The cause was taken up among Democrats in Congress. One senior Justice Department official has resigned, and Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales is now in the media crosshairs.
The participation of readers was also critical to the Democratic cat herding that TPM did during BushCo's push to loot Social Security. Josh is extremely good at spotting a promising story and being able to exert pressure in just the right spot, as well as enfranchising other blogs into the effort. I'm happy to see the TPM folks get the credit they deserve, but also delighted that the myth of DFHs in their bathrobes spouting two-bit opinions is being exploded. The US attorneys story seems to be turning into some sort of tipping point for the administration, the scandal that finally caused public disgust to reach critical mass. It's rather fitting that it be as a result of a blog-forged story that this happens, considering the fact that the blogosphere has kept the light shining during some very dark times.
As Digby says:
If the press can get past their loathing of the dirty hippies for five minutes they will see that not only have we been right, we have been flogging some amazingly good stories for the past six years that had they bothered to report them would have been journalistic coups. We really aren't that nuts — and the Bush administration really is that bad.
They aren't there yet, but a few of them look to be headed in that direction, and that is a very good thing.
Related posts:
Spotlight
Support this site!
Subscribe to the newsletter
Advertise on Firedoglake
Send
us your tips
Make us your homepage
About Firedoglake
Advanced search
Jane!
first
rats! missed it by one.
nope
Yeah, I was very please to see TPM getting kudos from several quarters about this. I suspect the fact that Josh is a former journalist (and has explicitly hired people as reporters) helps them get over the hump on this, but I hope that once they get over it, that distinction won’t seem as important.
I read that article earlier and it is very good. I kept expecting it to veer off into nonsense, but it never did.
This story, combined with the positive press that FDL got for the Plame trial coverage, is I hope opening some eyes at news bureaus around the country.
How long is it before one of the big newspapers tries to replicate this somehow?
between FDL’s live-blogging and TPM’s Abugate work, the credibility of “the blogs” must have, in the eyes of the press, increased manyfold in the short span of two months.
As usual, digby nails it. great post Jane.
Those media types that don’t understand the value of the blogosphere are really missing out on a good research and fact-checking resource: the volunteer citizen journalist.
I was a hippie once decades ago. But I was not, and remain, not dirty. We now have running water, and Dial. ;0)
I guess it’s kind of like “distributed journalism”, along the lines of “distributed computing”. An imposingly big problem, broken into small components which are worked on separately and then re-assembled into a coherent whole.
The analogy’s not perfect, but the basic principle’s the same.
Josh will have to fight for his Pulitzer with FDL, though.
They do need to add a blog category, because this is where news coverage is headed. The MSM can’t compete with the amazing energy supplied by hundreds of citizen-journalists, backed by thousands of fact-checking and investigating readers.
The US attorneys story seems to be turning into some sort of tipping point for the administration, the scandal that finally caused public disgust to reach critical mass.
looks like it may be the one, but how many times has Lucy pulled that football away from us?
(Gannon, wiretapping, Traitorgate, just to mention a few)
This existed to an extent before blogging, but just as now, it was usually the snotty attitudes of reporters that kept this resource from being fully utilized.
Joe Conason and Gene Lyons were among the first reporters to embrace their readers instead of spurning them. As a result, they have had for over a decade a dedicated core of internet buddies who will get them the information they need, often within minutes if not seconds of the request. And — the biggie — they welcome unsolicited information.
Back in the mid-’90s I found out right away that the more receptive a reporter was to unsolicited information, the less likely that reporter was to be in the tank for any particular group. Joe Conason is one of the most receptive reporters I know.
Good post, Jane. Too many MSM bigwigs think that vetted letters to the editor should satisfy our need to be a part of the world they report on rather than passive consumers. It’s worth it to give some cookies to those who try to see the difference, and it’s worth it to call those who refuse to try.
never mind…why am I asking?
Humility is a bitter pill for some of these mainstream journalists to swallow, but the sooner they swallow it, the better their work will become. Exponentially, and probably overnight too.
Maybe there needs to be a new term invented to replace “bloggers” when describing those who do the work the MSM won’t or can’t — or an enhanced term that includes “bloggers.” Something to set folks like Talking Points Memo and Firedoglake apart from those who are blogging about their fish aquarium or their kid’s first tooth.
Speaking of missing the forest for the cocktail wienies, I watched the Plame testimony last night on a CSPAN rerun. Wow. Did those guys roll over or what and was Victoria ever so Victoria as she was yesterday sitting there with her newly delivered head in her hands? A great time was had by all.
Now, if this isn’t an example of wtf we have been trying to say to these so-called reporters for, what, 6 years now, I don’t know what is. I hope we are generous in victory and only break the fingers on one of their hands.
SteveNS @ 10
Oh, that’s exactly it. And if done right, it can be powerful. (Back when the first FOIA docs came out from Abu Ghraib, a team of Kossacks volunteered to go over the huge document dump to help check for any other possible abuse cases. What would have been impossible for one person turned out to be manageable for several dozen.)
The Republicans are concentrating hard on 2008, for a variety of reasons. Are we?
I like “open source journalists” myself.
News Grinder @ 17
Maybe “blog journalist” would work…not to be confused with “journalist blogger,” which is Joke Line’s bailiwick.
blogalist.
Oklahoma kiddo @
20
Reading FDL, it doesn’t look like it.
This firing of the U.S. Attorneys is right out of the Nixon “Saturday night massacre” playbook.
There’s another aspect of pulling together thousands of people to dissect a story, and it’s not just a thousand different points of view (which can often be a huge distraction).
It’s institutional memory. Most of us get a bad case of CRS once in a while, and getting our memories jogged about something pertinent and historical which applies to a current story gives it context that’s too often missing in contemporary reporting.
Okay, how about this new name: Sloggers
Free dictionary defines sloggers this way:
1. To walk or progress with a slow heavy pace; plod: slog across the swamp; slogged through both volumes.
2. To work diligently for long hours: slogged away at Latin.
v.tr.
1. To make (one’s way) with a slow heavy pace against resistance.
2. To strike with heavy blows.
n.
1. A long exhausting march or hike: a slog through miles of jungle.
2. A long session of hard work: an 18-hour slog in the hay fields.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 20
I’m concentrating hard on 2007, myself. We’ve got legislative elections here in November, and we need to make significant but do-able gains in 2007 and 2009 to take at least one house before redistricting.
The Republicans are plotting for the next election. Shouldn’t we?
“good journalists everywhere.”
Yeah, both of them.
re: my status as a dirty hippie:
To quote Sir John Harington on Queen Victoria: “(Her Majesty) takes a bathes twice a year, whether she needs it or not.”
Of course this is right on and old media is scared of losing their power. Isn’t it always that way when there is a paradigm shift?
Too many reporters have been poo pooing the power of the internet and the blogiverse in particular. Some tried to go online and have apresence but failed to really embrace the democracy of it.
FDL is a perfect example of democratic media at work. Here you find a bunch of smart, inciteful, commited citizens of all ages, occupations, classes, races and so forth who are interest in one thing – the truth and they are tenacious at getting to it and do it with a sense of humour as well.
Bloggers are not amateurs. Marcy Wheeler and Glen Greenwalk are as sharp as they come… not to mention Jane and Christy and the FDL headliners. The difference may be that bloggers are not suck ups to corporate bosses, boards and agendas. I mean progressive bloggers. The right side are really into echo chambers… but that is another story another story another story.
Politicians and the press should be worried about the smarty pants bloggers and their readers. You can fool some of the people some of the time, but you can’t fool all the people all the time.
We aren’t foolable no more. We’re net savy… and lies have short legs… they don’t get far.
Do they?
Redshift @ 28
I like that! ;0)
Aren’t more repukes headed for jail because of scandals?
Where’s CREW?
DefJef @
31
I’m hoping you meant insightful, although your choice of homonyms might apply more often than not.
SteveNS @
10
Neurons in a super computer :)
Rob Zuber @ 6
I think this story does a better job than even the good ones in the past of explaining why blogging the news works. It may help newspapers figure out that it’s more than putting up a comment section on their stories that no one on staff reads.
The second key, in addition to the open-source distributed research and reporting, is that unlike print and broadcast, it costs nothing to put additional information online (other than the costs of writing and editing it.) Print and TV journalists and editors are steeped in the concept that stories have a length, because they have to fit. But web versions of stories don’t have a length, and part of their power comes from that “here’s some more” aspect, combined with the ability to link everything together so you don’t have to recap before every update.
Jane! Wishing you health and happiness.
In the media room at the trial I introduced myself as a “citizen journalist.”
We’ll find the right words eventually, but most important is there is WORK to be done.
Guitar_Playing_Bastard @
15
I read your comment before you deleted it… It would be interesting to get Lincoln’s response!! Having lived in the deep South and the ‘conservative’ Midwest (Iowa), I’ll take Iowa any day of the year. The blatant stupidity of parts of the South are astounding. It still revolves around the old feudalism idea. While Iowa may not be the hotbed of progressive ideas, we are far from being stupid and incapable of rational dialog to change our minds.
I agree with the main topic of the post in the ‘power of the people’ who are motivated by a passion for their cause to find the truth, whether it facilitates their point or not, is a good thing that the MSM cannot afford to dismiss. Blogs are a great gathering point for people with a common interest. Each of us may have a little piece of information that would otherwise be time consuming and expensive for MSM to track down, and are willing to share.
I’ll be the first to admit amazement @ the L.A. Times this morning when reading the Sat. Column One feature- “Blogs Can Top the Presses.”
I despair of the Times- IMO their news coverage & op-ed pages have deteriorated sadly in recent yrs. That article was a welcome surprise.
Of course, right next to it on page 1 was a big headline & article w/pic of Fred Thompson entitled, “Could an Actor Again Fill GOP Leading Role?”
But Terry McDermott’s TPM write up outshone that nonsense like a star through fog…
At Daily Kos, there’s a request for linked research from ePluribus Media.
Here’s the challenge:
Add water and stir.
SteveNS @
10
First, I gotta give a shout out to (((JANE!!!)))– Good subject, and one about which you are an authority!
Steve, your analogy is good!
Money is not the only thing that moves good journalism. A passion for justice, a good sense of indignation, can provide enough motivation for people to do the work of journalism.
I think what we’re seeing at FDL and TPM is a merging of traditional journalism with the original idea of blogging. Most bloggers are not trained at journalism, but on-the-job training can do wonders: one learns by doing, and by doing what works. One learns the value of citing one’s sources, and checking them. Even better in this new medium of the Internet, is the technology of embedded links that are even better than footnotes in conventional print media.
So, my hat is off to the bloggers of FDL and TPM, especially the FDL Plamegate team. You rock!
Bob in HI
It’s the co-operation between blogs that poses the greatest contrast to MSM. The MSM sends a team each to cover everything from Anna Nicole Smith to Iraq. Blogs happily refer their readers to other blogs who have staked out a story. For Plame it’s FDL, for USAttorneys it’s TPM. Hopefully, other blogs will pick their own areas of expertise and we can all help them with any local data that fits that puzzle.
Can you just imagine how the Republicans will interpret a win in 2008? A mandate for sure. But think what they’ll do with this ‘mandate’!
OT, but as I’m so often commenting at the end of a thread, didn’t want to get EPU’ed again.
Brendan: Thanks so much for the post on public transportation. That’s a biggie for me. Really appreciated your take and what all the commenters had to say. By the time I read through all the comments and crafted a response, even you’d bailed on your own thread. :)
Christy and Commenters: And thank y’all for all the links to, and recommendations for, some good Celtic music in this morning’s Pull Up A Chair. I got involved following links and checking out new artists and everybody’d moved on by the time I got around to saying “thank you.”
OT, but I thought our Mean Jean-loving folks might like this piece I just wrote for Howie Klein for downwithtyranny. It really happened!
Right Wing Puke
This past Thursday in Washington, US Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-OH) celebrated St. Patrick’s Day early in her own unique way. Schmidt, known in her district and elsewhere as “Mean Jean”, entered a bathroom in the Cannon Office Building, stepped in vomit on the floor and fell into it. How unpleasant for the vomit! Schmidt emerged from the bathroom indignantly screaming about the lack of janitorial services therein. Shrill shrew Schmidt soon attracted a group of people with her screeching loud voice who then observed the vomit running down the back of her clothing.
Our readers will recall Schmidt’s ranting speech in November of 2005, when she denigrated Pennsylvania’s Jack Murtha and caused ensuing chaos, shutting down the House of Representatives for half an hour. Of last week’s spectacle, Politico.com reader Vaughn D. Taylor said, “Cowards slip and fall, real representatives never do.” Rep. Jack Murtha had no comment other than a loud guffaw.
What goes around, comes around, Mean Jean.
Holy Shit!
I just got quoted by Greg at TPM’s The Horse’s Mouth — on how the transformative effects of TPM’s Attorney Purge coverage and FDL’s Libby coverage combine to re-inforce the growing awareness of bloggings strengths as a media.
You should check out Greg’s whole post ( http://www.talkingpointsmemo.c….._momen.php ), but here’s my quote from it:
Cool!
Redshift @
5
And the kudos FDL and its Plame crew got were in part for the fact that we covered the case as lawyers and other professionals, who showed up not just for the liveblogging but also for the intense analysis before, during, and since the trial.
Yes I did mean insightful..
But we do need some real incitement in another sense!
Thanks for the smell check
I ask you once again to please visit the draft Gore petition at the top right of this blog. Thank you very much!
kiddo. ;0)
Redshift @
5
Interesting, also, that KO called Josh the “publisher” of TalkingPointsMemo and TPM/Muckraker. Perhaps fitting bloggers into their journaminalizm paradigm without sacrificing the integrity and force-multiplier of the blogosphere is the ticket.
After organizing Plame House and getting multiple contributors to live-blog the trial, Jane should probably be called the Publisher of FireDogLake as well.
Of course the corporate owned media has no clue about blogs and how they can be used. It would mean admitting that they’ve been co-opted by power so that they can get the talking head slots and show how kewl they are. If they actually reported things that would upset the administration, why, they might not get that preferred seating at Signatures or whichever is the K St watering hole of choice today…
Guitar_Playing_Bastard @
15
Asking what?
Brief ThinkProgress post:
Past U.S. attorneys outraged by prosecutor purge
OT but if Gore were drafted at the convention it would / could upset all this corporate finance of pres elections. How many billions are going to be wasted on stupid pres campaigns where candidates only pander to the lowest common denoninator or every interest group they can think of… and basically say nothing.
Get money out of politic$ and get lobbyi$t$ out of government.
Phoenix Woman @
13
Very much so. That’s why it was so shocking — well, perhaps not — when the WaPo treated their online readers so cavalierly and tried to “hang tough” during Debbie Howell/Abramoff. Didn’t have to be that bright to figure out that wouldn’t play any more, what can you say.
Corporate media is another hierarchy pyramid game. The blogs are non hierachical. That pisses them off.
As it proves their stupid rise to the top rubbish (by sucking up) is hooey as far as journalism is concerned.
Bill Maher had a good “New Rules” segment on his show last night, about the kinds of sacrifices Americans have made in the War on Terror(TM). I’ve posted the transcript here.
(It’s the second post.)
FDL & TPM have proved blogs are more than just a source for opinion, at their best they can effect change. Hearing Valerie testify before Congress and watching the print and tv media catch up to what we have been discussing for so long is the proof.
I have not commented here often lately, I have been dealing with the illness and death of my mom. She was one tough lady who got involved in local gov’t in the 60’s and spent her life crusading to right wrongs.
Though I have not commented, I have been here celebrating through my tears with Jane, Christy, Marcy & Pach. I am proud of this community and being a part of it has helped me get through the saddest time of my life.
Joe Conason has always been way cool. And he is not getting a swelled head… but his eyes can sure see through the BS. Good on him.
Slightly OT but the Sunday lineup might be tilting a bit left. I ain’t gonna link but politico has the details.
TPM was one of the first blogs I found, along with Media Whores Online. Josh continues to do outstanding work, along with our own badass FireDogs.
While the Rethugs could certainly steal another one in ‘08, their ability to lie with impunity has been greatly diminished. They spent 30 years building their Wurlitzer, but since it has been bult on lies and deception-a bad foundation, if you will-it’s no wonder it is beginning to crumble.
Like the little pigs in the story, we are building our house with brick-facts and truth, not lies, PR and spin.
TeddySanFran @ 50
On the “TPM Media Masthead,” Josh calls himself “Editor and Publisher.”
Sending lots of love your way.
((((((((DIANE))))))))
Let us know how you’re doing about the loss of your mom. Many of us have been there.
Maybe “blog journalist” can be a blogjour?
Twisted Guinness @ 64
I miss The Horse!
Anybody have any good link for some liveblogging of the march on the Pentagon? Here’s one I’ve found, but I’m sure there are more.
Diane: I’m so sorry about the loss of your mom.
TexasEllen @
42
???
I googled up Plame to see what the MSM had to say. Except for furriners, the MSM nearly universally told its readers and listeners:
-A. Plame was glamorous – even once or twice I spotted “blonde bombshelll.”
AND
-B. There was nothing new.
Yeah, Anna Nicole Smith got lots of coverage. Maybe if Valerie had – aww, fogetaboutit.
Indeed FDL is a contender for any title with the admirable work of Josh Marshall. And FDL has carried by far the bigger story in my estimation. The damage to the national security from the outing of Valerie, without regard to the coverup of concocted evidence to get us into a terrible war, was far greater than that of other machinations of the criminal enterprise that has been running the country.
The MSM doesn’t seem to know or care one way or the other.
I think I agree in the main with what you are getting at, TexasEllen. I guess it’s a matter of different focus and semantics.
Best, Terry
TeddySF, great riff on the title of publisher. After all Jane was and is a producer, so isn’t that similar to a publisher? Like the GM of a football team, they pull all the parts together and the director/head coach/editor executes the vision.
I loved the Irish post this morning but what made mmy heart glad today was Waxmans letter to the White House about the hearings.
Will they respond and if they dont what?
egregious, thanks for the hug – it is very overwhelming dealing with both the emotional loss and also with the legal & insurance process. I so need a lawyer.
Redshift @ 28
A-yep.
re: Redshift @
5
Those who saw/read Waas’ slightly testy riposte to EW on DN the day after the Scooter verdict, may realise that the categorial boundary between “blogger” and “journalist” is contested:
Which side of the soapdish is Josh on? What’s his DFH cred? Chomsky insists that the culture wars (e.g. red/blue america) are a distraction from reality based politics, but how to make them go away? Or should we riff on them until they explode?
Terry, part of what I’m contending about blogs is that they decide what is important and focus on that with depth and nuance. The MSM’s greatest weakness is trying to do something of everything and are therefore a mile wide and an inch deep. Because of that, they tend to sound alike, even when twenty reporters have zipped in to “cover” something they have little or no background on.
{{Diane}}
Here is a copy of a letter I sent to the LA Times today after reading their article about Talking Points Memo. KUDOS TO ALL OF YOU!!! TPM, FDL, No Quarter and Raw Story are the four must read sites every day for me.
*******************************************
“Liked your article. I am a regular reader of TPM as well as other political and public affairs blogs. I contribute my comments on occasion and enjoy reading the rest of the time.
I’ll tell you why people like Josh Marshalls site are so hot – bloggers such as TPM and Firedoglake.com, don’t have to answer to the giant corporations that own the rest of the media establishment. They are not limited as to what they can say. In some way, I think the readers help keep things on track and establish a healthy balance. Its a good place for people to vent, discuss ideas and probably a good substitute for a therapist, for some. Its also a place where you actually get to follow the story in-depth and its not all done in 30 second sound bites.
I am amazed at people that I personally know who talk about something they saw on the news in a 30 second snippet (on FOX no doubt) and they are an expert of what is really going on at the White House, or whatever the subject may be. With Josh’s site and others out there, you have a choice of getting involved and being heard. I think sometimes it comes down to feeling the need of being validated. (Am I the only one that thinks such and such about ________). Then you find a whole plethera of people across this country that are thinking the same thing.”
sorry for your loss, Diane
I would have broken this story if it wasn’t for you meddling kids.
-Dean David Broder
Jane @ 55:
…that’s why it was so shocking — well, perhaps not — when the WaPo treated their online readers so cavalierly and tried to “hang tough” during Debbie Howell/Abramoff. Didn’t have to be that bright to figure out that wouldn’t play any more, what can you say.
yeah, that blog don’t hunt, or something like that
Renee in Ohio @ 57
Good stuff from Dan Rather, too, on the media having traded speaking truth for access. (Especially gracious in that he didn’t exempt himself.)
“When will it all cave in? The sky, I mean; our networks; our intricate pretensions. We were too good at what we did, at being fruitful, at multiplying, and now there’s too much breathing. We eat dangerous foods, our shit glows in the dark, the cells of our bodies turn on us like sharks. Every system is self-limiting. Will we solve ourselves as the rats do? With war, with plagues, with mass starvation? These thoughts come with breakfast, like the juice from murdered fruits. Your depression, my friend, is the revenge of the oranges.”
Margaret Atwood
I do not think it too early to be thinking about the future.
Oklahoma kiddo @
25
I would compare it more to Nixon’s penchant for using government departments as if they belonged to him for the duration of his term. He didn’t seem to see why he couldn’t or shouldn’t attempt to use the IRS against his “enemies list.” We’ll be very sorry if Bush gets away with replacing people for following the law and their conscience: people who used integrity in the application of the law.
That is really where the Repugnicans are concentrating their hopes and dreams for the next election. A lack of integrity allowed to flourish in the Dept. of Justice will come back to bite us!
Sorry to hear about your mom, Diane; she sounds like a great lady. I’m glad we were able to serve as your extra family-of-choice.
Keith Olbermann referred to Josh Marshall as an internet publisher if I recall.
-GSD
Diane, my best of thoughts to you in you and your families time of pain.
I’ve riffed on this before, but I think it bears repeating-Bloggers and blog readers are active consumers of news-we look for more than just a stroy, we want to see where the info came from. Most people, and these are the ones that traditional media caters to, are passive consumers of news. They believe and are satisfied with what they are given.
It’s like we took the blue pill and can now see the Matrix, and the rest took the red pill and can’t. The goal is to create more active consumers, and make it easy and not intimidating to take the blue pill.
I’ve found that the higher up the media food chain, the more ossified the ideas, and the less receptive one is to outside information — and the greater the likelihood that the persons therein are on the take, spiritually if not literally.
And it’s not something from which online journalists are entirely free — Jake Tapper started out as a halfway-decent reporter with Salon, but ever since he left Salon for Big Media his ethics and skills seem to have declined even as his head and paycheck have swelled, as this indicates pretty conclusively.
(((Diane)))
Ann in AZ @ 82
;0)
Jane -
The other strength of FDL (and probably TPM) the breadth of professional expertise and experience among the readers, lurkers and posters. As I said once before, from what I see here FDL could staff an international law firm, a full service hospital with mental health facility, and engineering firm, an accounting firm and I’ve lost track of what else. Not to mention some older but battle hardened 60’s Berkeley
rioters
protesters. That kind of resource is just not available to the MSM for free and almost instantly.Diane – re: lawyer, what state are you in?
Thanks all for your kindness & sympathy.
Sorry to hear that news, Diane. It’s always a difficult time. My condolences.
jane, i sent you an email, if you’re still here.
Do you really think this latest scandal is the tipping point? There have been so many…
(waves to petedownunder)
Another point worth considering: print journalists work not only on deadline but on a standard schedule. That is, they *have* to write something, esp. the columnists. It’s easy to tell when articles or columns have just been knocked off in a hurry because the writers really didn’t have anything important to say, or even anything at all to say. There are journalists in my family, and I can’t count how often I’ve heard “I need something to write about in my column—do you have any ideas?” or “I have to turn in X,000 words by Thursday afternoon, and I have no material.” And isn’t it fun to read something written under that attitude?
By contrast, on-line independent journalists (=bloggers, for the sake of this conversation) don’t have to turn out print on schedule. If the blogger doesn’t have material or a special topic, the blogger starts a conversation with readers, via an open thread. So not only do bloggers have the time to research carefully, over a long period (as witness FDL on, and TPM on the US Attorneys), but they also have natural subjects and passion. Since the bloggers respond to their readers, pretty quickly (unlike print journalists), they develop relationships with those readers. Errors are caught and acknowledged quickly (again a contrast to print media, let alone television and radio news). I subscribe to two newspapers (one being the NYT), but I don’t actually love reading them. I love reading FDL.
Eventually the MSM will have to start giving real credit to on-line independent journalists and researchers. They may be resisting now, but they’re fighting a rearguard action, and they know it.
TexasEllen @ 76
Ummm yeah. I agree to a point but the main problem I see is that the MSM is usually little more than canning factories for AP and, to a lesser extent, Reuters, which has already cut out the bone and muscle in a story and left the fat. A thousand reporters doing a great job would not correct that.
A reporter for Time covered something like southeast Asia when I was in Vietnam under Eisenhower. Despite limited tools and his huge territory the reporter produced far better intelligence than the Army Intelligence office I was working for. Unfortunately his reports were edited to conform to editorial policy just as we had to tell the generals they were right. Mosquitoes was Time’s title of the report on the first shots – actually bombs – of the Vietnam War. I was only ruffled a bit by the very first bomb but others were severely wounded and some died. All went for naught. And then the heroic JFK decided death squads would be just the thing to make everything all well. The result was easy to forecast but only a few did. Now the evil that JFK did has been turned upside down just as with Clinton. Such is life.
God bless FDL. Wish it had been around way back when. The mosquitoes may still have drawn blood but the word would have been around for those who would listen.
Best, Terry
Hope. And I am not alone.
WASHINGTON — Denouncing a conflict entering its fifth year, protesters across the country raised their voices Saturday against U.S. policy in Iraq and marched by the thousands to the Pentagon in the footsteps of an epic demonstration four decades ago against another divisive war.
Renee in Ohio @ 57
Video here:
Windows Media Player:
http://www.crooksandliars.com/…..rifice.wmv
Quicktime:
http://www.crooksandliars.com/…..rifice.mov
petedownunder, I am staying at my mom’s in NE PA – Scranton area. She still isn’t going down without a fight, the weather is preventing her burial.
JGabriel @
46
Way Cool! I would even say Way, Way Cool! Congrats to you.
Diane,
So sorry to hear of your loss. I hope she was well long enough to see the good guys start to win and the Dark Lord of Mordor start to see his powers ebb.
My aunt died in mid-January. She was a remarkable woman and an urban activist in 60’s Philly. She was so pleased to have seen the 2006 results before she died.
(((Waives to LoudounLib)))
Diane – I don’t know anyone in that neck of the woods, when I’m in the US I’m in northern CA. Maybe some of the Eastern Pups will have a recommendation. My condolences and sorry I can’t help.
Great article, great angle on blogging… one nitpick: the word “forged” has two meanings, and the one fresher in most people’s minds is the bad one (the Freeper-forged-and-planted Texas Air National Guard docs that cost Dan Rather his job, a classic Rovian double-bind…)
But great article. The synergy and scope of the internet is what’s really great about it. “Many hands make light work” and all that.
Gloomy Gus @ 95
Thinking about it in the context of the last six years, no–at least not one that leads to wholesale, abrupt change.
That said, I’m not sure there’s going to be any point where the avalanche begins. This administration is like a landfill that’s now beginning to fill up to its borders and everything from now just makes the pile higher and the stench stronger. We’re probably going to see the level of general disgust in society rise proportionally.
Even if there’s another war, I don’t think that will constitute a tipping point. People have become inured to this adminstration behaving badly and are just waiting them out.
Right now, I think the only thing that would bring out the torches and pitchforks in very large numbers is if some whistleblowers appeared showing that the administration was somehow partly and deviously responsible for 9/11. 9/11 gave them their power–it’s about the only thing that can take it all away.
Jane ” the blogosphere has kept the light shining during some very dark times”. You can say that again!
So Bush is basically saying that 10% of the his hand-picked USA’s were bad apples.
Heckuva job.
-GSD
Blue Dido @ 95
Well, yes but…I used to work at the NBC affiliate in Providence, Rhode Island, and they set up a reporter purely to do investigative stuff (mostly Mob stuff, being New England and all). He didn’t have set deadlines – he’d just chase stories. Brian Ross (ABC & NBC, I think) operated that way, and the only thing that would stop the MSM from doing that is money and ruffled feathers.
I think blogs – particularly blogs with a point of view – are willing to afflict the comfortable in a way that the MSM has lost its stomach for. No one here cares if Karl Rove stops inviting them over for quail, after all. That on top of the collective wisdom and insight of the community makes for a very powerful adjunct to the media.
I don’t think Blogs can replace the media – there are issues of access and resources that would stymie blogs on a lot of issues – but they can certainly follow certain trails deeper into the woods than a deadline reporter can, or may be willing to, do.
As for what to call it – hey, if it’s journalism, it’s journalism. Team journalism of the best kind.
There was big support for Lamont in the last election here. And I certainly was a supporter of Ned. Can we expect the same for a presidential candidate for 2008?
And next to THAT page one story the write up of the Plame hearing, and yet more insulting characterizations of Valerie. “And as she got up to leave, she swept her hands back and forth like a Hollywood actress accustomed to clearing her way through paparazzi.”
Quick, someone get these reporters off the D.C. beat and onto the “Dirt” writing staff!
And gee, not a word about the Flaming Harridan.
Marie Roget @ 39
Josh Marshall was onto something big? Really? That’s not what Jay Carney says.
We swear too much unlike Bob Novak and Dick Cheney. Like David Broder, I have the vapors just thinking about it.
ajg @ 110
Carney was enough of a mensch to admit he was wrong, at least…
trifecta @ 113
That’s a fuckin’ shame. Here, lay down on my chaise longue for a bit. :)
I love Josh’s fantastic work. I created a URL forwarder that points to his page on repubs under investigation or already indicted/arrested: http://RepublicanMugShots.com. Check it out :-)
The domain name was the idea of Gina Cooper of YearlyKos fame; I just spent the few bucks to set it up.
I think the tipping point already occured – Katrina. The image of Dubya looking out the window of AF1 is burned in the minds of many.
Allison, she was thrilled when the Dems came back in Nov, particularly Casey beating Santorum.
petedownunder, thanks for the thought, wish you were here to help.
Fred Thompson v. Hillary Clinton? Gee. I can hardly wait.
Raw Story:
Kristof: US should stop biting tongue on Israel
Seems the Colorado prosecutor was switched around, too. The owner and top management of Quest, which refused to let the government see phone records, were hauled before the Security and Exchange Commission.
http://dailykos.com/
Oklahoma kiddo @ 118
Yeah, you can almost feel the electricity in the air with that match-up…. :)
The local rag in this repuke mecha of a blue state hardly mentioned the Plamegate hearings in today’s so called “newspaper”
Diane…my thoughts are with you. My mother died Christmas Day and in some ways, since I missed the funeral, it still doesn’t seem real. I plan to visit her grave when I return to the States in April and maybe I’ll “comprehend” it more then.
Just had the most wonderful dream about her early this morning. I have comforting “visitations” via dreams of both my parents and I’m filled with the love they always showed me. I hope you will receive the same comfort.
Where’s Redd? The Lady Mountaineers are on ESPN2. It’s a good opportunity to expose the Peanut to some women’s basketball.
Charlie Rangel takes on and destroys Dennis Miller.
It amused me enough to add my two cents.
2 thoughts, OT:
If the GOP message is so right and tidy, then why do they have to continually sneak around to get what they want?
Ms. Toensing is/was “gumming it to death” in “good faith, of course.” Hmmm.
Update. I just went to Swampland and read Carney’s Mea Culpa. Very big of him to do so.
The Press: (looking down on a very simple puzzle) Now how do you put this thing together?
Us: It’s very simple really. You take that red piece that you have in your hands and you put it next to the blue piece.
The Press: But my friend says this red piece doesn’t belong.
Us: Ignore your friend for a minute. The red piece is important. See how it has an outtie that is just the right size for the innie on that blue piece? Just put them together.
The Press: I don’t know, this shiny thing here looks pretty important. Maybe I can just force it over he…
Us: (Grabbling puzzle) Gimme that thing. Look, just forget it, OK? We’ll do it ourselves. We haven’t got all day. Jeez!
The Press: {Dirty fucking hippies}
I am a huge Josh Marshall fan. I am very happy he is getting more well deserved respect and recognition. The site and posts are lucid, cogent, and enlightening. It is the first site I read in the morning and one of the last at night. He has brought several stories into the light. I hope his career continues to grow and expand.
kitty @ 127
You forgot your disclaimer.
AND, as much as I like Josh Marshall and all of the quality work he’s been doing, we should not lose site of the fact that he didn’t get the Lieberman thing at all. Oh, he mouthed some words and he acted all perplexed by Joe, but in the end, he thought it was no big deal.
So, he is not perfect.
Dennis Miller used to have a progressive perspective, but he wet his pants and moved to the dark side,
NZ Expat, I’m waiting to see her in my dreams.
NPR watch (is this OT or on-T?)
Here’s the message NPR chose to put on (11 min past houor) on ATC. The pretext was the Iraq War protests – yet NPR finished and (IIRC) prefaced the anti-war protest with vivid quotes from the far smaller pro-war protests.
Poltergeists don’t assemble the sequence of stories on ATC – NPR editors choose each piece and choose what comments to quote.
And they chose to quote a pro-war demonstrator praising “the patriots who came here [pro-war rally] and not the traitors [anti-war citizens] out there”.
How nice of NPR to frame the anti-war patriots as “traitors”.
The majority of Americans want the war ended now. NPR’s listeners seldom hear this – so perhaps NPR’s editors also don’t know.
Where do they get their editors? Oral Roberts U?
Perhaps the most interesting hook in the article comes with the discussion of disaffection with MSM, the author writes
Yes. And I wonder if this isn’t akin to the rightwing aggravation that was mitigated by 90s talk radio and the Fox
NewsOpinion Channel. I think the left was slower to fully acknowlege the lethal weakness of the fact and fairness centered media. Jefferson said that an informed citizenry was essential to keeping our democracy, it was the social glue and the source of informed decision making.My biggest worry the last couple of years has been understanding that I spend more time reading the blogs than most people I know would ever devote; these are people whose lives and jobs are so consuming that they have no time to be adequately informed citizens, and the addition of 20 or 30 top tier Dem/left blogs to the information assignment is just not on. This article is a good prod to steer a few more folk to become devoted blog readers.
Some of the problems facing mainstream newsprint organizations in the electronic age now were faced quite some time ago by scientific journals. At least in my own field, there’s no question who won: game set match to the blogger-equivalent, known colloquially (now anachronistically) as the Los Alamos Physics Server.
Naturally, the bias/political interest issues are very different. But Paul Ginsparg, who started arxiv, gave a very interesting talk on the paper-vs-electrons issue to UNESCO in 1996. I think there are some good parallels to the blogger/journalist tension.
Since that talk was written, arxiv has become the de facto communication and nerve center of at least particle physics. I know this is also true for several other fields.
The media being so in bed with the political community is only feeding blogging.
You have congressmen who become either media members or lobbyists when done. Journalists who don’t cover the outside world, just D.C. It’s so incestuous that Rudy Guiliani should ask for an annulment.
Did Rove threaten the MSM with a loss of access to the WH if they made a big deal of the Palme scandal? Gonzo looks ready to resign and be Rove’s fall guy and this is not news? Valerie was covert! Victoria seemed deranged! Waxman’s I’m leaving the record open Smashed Vic’s face to despondency! Yet somehow despite the juicy story the MSM has gone all Pravda on us with a news blackout!
Jeany @ 133
It wasn’t that hard to see and figure out–matching a lie with the truth for “balance” isn’t reporting, nor is it a backwards glance at the fairness doctrine. It’s a way of obscuring what’s actually happening.
Once reporting goes down that road, it’s very difficult to find enough room to turn around and go back.
New Next Hurrah thread:
The Heart Of The Matter
Diane @
58
Very, very sorry for your loss.
Very sorry indeed.
Josh Marshall is great. FDL makes up for his snark deficit.
OT- Frank Rich op-ed is up @ NY Times (behind the wall, but I’m sure Raw Story & others will quote extensively):
The Ides of March 2003
the reason for the news blackout is that all the WH reporters are at Camp David this weekend. They are probably all going in for their monthly “Manchurian Candidate” download.
http://www.editorandpublisher……1003559607
Can’t say it any better than this I think.
Best, Terry
[waving to snowbird42 & Blue Dido (sorry to have missed you earlier)]
TeddySanFran @
50
I call her my publisher … oh wait. THere’s a reason for that.
Diane @
58
Diane, I am so sorry to learn of your and your family’s loss. My heart goes out to you in this time of grief.
Witney @ 140
Is Cheney at Camp David, too?
Mutant Poodle @ 107
Phoning it in for more than a decade, along with subservience to the corporate paymaster, killed the media. While the rest of our experience has been to chase the extreme in search of the authentic, corporate media played it safe and removed itself as far as possible from anything that might be threatening or uncomfortable. I have wondered if this wasn’t another factor in the build up of hype and theater surrounding the Clinton scandals; they were safe, could be pursued from the comfortable confines of the beltway, within reach of the cocktail weenies and the three-martini lunch. No need to actually get one’s hands dirty doing any heavy lifting. Cushy.
It’s not just the willingness to afflict the comfortable, either, that makes blog-based citizen journalism so compelling. It’s that they reject comfort themselves, are so impassioned that they ignore threats to themselves in order to seek out the truth.
Jane, for example, is on the spot at the Libby trial in spite of her on-going convalescence, deferring her chemotherapy to demand the truth in person.
Larisa Alexandrovna, in spite the risks incumbent with reporting on Putin and the Russian government, in spite of her own chronic health problems, reports on Russia anyhow and our own problem children.
Marcy invests herself totally in live coverage from Prettyman Courthouse, on the heels of writing and editing a book to a collapsed timeline, putting her personal consulting business on hold to cover the Libby Trial.
Comfortable, my ass. The truth doesn’t come with a doggie bag.
Curious in Central Texas @ 144
Cheney and Rove are the ones that administer the injections!!!
FreddyMoraca @
73
FWIW, either I was VERY hungover when I made the comment, or Murray’s response to mine totally missed my point.
I was talking about weaknesses in the media–as I have in my book. Think media’s working? Great, then make Murray’s argument. But even he woudl agree it’s not. And frankly, the failure of journalism is partly due to the fact that the good journalists–like Murray–apologize so much for the shit their colleagues pull.
Journalists have bought into the meme that it is unpatriotic to be skeptical – Bush brainwashing.
Pach & Kirk, thank you for your kind words of sympathy.
Laughter has taken down more tyrannts than armies, although the armies might clain otherwise!
Diane @ 151
They report what they must to keep their jobs. I think reporters are the most skeptical people on earth.
I know your pain, Diane, and know there is little anyone can say to make it go away.
I knew my mother was hours away from death years ago when the very name Nancy Reagan couldn’t get a rise out of her. That was the kind of thing that kept her going for years when she could no longer even feed herself – a woman who had been among the most independent people on earth.
Getting old is a horrible thing. All that is worse is not doing so.
Best, Terry
A SE Tennesse wave back to Waccamaw.(Isnt that a discount pottery place? LOL)
Diane @ 150
Yes, that, for lack of a better term, is the “Fox Effect.”
Not sure that’s all of it, though. The phenomenon precedes Bush. Part of it, certainly, has to do with the enormous amount of money that the right-wing has put into creating PR firms and think tanks and speakers’ bureaus. That sort of saturation creates a mindset among journalists that the “experts” in the Rolodex are on the right, and they get called first for opinion or “background.”
In a backhanded way, that has politicized reporting as much or more than any other factor, and that process has been very insidious–almost unnoticed, even by the journalists themselves.
The other thing about the blogs is that not only do they serve to help bring a story to light, but they offer us perspective on a story after it has been written and published. I read about 10 of the most prominent liberal blogs daily, and collectively they give me a broader and deeper view of an issue that I would have otherwise.
Brendan @
8
This would be EPUd, and if someone else mentioned, I apologize. Making mass transit more effective requires different building practices, building up and not out. One reason NYC’s trains run 24 7 is because the population is so dense that there is always a number of people who need to get on the train.
Also, with closing time at 4am, there’s demand through the night for service from revelers (who are outside right now, doubtless throwing up on our sidewalk).
On sorta the same topic, some people have noted that the City is one of the greenest cities in the country, because of its high population density, great mass transit, a low ratio of car ownership and little tiny living spaces that require less per capita in energy to supply.
lhp has bedtime stories upstairs
emptywheel @ 148
The problem with media is so very evident in the example of Waas himself; skippy pointed it out this past summer, that Waas alone was covering the Plame affair because he needed healthcare. Cripes, why wasn’t Waas being offered multiple jobs with increasingly better benefits besides healthcare coverage? Why is Waas apologizing for people who haven’t had to settle while continuing to push pap?
Gah. Corporate media is so completely opposite of much of the rest of the corporate world, where it’s dog eat dog and you’re only as good as your last production. Frustrating to sit and watch it when the rest of us have to truly hustle for a living, without so much as a hope of ever seeing a quail wing.
Unless you work in a poultry packing plant…
Finally read up-thread: Agreed, rosalind @ 109. L.A. Times Plame coverage caught w/its Tribune bias showing. When the Times fired Robert Sheer the downhill slide started IMO, & it’s been steady & steep ever since.
For Diane: All the love you could ever hope for to help you in this sad time seems readily available upstairs from kind FDLers. Just adding my prayers to theirs.
Good times.
I chipped in with a couple of pithy comments about reading the LATimes this morning, the fact that the TPM article was shockingly good journalism for them these days. TPM is fantastic, has a great, evolving structure that is just getting started, and JM and his gang deserve all the credit.
But let’s talk about JH and the pups for a moment. First of all, as happy as I was to put together a couple of thoughts this morning, I hope that people realize that the writing and comments above by Ms. Hamsher are extremely solid, perceptive, and well-written. She’s really really good at this. And of course it’s not just her. It’s a freaking gang, and they all pretty much kick ass multiple times a day.
Let’s note the fact that in JH’s analysis she never for an instant says, hey, what about FDL? Why didn’t we get more love from our hard work on the Libby trial? Nope. Nothing. Just moving ahead, part of the evolution and the journalistic industrial revolution we’re all witnessing.
My favorite item that I don’t believe anyone has noted in the thread is when JH mentions that FDL and others have served up multiple stories on silver platters to journalists of all MSM shapes and sizes, and aside from a few exceptions, people like Waas who didn’t need any help, they haven’t done the job. It’s so easy to picture them in big city newsrooms just going through the motions, crippled by deep ambivalence, by fear and loathing for the administration, their professions, and themselves.
Lastly, one of the things about the “new news” that doesn’t seem to be mentioned in the thread very much is that the new world is instantaneous. FDL and TPM are catching up after drafting for a few months on Crooks and Liars and YouTube, and who wants to guess that oversight.gov had its biggest day ever yesterday? If the big for-profit news organizations are going to compete, they’re going to have to throw all the money they can find at their websites and then go throw some more.
We want it better, and we want it right now.
And what we really want is truth in government and the opportunity for all of us to do our best, every day, just like the FDL shock troops keep showing us.
All your publishers are belong to us.
Oklahoma kiddo @
29
We should be doing a great deal of dirty work right now, not only to deat repukes, but to purge the party of the “blue dogs” (an insult to any dog if you ask me) like Tauscher and other Clusterfuck water-carriers.
Furthermore, we should be looking high and low for a candidate to run against Dianne “Lieberman in a dress” Feinstein, and looking farther down the road, another candidate to run against Barbara “I’m for Lieberman so I’m FOR the war” Boxer.
I’d donate my band’s time (we’ve agreed to this) to play any local fund-raiser, no charge at all, to any progressive candidates. But no to just any Dem and certainly, not to Feinstein or Boxer.
It’s time to tell people like Rahm Emanuel the status quo won’t go, hat ,b.we’re taking over and he can go along or be swept away.
It’s time to stop taking prisoners.
Guitar_Playing_Bastard @ 162
Amen to all that.
But those folks who’ve been recruited and groomed as candidates need to amass money this year. One thing that many of us could do right now is start our own mini-PAC’s, have house parties and raise money to give to candidates once identified.
One of the most important things I learned in my 3 years of grassroots of activism is that it only takes 2 people to form a PAC. Liberating idea, isn’t it?
portia.vz @ 126
Very funny vignette!
News Grinder @ 27
why not a brand new word? blog newsers could be called
blewsers …..
christine @
38
I know, but there are plenty of morons in the midwest. One guy who calls himself “Angry American” is in Wisconsin, and he uses quotes from Limbaugh, Malkin and Coulter to back up his arguments.
It would be fine with me if the Blue states (the states with the MONEY) were to secede and form their own nation, leaving the red states to fend for themselves. The resulting poverty and human suffering would be truly entertaining, because people who are that voluntarily stupid, frankly, deserve to suffer.
I’m a TPM fan as well as a new Firedoglake fan! One thing I have noticed in both places, Josh has a newish Ph.D in history (and a new baby which counts too) and you all are very accomplished in a variety of arenas including raising families and graduate education and experience in the world. You bring your high level critical thinking and synthesis skills with you in reporting on and analyzing whatever you are watching at any given time. That makes a huge difference in the merits of the products and pieces you publish, even on the fly You are also just enormously interesting and funny in your relaxed times!!
k, not to toot my own horn over the latimes, but i said similar things about firedoglake and the libby trial three days ago.
One of the thigs Josh was talking about this week was that the firing of U.S Atty Carol Lam in San Diego was the tip of the iceburg there. Yes, Duke Cuningham was convicted, but what about Porter Goss, Dusty Foggo, and hookers at The Watergate?
This is a story/crime that has yet to be exposed.
The most important fact, IMHO, uncovered in USAttorneygate or Gonzalesgate is how many more Democrats have been targeted for prosecution versus the much fewer number of Republicans and independents.
Then it dawned on me. What the Republicans have been doing since the 1990s (Whitewater and all the spurious Ken Starr investigations into the Clintons) and the US Attorneys this decade (especially after Gonzales became AG) is to get a whole lot of Democrats involved in litigation, force them to “lawyer-up,” and, if an elected Democratic official, spending a whole lot of potential campaign funds for their legal defense. I just wonder how many of these Democrats under investigation by Gonzales’ U.S. Attorneys have been driven into near poverty due to the costliness of lawyering-up?
In other words, the Republicans apparently learned one partisan lesson from Watergate and Iran-Contra, scandals in which Republicans either under investigation or indicted had to lawyer-up and spend large amounts of money to defend themselves. That is, go after Democrats and get them to lawyer-up and spend lots of money to defend themselves, with the Republicans going so far as to actually manufacture “scandals” to accomplish their evil, over-the-top, anti-American goal.
This, I believe, explains Gonzales’ goal of replacing all the U.S. Attorneys who wouldn’t get with “the program” of going after Democrats and getting them to waste a whole lot of potential campaign donations/funds on their legal defense. Voter fraud, therefore, is just a Republican “catchword” meant to hide their true intentions.
Nice catch Oracle.