One would think for a medium so young blogging wouldn't have much of a history. But it does. With all the talk of how quick the world moves today, we forget that it's just as true that history piles up behind us just as fast.
While there are other dynamics in play, not only is blogging history about to repeat itself, it's going to do it in half the time.
Energized by bloggers and blogging as a new media form, Left-side activists fueled what first appeared to be a revolution among the Democrats. In hindsight, it was more a shaping and refining of ideas, messaging and election tactics than it was anything else. The Netroots might be more or less where they started, though still refining themselves and developing into vehicles such as TPM, and others. But the Democrat Party has gone from a minority to a ruling class all by itself. And it was fueled by the energy of the Netroots out here on line.
While the Right was forced to mostly play defense and struggle against the complacency of a Republican Party that grew stale from being in, as opposed to out - that doesn't mean that the Right wasn't watching, gaining experience and learning as it went.
Some pieces will eventually fill in quickly, some will take more time. However, the Right on line already has substantial infrastructure, along with support from conservative talk radio and Tea Parties that only continue to grow in size and influence. Win, lose or draw, witness what just happened in NY - 23. An establishment Republican candidate was thrown over for the base's preference just a mere one year after Obama rose to power.
The Netroots achieved nothing like NY - 23 in their first years out. And their ability to challenge the establishment has left them with an even more defiant Lieberman, perhaps as much as it has accomplished anything else. That is not to say they are without significant accomplishment. They are. And certainly Obama in the WH, as opposed to Hillary, is proof of that.
Still, the grassroots fire now taking place on the Right, much of it, even the ground game, is fueled by on line activism, including on the blogs. And that has occurred within just one year's time from when the Right on line was seen as mostly ineffective, the weak sister of its counterpart on the Left. With that bit of now history having been written in less than a year, one can only imagine where it will be in four.
The Republican Party can search and talk all it wants as it struggles to understand and define its future. But that soon to be history, too, is already being written for it. All they need do to discover it is to spend enough time reading and engaged with the Right on line. And they will. New York - 23 has seen to that.
I have a few words to say about Lieberman here:
http://powerandcontrol.blogspot.com/2009/11/dede-is-democrat.html
The last line is:
I'll say this about that from a Republican point of view. With enemies like Joe who needs friends like Dede?
Posted by: M. Simon | Tuesday, November 03, 2009 at 04:42 AM
Quoted from and Linked to at: http://www.thecampofthesaints.com/2009.11.01_arch.html#1257277875965
Posted by: Robert Belvedere | Tuesday, November 03, 2009 at 08:22 PM