Salon Exposes Big Box Blog Payola
Russell gets a nice mention in this article (sorry, might have to sit through a damned Visa ad - Bugmenot no seem to worky):
“It looked like Jerome and Markos were using their big-box blogs to steamroll into Ohio,” said Russell Hughlock, aka Pounder, an electrical engineer who runs the BuckeyeStateBlog. “A lot of people left Kos … because they got pissed.”
While I hate the term “Blogfather” (especially as applied to a practicing Buddhist), but what I hate more is political money influencing blogs to the point where a blogborne candidate is nixed in favor of someone who buys Blogger Balm by the case!.
I don’t intend to dredge up old shit (OK, too late), but this is serious enough to continue to talk about. The Blogfather and his Blogson both flipped on Paul Hackett and the timing seems to indicate why - Sherrod Brown money. Salon’s Scherer exposes this quite nicely within the piece:
The online unity was shattered, however, in October when Sherrod Brown, an outspokenly liberal seven-term congressman from Ohio, announced that he would run for the seat. Armstrong, who had been working as a consultant for Brown, encouraged an online rebellion against Hackett. Before long, Moulitsas and other bloggers had abandoned their once-favorite son, arguing, along with Democratic Party leaders, that Brown was more electable. In one post,, on Oct. 6, Moulitsas wrote, “It might be a good idea for Hackett to stand down.” This shocked many readers who had cheered another Kos post just two days earlier, in which Moulitsas seemed to endorse Hackett in a race against Brown. “Give me an Iraq vet over a career politician,” he wrote.
How the hell else do you explain this other than Brown was Jerome’s guy and that affected Kos’ take? “Encouraged an online rebellion”. Well put. This is the precise reason that I stopped going to Kos and started to focus more on in-state blogs and bloggers. That, and like Jill, I too get Comment Tunnel Syndrome!
Blogs are self-policing only if such things are talked about and exposed for what they are. Kos telling us one comment was heart driven and one brain driven not only doesn’t pass the smell test, it doesn’t pass my 5 year old test. I’d have to give Markos that smirky look until he admitted the bullshit outright.
Not much new in the article, it just looks like Salon stirring the pot to divide Dems in Ohio.
It would be interesting if the blogosphere spent as much time and effort exploring the potential of the GOP to disrupt Dem races by using bloggers who pretend to be progressive.