The Sad State Of The Conservative Blogosphere
by Matt Margolis on November 10th, 2008 at 09:52pm
This blog post was a long time coming. With the disastrous election behind us, the conservative blogosphere has an opportunity to play a role in delivering the Republican Party out of the wilderness… if we’re up to the challenge. Right now, however, I don’t think we are.
2004 was a good year for us, but it has been downhill ever since. The conservative blogosphere has become a series of self-serving cliques rather than a movement-serving community.
Back in 2004, we were all united because we had the same goal, and we worked together to achieve it. But now conservative bloggers, unable to duplicate the fundraising prowess of the left-wing blogosphere, have made their objective to try to recreate the party in their own image from the top down rather than by true grassroots buildng from the bottom up..
Conservative blogging used to be about building community. But it has become something that is elitist, DC-centric, and contrary to grassroots empowerment.
Look at some of the top blogs we have on the right… they’re run by people who are in the business of politics… I know and like many of them, but so far I haven’t seen huge successes from their work. I do applaud their efforts to help the party, and admire their dedication… I am just not convinced the current approach will help the cause. For instance, there are weekly “Conservative Blogger Briefings” and conference calls that I and many other bloggers are invited to, but if you live outside of the Washington DC area or have a full time job, you can’t take part in them. Even if you could, I have failed to see how they’ve helped the movement.
As the founder of Blogs For Bush, one of the most successful blogs during the 2004 presidential campaign, I have been effectively shutout because I don’t live in Washington DC and don’t blog full time for a living. Other successful blogs and bloggers have moved down the path of conglomeration… not so much to serve the movement but to serve their own ambitions and egos. Blogging for them is a business venture.
We were destined as a community to fail our party’s nominee when we made the primary season the quest to find the next Ronald Reagan. While the Democrats were pretty much united around one of two candidates, we were divided amongst all all of ours. And look at the result. Turnout this year was virtually the same as 2004 despite the huge operation Obama had. This means that given the huge deficit McCain had in the popular vote compared to Bush in 2004, too many decided that since McCain didn’t score high enough on the “Ronald Reagan Scale” that they weren’t going to help him win. There is more unity in the conservative blogosphere when we want to punish Republicans for not being conservative enough.
Whether it was blog posts about protest votes for a third party candidate or not wanting to make calls for GOTV, the conservative blogosphere just kept demonstrating that the impossibly high standard they set for McCain was enough reason to use their power to prop themselves up as arbiters of conservatism, rather than to encourage their audience to vote for the one man who could stop the Orwellian nightmare that Obama has promised to create.
And from the look of things they still don’t get it.
Perhaps my clout in the conservative blogosphere isn’t what it used to be, and none of the people who should read this will take my critique seriously because I am not a former campaign worker or some other blogger never bought me out to write for their own blog, but I did create something that worked back in the day, and while blogging has changed over the years, the formula for success has not changed so much.
Here is what I think the conservative blogosphere needs to do to get back on track:
Get Local
This is an example of what the right should be doing more of, and this is an example of what the right should be doing less of. All politics is local and it doesn’t matter what I, a blogger in New York, says about about a congressional race in California or a gubernatorial race in Washington…
I run two local politics blogs, Hub Politics for Massachusetts (though my brother really runs it now), and The Buffalo Bean for Western New York, and I can tell you that it is much easier and more effective to engage your own community and cover races that impact you than it is to proselytize from a nationally oriented blog about a race with local issues that you can’t fully grasp since you don’t live there. By getting local you can establish connections with your local party leaders and even local media. We got to get our heads out of Washington and back into our states and congressional districts. The bloggers/activists trying to reorganize the party now have things upside down because they think they can rally a movement around a single site with a top-down approach.
High-traffic nationally oriented blogs can’t keep on assuming they will have the same impact as a local citizen journalist who builds up a following in their district, region, or state. They have a role to play, tey just got to understand what it is.
Promote Candidates, Not Your Own Agenda
Again, more of this and less of this. I am sick and tired of conservative bloggers wasting time and effort on the wrong things. Trying to influence who is chosen for leadership positions in the Senate or who becomes chairman of the party are the wrong battles. We can be far more effective uniting behind good conservative candidates than we can in pretending that leaders already in Washington give a damn that a few bloggers with big egos signed a statement telling them what they should do. We don’t need to waste time telling them they need to better harness the internet, either. No one cares about what is on GOP.com (or their sad excuse for a blog) and the party isn’t going to revolutionize itself by using Twitter. How many of you have done your part to make one of the NRSC’s YouTube videos go viral, or visited and linked to one of the NRCC’s microsites? The party will either figure out how to do things rght or thoy won’t… but we are on the frontlines of iternet based campaigns… so let’s get our act together before we tell them how they should do things.
As, bloggers, we’re not even using the internet as effectively, so we shouldn’t pretend like we have the magical answer for the party. Recent attempts to create conservative alternatives to ActBlue have been failures. RightRoots.com died (rightfully so) and Slate Card raises only a fraction of what left-wing counterparts do. If we can’t beat them by copying them, we need to try a different approach.
Focus On Rebranding and Redefining Our Image
Our ideas haven’t been rejected, we just allowed ourselves to be falsely defined by the Democrats. During this presidential campaign, Obama hid a radical agenda behind empty rhetoric and slogans. So, we need to realize that Obama’s presidential campaign didn’t win, his marketing campaign did. If we can’t effectively communicate our message then it doesn’t matter that our ideas are better. We need to redefine our image and bring back those voters who have been duped into thinking that Democrats actually give a damn about helping them. We need to be creative in our presentation and realize we are a selling a product. And for a product to outsell the competition it first needs a good marketing campaign. Superior products that don’t get exposure eventually don’t get off the ground… We, as conservatives have the superior product, we just aren’t marketing it right. So, let’s put our egos aside and help rebrand the party instead of wasting our time remaking it with pointless lists and mission statements.
Unite Ourselves
The conservative blogosphere is not united. We’re motivated more by self-promotion than by advancing conservatism. Get over it. Let’s help each other win back this country. No one blog is the answer. A bottom-up grassroots network is what we need. We can do it if we are committed to the cause.
There, I have said my piece. I don’t know what other conservative bloggers will say. They may not notice or acknowledge what I’ve said. They may think I am totally wrong. Maybe I am. But I don’t think so. Maybe I will be welcomed into the dialogue, maybe I will be blacklisted. Who knows? I guess we’ll find out soon enough.
UPDATE: Future assessments of conservative blogging to be posted here.
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November 10th, 2008 at 10:06 pm
Mark,
So, you are ignoring what Eric Odom and others are starting up with http://www.dontgomovement.com and what Patrick Ruffini and others are doing with http://www.rebuildtheparty.org? What you are describing is exactly what we are going to be doing with #dontgo, which I am proud to be a part. Before throwing us all under the bus, using the terminology used too often this past election, I think you may want to look closer.
November 10th, 2008 at 10:08 pm
Argh. I meant Matt in that last post. I type too fast for my own good somedays :-)
November 10th, 2008 at 10:11 pm
STANDING OVATION!!!!
Too much damn talk, no action in the blogosphere!
so far I haven’t seen huge successes from their work
No doubt!!! Why in the world should anyone take the usual suspects’ (unsolicited) “advice” or punditry as anything more than just the rantings of some random guy at a laptop? I keep seeing all the same old navel-gazing nonsense prescribed by the same old people, and it’s the same old prescription. It is to laugh. It hasn’t worked thus far, so why on earth would it work now?
What have they actually done that gives them ANY credibility? I couldn’t care less about how many readers they have, that’s a self-serving statistic. I want to know how many VOTES have they produced? How much money have they raised? What’s the real-world impact as it pertains to advancing the conservative agenda?
I’m so OVER blogging and the stupid blogosphere it’s not even funny. I’m tired of bleating to my dwindling readership to send money to Candidate X or take action on this or that. People just blogs to regurgitate the news and insert conservative snark in it, and the right’s bloggers almost all think they’re the next Coulter or have that as their primary objective (and God help us, that’s the last damn thing this party needs).
I could go on for days singing my agreement with you here, but why waste pixels? Just a simple AMEN to everything you said!
November 10th, 2008 at 10:13 pm
Excuse my lack of editing in that comment. ^^^
(argh)
November 10th, 2008 at 10:20 pm
Wow Matt, nice post. I agree with you a great deal. You do have some good ideas, or at least you used to. You say your ideas are better, but what are they? I haven’t seen too many. Far more of your posts of late have been negative rather than positive. How do you want to make America a better place?
If you really want to win the country back knock off the negative crap. If this election proved anything, it was that most Americans don’t care about Wright, Ayers, or Resko anymore than they care about Hagee, Liddy, or Keating. Obama won because he talked about how to make this a better country, much as Reagan did. McCain lost because he talked about how terrible Obama is.
November 10th, 2008 at 10:30 pm
Thanks for finally addressing this.
While ’some’ are trying to tell the National Party what to do when their own house is dirty. Funny.
We need entirely new blood.
November 10th, 2008 at 10:35 pm
actually matt…they need to go down fighting instead of wimpering…you cant change the stripe on a coward…but you can keep a good mans attitude up…there are too many inconsistencies in this election…they need to figure out how the chinese hacked the election computers…
last june congress agreed that it could be done…but not one swingin idiot up there is talking about checking to see if it was..
thats that yellow stripe i was talking about above…we need to know exactly who is running this country…who paid for obamacides campaign…and why nobody is getting answers…
November 10th, 2008 at 11:04 pm
A natural part of the political process is redefinition of one’s self and one’s party. Imagine what it would be like if the parties of today held onto some of the outdated beliefs of the political parties from two hundred years ago. World view and strategy has to change with the times. This does not mean to let go of the ideals that you have no desire to leave behind. It simply means reevaluating the political climate and fine tuning your image to more properly mesh with the voting populous. Every political group must do this from time to time or sink to inconsequentiality and eventually cease to exist. Shouldn’t worry about disenfranchising some of your current voters if you believe it will attract more to your belief set, because if the alternative comes true (party disbandment) those people will be forced to leave your party anyway. So long as you don’t misjudge what is popular then you’ll be fine.
Of course, we all know that doing the popular thing isn’t always the best, most logical, or most moral thing. However, it can’t really be helped. What’s the point of a political party expressing its beliefs if it isn’t able to make a difference? You have to appeal to the masses first and foremost. If you want to change the perception of the masses, you have to start, as Matt said, some sort of wild-fire grass-roots movement unless society is naturally trending toward your beliefs.
I still recommend focusing on the patriotic qualities of self-reliance and the shunning of government handouts. If we’re lucky, at least some good will come of Obama’s presidency and his example will motivate many disaffected minorities to give the “moral” life a second shot, and come to believe in their own power and turn away from reliance. I am not a political expert by any means, so I am just offering my opinions. I agree that negativity doesn’t seem to sell anymore. The problem comes in how to bring attention to negative qualities that you believe are worth mentioning if nobody wants to be educated on them. It is a dangerous path to assume that just because negativity doesn’t sell that scandalous behavior shouldn’t be actively pursued to become public knowledge. Otherwise, we would have no way of evaluating a man’s integrity if we just look at his good points.
So bottom line is either change the party to fit the people, or change the people to fit the party. Changing the people is very hard if you don’t have the collateral, which Republicans do not have right now. So instead I think it would be more efficient to change the party message to capitalize on the failing’s of the Democrat’s attempts to change the people.
November 11th, 2008 at 12:24 am
Excellent post, Matt!
David, it looks like Eric has started something exactly what Matt was referring to above. We should definitely concentrate on one main blog and divide up into State and even Local blogs. I will pass on dontgomovement to others so they can sign up. We need to get this moving NOW. Conservatives are ready. Let’s roll.
It takes a lot of work/time to keep a blog running. I am hoping each State/Local can have a multitude of volunteers to keep it going.
I also hope it will be possible to keep the main blog and the state/local blogs contained … far left posters destroy the purpose of the blog. I understand why the lefties keep conservatives from posting … we need to do that on these specific blogs too.
November 11th, 2008 at 2:58 am
Observer writes:
“If you want to change the perception of the masses, you have to start, as Matt said, some sort of wild-fire grass-roots movement unless society is naturally trending toward your beliefs.”
The tricky part is getting behind a grass roots movement that will take hold with a large portion of the population.
Social conservatism was the ultimate grass roots movement and its member’s inflexibility is killing the Republican party. By championing “small town values” conservatives have alienated the educated, minorities, and younger generations. It base is now rural communities. It is battling for the suburbs.
Look at Mark for an example of divisive politics.
It was these voters who forced Palin on McCain and ultimately contributed to scaring away the center.
Meanwhile, fiscal conservatism has become a punchline. The country isn’t going to let a REpublican near any money any time soon.
It is safe to say supply-side economics is going on a long vacation.
In a bizarre way, the Republican party needs a Hoover, a respected businessman who embodies the American dream. This person can build a coalition of voters and not pander to the divisive politics of social conservatism.
And thn there is this:
“I agree that negativity doesn’t seem to sell anymore. The problem comes in how to bring attention to negative qualities that you believe are worth mentioning if nobody wants to be educated on them. It is a dangerous path to assume that just because negativity doesn’t sell that scandalous behavior shouldn’t be actively pursued to become public knowledge.”
The first problem is the glee Republicans demonstrate every time they think they have found the smoking gun. No one likes a tattle tale. Also problematic is the fact bloggers like Mark do a poor job policing their own party. His failure to examine his own candidates undermine any claim he hurls at the opposition. Mark is not fighting for honest government. He is fighting for a conservative government. I see talk of ballot stuffing by Democrats but no accusations of purging voter rolls by Republicans.
The claim that the MSM “bias” makes such reporting of Republican wrongdoings unnecessay is bogus. The goal should be to correct such wrongdoings, not use them to push others to vote for a party with equally dirty hands.
Second, the public was educated on many of the negative aspects of Obama. There is a difference between being educated on a topic and being persuaded to take a specific viewpoint on that topic.
William Ayers is a good example. People were told about Obama’s relationship with him but decided it was inconsequential.
The Socialist charge was another example. McCain pounded ont that accusation. He dragged Joe the Plumber to campaign events. He beat it to death in the last debate. Ultimately, Obama won the argument. America either decided that a) Obama was not a socialist or b) socialism was a better alternative to the “free market” we currently operate under. I think it is the former given Obama’s tame policies and choice of economic advisers. Noam Chomsky isn’t standing by him.
As for right now, Republicans should pray Obama is a new Carter. If he is the next FDR, prepare for forty years in the desert.
November 11th, 2008 at 5:53 am
Obama will be a laughingstock if he and his allies don’t reign in the so-called “bailout”.
Bush is still in charge for another TWO MONTHS, and is slashing and burning on his way out like Sherman’ march to the sea.
DeKlerk pulled the same stunt on Mandela on his way out. God help us all.
November 11th, 2008 at 6:04 am
Certainly a lot to think about. . . except: I watched the Democrats in 2004 rehash their failures, and what they seemed to come up with was “we’ve got to beat the Republicans at the “values” game”–and they did in 2006. Ohio got a former Methodist pastor who did the values-lite, peace and justice theme–mainline Christians are very comfortable with that–been hearing it for years. But that’s definitely not how we got President Obama. For that the party marketing machine noticed the effect he had on white liberals and their guilt in the 2004 speech (a speech he’d given many times when running for the Illinois seat and which didn’t really rouse the black voters much). Republicans finally have a charismatic candidate (Palin) and the misogyny and sexism runs so deep we can’t even accept the gift. Maybe we deserve to lose.
November 11th, 2008 at 7:41 am
Matt wrote - “We were destined as a community to fail our party’s nominee when we made the primary season the quest to find the next Ronald Reagan”
Incorrect matt because the single issue socials have now shown they’ll NOT VOTE 4 a moderate gop candidate & therein allow the dem to be elected.
and the single issue socials would NOT support Ronald Reagan & therefore would NOT vote.
November 11th, 2008 at 7:57 am
Jefferson On Big Government
To paraphrase President Thomas Jefferson, “A government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enought to take it away.”
The people have spoken and though I fear they will regret it I will cling to my gun, if not my bible, and be ready for the call for liberation when next we vote, as will my brothers and sisters.
May God and wise fellow citizens guide our next President Barack Hussein Obama.
November 11th, 2008 at 8:22 am
Ayers Obama Controversy Overblown?
In 1969, Bill Ayers participated in planting a bomb at a statue dedicated to police casualties in the 1886 Haymarket Riot. The blast broke almost 100 windows and blew pieces of the statue onto the nearby Kennedy Expressway.
The following year he “went underground” with several associates after the Greenwich Village townhouse explosion, which caused the death of three of his terrorist cell members while a nail bomb was under construction. In Ayers’ words, decades after the fact, the bomb was “destined for the army base nearby,” Fort Dix in New Jersey. The massive bomb contained a box of carpenter nails, and though Ayers does not say it or admit it, it almost surely was intended to kill many people. The same Weather Underground bombed the Pentagon, the Capitol Building and The Us Department Of State.
So whats wrong with our next President befriending this man? He was pardoned by Jimmy Carter so its all good now right? Surely you’d have no problem with our President having a known and convicted terrorist as a friend?
The Media needs to do a self examination of its role in down playing this story. The media needs to reexamine the story and self police itself. The media needs to look into the source of that withheld LA Times video and see if there is any truth to Obama being present at a dinner involving anti-Semitic speeches along with Bill Ayres. It is too late to change the election results but the media at least serve to get at the truth of exactly who we have voted for.
November 11th, 2008 at 3:31 pm
Mark;
as blogger’s we cant overcome the MSM shills.
After obmanation enacts the fairness doctrine, his second enactment will be to control the net.
We ( the US ) are in for some hard times, this will energize our base just like id after ole jimmah kartah, and BJ klinton.
Sometimes it takes a cold glass of water to wake one up.
November 11th, 2008 at 3:32 pm
id = it did
November 11th, 2008 at 3:40 pm
fmrmarine: Many of us are starting a “Vet the Media” site. There we will announce which party they belong to, how much they donate to that party, grades in college, tickets, criminal backgrounds, tax liens, etc. Should be fun!
November 11th, 2008 at 5:35 pm
Much as I’d love to claim credit for it, conservative bloggers did not keep America from the potential disaster of a McCain presidency. George Bush, John McCain, and all the other Republicans who sold out the GOP’s core principles did that. Conservatives didn’t leave the Republican Party; it left us. If they want to win us back, returning to those principles will be a lot more effective than scolding us for displaying the integrity that they lack.
November 11th, 2008 at 8:13 pm
This has been a pretty interesting week to watch the conservative blogosphere. I’m pretty new to the scene, having posted only locally until August of 2007 when I started one of the independent McCain sites for Indiana.
I think I disagree and agree with Matt.
Politics is local, and we can have our greatest impact on the local races and issues. But we also need to learn from the last election, and repair our party. http://rebuildtheparty.com and http://dontgomovement.com are wonderful places for local bloggers and activists to get ideas, to refine their writing, to frankly get some digital mentoring.
I’ll keep writing locally, met today with a local county chairman and laid it down flat “we need a totally new way of approaching this party thign” … but stay connected to those that are challenging us nationally.
One last thought on the McCain campaign, they fell flat on their faces when it came to online interaction. We all knew that, and said things when we were asked, which was seldom. Sorry but I was there for 16 months … in the trenches … with nothing but a blank stare from the campaign team.
November 11th, 2008 at 8:34 pm
Leslie c
I read your post, and visited your blog, you are right on the money!
November 11th, 2008 at 11:35 pm
All I have to say re: this post is, “Thank you”.
November 11th, 2008 at 11:37 pm
I agree with what you just wrote. It’s like being back in high school all over again and I can’t stand it! I don’t like the cliques and it’s really hard to have a voice when I can’t seem to get Michelle Malkin to write me back and tell me how I can participate in the comment section of her blog. It’s frustrating because some of these huge bloggers make it hard to help fight the good fight.
Now I remember why I was familiar with your name. I think I used to be on Blogs For Bush but when I went from Angela’s Right to Free Speech to Domestic Divapalooza, I couldn’t seem to get anybody to write me back or help me figure out how I could stay on the blogroll under my new blog.
I do agree with what you wrote. We just have to keep going. We can’t give up.
November 14th, 2008 at 11:20 am
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