Drum on Atrios (By Accident)

Kevin Drum is probably the only A-list blogger I read regularly. I would read his work even if he wasn't an A-list blogger because it is good stuff which I like to think would have made him an A-list blogger even if he was as late to the show as, say, I am. That's why Political Animal is the only A-lister on my blogroll. Yesterday he was in an introspective mood. During a very readable personal post about his battle with chronic depression he also had this to say about political blogs:

In a large sense, it does matter who the A-list bloggers, A-list op-ed writers, and A-list talk show guests are, because they control both the tone and content of a lot of public discourse. But the whole point of blogging (well, one of the points, anyway) is that it allows far more people to participate in public discourse, and to participate with a very different and more personal tone than op-ed writing or academic journal writing. You don't have to appeal to a hundred thousand people. A few hundred or a few thousand will do. (emphasis added)

His point is a good one, although I wish I could endorse it from the heady heights of thousands of hits a day. I really, really do. Maybe Atrios should endorse it too and acknowledge that "if you link it, you own it" as he once famously said. You own the consequences too - something he seems singularly unwilling to do.