Glenn Reynolds asks, “Do Blogs Matter In Presidential Politics?”
Last time around, I said they’d probably matter in the primaries — when it’s mostly about a comparatively small number of tuned-in voters — but not so much in the general election. With the Rathergate affair, that was proved spectacularly wrong as the explosion of CBS’s bogus story may well have swung that close election, not only because it shut down a particular anti-Bush story but because it made other, similar stories less likely, and less believable. So who knows? So far I’d say blogs haven’t made much of a difference. But the election is nowhere near over.
Meanwhile, does the legacy media matter? Roger L. Simon catches David Broder of the Washington Post claiming, “Few of those voters will have had more than a quick glimpse of the candidates, who have had little time to devote to the entire country since the last single-state contests in South Carolina and Florida.” Roger responds:
Como se dice? What country is Broder living in? We have television and the Internet now. Any citizen with the slightest interest in the candidates has been bombarded by them and their minions for months. Most of us are ready to say “Uncle.” Yet Broder wants more. Perhaps he missed the 17 or so debates where the same questions were asked several dozen times. Some of us are reciting Hillary’s health plan in our sleep… Sheesh.
Finally, the New York Times decries blogs for passing on misleading quotes.
Yes, the same New York Times which led to the phrase “Dowdification“. Hey–all the news that’s refitted for print.
