The anger that some establishment journalists have expressed over The Huffington Post being called upon during President Obama's first prime-time press conference deserves further explanation. It is, in part, as Atrios notes, about "where in the pecking order he's supposed to be," within the world of political media. And it is also, of course, about a perceived threat that new media outlets pose to more established ones. For years now, bloggers and other new media sources have been attacked as rabid, inexperienced, uninformed, arrogant, newcomers all as part of a campaign to keep bloggers, new media and grassroots types out of the political media establishment.
Beyond struggles over pecking order within the world of political media, attacks on bloggers, new media and other emerging grassroots types are also form of long-standing wedge politics designed to drive the progressive / Democratic coalition apart, and to keep the power center firmly in the centrist / corporatist wing.
More in the extended entry. |
Those who engage in attacks on bloggers must be aware, at least by now, that blogging and other new media is not simply a fad that will dissipate ala rock and roll or television before it. Traditional media is losing its audience and revenue streams at a rapid rate, and by now it is obvious to anyone involved that the self-publishing Internet is the main reason for this. As such, it is obvious--painfully obvious, for some--that it is simply not possible to shift the ever growing online audience back toward print, radio or other declining mediums.
So, since you can't stop the rise of the new medium, the only available tactics left are to discredit the emerging new outlets within the new medium that operates independently of your control (portray independent new media operators as rabid, inexperienced, uninformed, arrogant, newcomers) while simultaneously working to co-opt their tactics within that new medium (hire a bunch of rabid, inexperienced, uninformed, arrogant, newcomers to produce content for your outlet). So, for example, you attack the credibility of the largest independent new media political website, the Huffington Post, write diatribes about other large blogs such as Daily Kos, and pass Congressional resolutions chastising the largest online political organization, MoveOn.org, while simultanesouly hiring bloggers to produce content for your show, inviting them as guests on your programs, and trying to start email based activist organizations of your own.
All of this is done not because new media itself is despised, but because new media has allowed alternative power centers on the left-wing of the Democratic / progressive coalition to rise as challenges to established, and largely corporate, dominance. No one in the political and media establishment would attack the Huffington Post, Daily Kos, or Moveon.org if they were operating as supportive adjuncts to, say, the Blue Dog coalition. The reason they are viewed as dangerous and worthy of attack is because of the political views they espouse, not just because they are new media. As long as these new organizations thrive, they offer voters, activists and politicians potential insulation should they seek other avenues than corporate PACs, large donors, and conglomerated corporate media outlets.
Attacks on bloggers and new media outlets thus seek to discredit those outlets in the minds of enough people that no one in the political and media establishment would be willing to touch them with a ten foot pole. It is not about driving down audience. It is about driving down access to power for the left-wing of the Democratic / progressive coalition. The flip side of that coin is that it is about driving down alternative means of survival for members of the political and media establishment who seek to abandon or oppose the center-right corporatist establishment. It is wedge politics--an attempt to keeping the left-wing grassroots out of power, and keeping those in power in line by making sure they remain separated.
Fundamentally, that it ultimately why many in the political and media establishment were horrified when the Huffington Post was allowed to ask a question at President Obama's first prime time press conference, and why I shouted with joy when President Obama called on Sam Stein. |
