January 26, 2004
Atrios and Sullivan
Talking about the blogosphere. I didn't get to listen to the whole thing so I don't know if this MP3 gets to the other bloggers (Josh Marshall was supposed to appear among others), but I did hear Sullivan let loose some juicy attacks on Atrios.
Here is a challenge from Sullivan:
http://www.andrewsullivan.com/index.php?dish_inc=archives/2004_01_25_dish_archive.html#107509370089926452
Here is the response from Atrios:
http://atrios.blogspot.com/2004_01_25_atrios_archive.html#107514136436069186
I can't read Atrios b/c his is a banned site for some reason. (It's not because he's liberal; the software used to block sites is just really random.) So if someone wants to copy and paste it that would be great.
Atrios' response
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Silly Sully
Last night in our little conversation Silly Sully said the following:
...what you'll never hear atrios do, is criticize the left...
after which I deservedly called him a liar. He then posted the following “challenge:”
On the radio last night, I made the point that blogger Atrios never seems to criticize the left. He denied this and called it a lie. So I asked him to cite a recent case in which he criticized the left or had anything good to say about president Bush. He couldn't. Well, he's now got plenty of time to prove me wrong. Let's see a few recent examples of his taking on the left or defying pure partisanship. If he can't, I'd appreciate him withdarwing the notion that I was committing a lie.
He's already shifting the goal post, requiring that I also demonstrate that I ever praise Bush and also wants recent examples.
The thing is, of course, is that no matter what I write in “defense” of the challenge, debate team gold star winner Andy will declare victory. You see, it all depends on how we define “the left” and what it means to criticize them.
I'm not sure what “the left” means in Andy's world. Sometimes it's Salon and the New York Times. Sometimes it's Tom Daschle. Sometimes it's Hillary Clinton. Sometimes it's the mythical Transnational Progressivism movement, operated out of Barbra Streisand's basement. Sometimes it's some guy with a sign somewhere that Andy doesn't like. Sometimes it's a website in the Netherlands which proves the existence of a liberal fifth column operating out of liberal blue state enclaves like Provincetown and Washington, D.C.
As for criticize, I'm sure what Andy will require is that I've criticized them in a way he agrees with. It won't be enough to prove I'm ever critical of the Left, but critical of them from a perspective he endorses.
Anyone who reads this blog knows I regularly criticize the New York Times and Salon. I've criticized the American Prospect and even the liberal New Republic. I regularly criticize the congressional leadership. I've criticized Daschle for selling out for farm interests. I've criticized Clinton, Kerry, Lieberman, and Edwards for their Iraq war votes. I've criticized Russ Feingold for voting to confirm John Ashcroft. I've criticized Dennis Kucinich for his abortion flipflop. I've criticized all of the major Democratic candidates for various things they've done in the campaign. I've criticized the Dems for passing that Medicare nonsense. Given that they're the minority party, there's little to criticize them for doing proactively – such as stupid legislation they've proposed . They're the minority party – they can't do much but react. But, I've criticized Fritz Holling for being behind stupid digital copyright-related stuff. I called for Jim Moran to resign from his leadership position after his anti-Semitic comments, as did Nancy Pelosi, and he subsequently did step down. I said that their little “pledge of allegiance under God” performance was when I was most embarassed to be a Democrat. Andy may not agree with these criticisms, but they are criticisms nonetheless.
The implication of Andy's statement is that in order to make “my team” look good, I only ever criticize the other team. That's what a hyper-partisan would do – never find foul with anything they do. So, if, say, Tom Daschle proposed a constitutional amendment banning abortion I'd say “You rock Tom! That's Great!” despite my lifelong opposition to such a thing. I don't do that. I can't think of any major person/entity/publication on “the left” that I haven't criticized.
I don't care what some guy with a sign or some other person-we're-going-to-pretend-is-representative-of-the-left says or does. I don't really feel the need to scream and shout every time Cockburn writes something I don't agree with, largely because I never read him. He doesn't represent me or the Democratic party, so why should I? I have no idea what Transnational Progrsesivism is, and I really don't understand why the Left gets equated with Militant Islamic Fundamentalism simply because we're occasionally insufficiently enthused about indscriminately bombing countries which have nothing to do with it. Generally, there's little point in critcizing the powerless, and only in the fevered imagination of Adam Yoshida do the elements of the left which are unpleasant to me actually have any political or financial power.
But, once again, Andy showed himself to be the small little man that he is. I had my list of “things to attack Andy with just in case” at hand, but after listening to 100 minutes of cordial nonconfrontational discussion about blogs it really didn't seem appropriate. It wasn't.
Whether or not this make the cut it is probably up to the reader. As you might expect, I sympathize with Atrios, not least because of Sullivan's arrogance, but also
1) everybody knows Atrios is a partisan blog--there are plenty of center-left blogs out there that will criticize both the far left and mainstream Democratic policy. Furthermore, Atrios is to the left of the congressional Democrats and he does criticize them from that standpoint.
2) I'm not sure how productive it is to constantly castigate people like Cockburn, Moore, Chomsky, etc. Matt Y. has written about how he used to be obsessed with this. Now he sees it as a distraction and I tend to agree with him. If one is tempermentally inclined to attack the left, then fine. Both TNR and [i]Dissent[/i] do this quite well. However, I commend Atrios for focusing on the real problem (the GOP) rather then embarking on a crusade for ideological cleansing. If the Dems regain power, Atrios will have to choose a side on specific issues--that is, between the mainstream Dems or the left opposition. After that, the tone of the blog and the frequency with which Atrios attacks the Dems will surely change.
Well, it was pretty clear that at several points in the discussion, Sullivan was trying to score points on Atrios. The accusation that he's never critical of the left was the most egregious, but he also attacked him for using a pseudonym. Without links to all the criticisms Atrios listed, I can't be positive, but it surely sounds like Sullivan was either speaking from a misperception or knowingly misrepresenting Eschaton.
One interesting thing was Sullivan's comment that he makes $40,000 to $50,000 in profit each year from his blog. That's wild. Maybe Josh Marshall should start doing annual fund-raisers and taking off August, too.