Part of what’s confusing about the left netroots right now is that it’s made up of an admixture of newly impassioned Democratic Party activists who came to politics through blogs and long-time liberal movement activists who have now begun blogging. To the extent that you listen to one sub-group or another about what the broader goals of “the movement” are (as if there were only one), you’re likely to leave the rest feeling misunderstood, as well as get an incomplete picture of what’s going on. For example, a number of people think the race against Joe Lieberman really is all about the war. The Huffington Post‘s Frank Dwyer articulated that point yesterday when he wrote, “The Connecticut senator, of course, faces a strong challenge in the Democratic primary because of his unflagging enthusiasm for George W. Bush’s war.” Suzanne Nossel, over at Democracy Arsenal came to the same conlusion while walking along a different intellectual path. “The crux of Lieberman’s problem is his unwillingness to acknowledge the severity of what’s happened in Iraq, and to demand accountability for it,” she wrote. So there are clearly people out there blogging who say that the race is all about the war. Reporters aren’t getting that wrong.
There are also, however, people for whom the opposition to Lieberman comes mainly from a desire for greater party unity, and an objection to how a divisive Lieberman has criticized Democrats and, especially, liberals, over the past three years. “For us Lamont supporters it isn’t just about the war, of course,” writes Duncan Black at Eschaton. Ezra has also made that point repeatedly here at Tapped. Similarly, while some bloggers decry liberal interest groups or organizations who support Republicans (see “The curse of the liberal interest groups”), others have decried moderate Democrats who they fear will betray those interests (See “The Age of Principle”).
Confused yet? You could go nuts trying to make sense of all of these conflicting voices. That’s because the netroots — an inherently vague term I use only because its a convenient short-hand, even though I know it treats several distinct phenomena as one thing — appears to be a collection of different factions, some of whose most prominent voices see themselves first and foremost as progressive activists defending principled positions, some of whom are well-paid technical consultants, press secretaries in disguise and oppo researchers, and some of whom are pragmatic infrastructure builders of the emerging vast left wing conspiracy. Add to them a large and constantly shifting cast of random, self-selected, and largely blue state individuals who are much more interested in politics than most, a large number of lawyers and professors interested in doing popular writing, the paid staff of long-time liberal institutions, and a small group of people who have come to think of “blogger” as their primary public identity (as opposed to, say, “journalist” or “think tank fellow”), and, of course, the millions of readers seeking entertainment, information, and a community of outrage, and you’ll almost have it covered. I’m sure I’ve left some critical group out. Anyway. Can we stop blogging about bloggers now?
