A few weeks ago I did a little research for a client that involved creating a list of Republican, conservative or libertarian-leaning political blogs in Oklahoma. Coming from the robust Tennessee political blogosphere, heavily populated by a number of well-read (and well-written) blogs by people from all over the political spectrum, I thought my task would be to immerse myself in Oklahoma's political blogosphere and find the 10 or 15 best and most-read political blogs in the Sooner state.
Boy, was I wrong.
What I found was a very anemic conservative political blogosphere. I had trouble coming up with a dozen political blogs total, never mind finding 10 to 15 really good blogs with goodly sized readership.
I'm not sure why - and haven't spent much time researching it - but it is becoming increasingly clear to me that Tennessee's political blogosphere is much larger and more robust and varied than that of other similar-sized states, with many bloggers writing about government and politics not just at the federal level but also at the state, local and even community level.
Oklahama's sparse right-leaning blogosphere popped into my mind this afternoon when I read a story in today's Washington Post headlined Online, GOP Is Playing Catch-Up.
"There is a widening gap between Democrats and Republicans on the Internet," says the WaPo story, which examines the reasons for that gap, which is evident in such measures as page views for various presidential candidates' websites, the number of "friends" candidates have on their MySpace, YouTube and FaceBook social-networking pages, and even in online fundraising.
The Post article includes some comments by David All, founder of TechRepublican.com on reasons for the red/blue digital gap.
But an underlying cause may be the nature of the Republican Party and its traditional discipline -- the antithesis of the often chaotic, bottom-up, user-generated atmosphere of the Internet."We've always been a party of staying on message," All said. "It's the Rush Limbaugh model. What Tony Snow says in the White House filters down to talk radio, which makes its way to the blogs."
Peter Leyden, director of the New Politics Institute, a San Francisco-based think tank that in recent months has been advising Democratic members of Congress and their staffs on how to take full advantage of the Web, argues that the culture of Democrats is a much better fit in the Internet world. "What was once seen as a liability for Democrats and progressives in the past -- they couldn't get 20 people to agree to the same thing, they could never finish anything, they couldn't stay on message -- is now an asset," Leyden said. "All this talking and discussing and fighting energizes everyone, involves everyone, and gets people totally into it."
I believe All and Leyden are right - although, as Tennessee's strong and influential conservative blogosphere shows, the traditional top-down message discipline of the Republican Party doesn't have to be allowed to stifle the growth of a conservative blogosphere.
Tennessee's "red" blogosphere is most certainly not just an amplifier for today's GOP talking points out of Washington. For one thing, a number of Tennessee's conservative, libertarian and Republican bloggers don't write strictly about national politics and policy. A number of them - including myself - focus on state-level politics and policy, and swerve into national stuff on frequent occasion.
For another, Tennessee's "red" bloggers come at issues from a variety of perspectives, and focus on different things from fiscal policy to education to social issues.
Another key to the growth of Tennessee's "red" blogosphere has, I believe, been its willingness to engage the liberal side of the blogosphere in civil debate and conversation, both online and in a variety of blogger meet-ups and such. Conversation is more interesting when it engages other points of view, and Tennessee's blogosphere does that with relish. And interesting conversations draw more participants.
Over the five-plus years that I've been writing my blog, BillHobbs.com, a number of frequent readers of my blog have gone on to start their own blogs, joining the conversation and adding their own voice, perspective and expertise to the political debate - increasing the overall audience for the blogs. As the blogosphere's audience grows, inevitably, more readers will become bloggers.
A final key, I believe, has been the success of a number of bloggers to court and gain media attention for their blogs - on talk radio, in newspapers and on local television news - eore Nashville's WKRN Channel 2 hired a full-time blogger and started systematically following and reporting on what "Nashville Is Talking About" on the blogs. (WKRN subsequently hired a second blogger, to write its politically-focused VolunteerVoters.com. That blogger, A.C. Kleinheider, comments on the WaPo story here.)
Can Tennessee's healthy right-leaning blogosphere be replicated in other states? I believe it can, though it will take hard work to plant the seeds, recruit the bloggers and help them do it. The key isn't teaching people "how to blog" but how to build an online community. Blogs don't flourish as islands in the media stream - they flourish when they build bridges to other blogs, to the media, to readers and to elected officials and political candidates.
I have some thoughts about how such success could be accomplished, though it isn't clear to me today that there is a national Republican organization that would be the right vehicle to fund and organize such a recruitment and teaching effort.
Until there is, Tennessee's right-leaning blogosphere may be the exception in world where the Democrats are vastly outpacing the GOP online.
Update: Terry Heaton, a former Nashvillian and broadcasting/new-media consultant and visionary instrumental in helping WKRN launch NashvilleIsTalking.com, comments on the WaPo story:
Here is my overly simplified reason for this, and it follows another institution’s failure to grasp the value of the web. The GOP’s values follow the modern era’s rules of order. It is very much the party of top-down thinking. While republicans complain about big government, the truth is they are the law and order party, the command-and-control group, the clique that needs to be in charge, with a tightly controlled organization that flows from the top.This is a similar position of the evangelical church (see my post below), and this group has been noticeably absent from the cutting edge of the web as well. This is odd, because evangelicals have always been at the forefront of communications. Two of the first transponders on the first Satcom satellite went to Christian broadcasters, for example.
The reason these groups don’t like the web is that it’s not a mass medium. It’s much more bottom-up and grassroots, and the GOP doesn’t play well in such a postmodern cultural marketplace. Neither does the evangelical church, because God, the Father, is the ruler of their world. Pomos, as I’ve written before, much prefer the concept of God, the Holy Spirit.
In a similar way, the GOP only recognizes that which flows from the top. Late to the game? I’m not sure they even knew there was one.
There is. And there is a way to win it.
Comments
Good post Bill...
I've argued before that the Republican Party needs a national, state-driven blog strategy, similar to Howard Dean's 50-state strategy.
Keep plugging.
Losing at the internets
The reason the progressive/Democratic blogosphere is bigger than the conservative/Republican is the same reason that non-political sites like youtube and digg end up leaning liberal: the people who use the internet skew more intelligent than your average Republican voter. The Republican base quite simply consists of ignorant rednecks voting against their own self-interest and with their corporate masters. Of course, the corporate masters vote that way too, but there aren't very many of you, are there? You need the ignorant rednecks to have any chance at all. Stick to AM radio and baseball games. Sadly, you still won't "get" the internets, and will instead censor this post.
Actually...
...If you were a regular, you'd understand that we don't "censor" any comment unless it's spam.
We're happy you're here trolling instead of making a difference for some liberal candidate somewhere else.
And BTW - it's so ironic that you use such a simplistic argument posted as "anonymous." That leads me to believe that you don't even truly believe what you're saying.
Again, please kick off your shoes and stay awhile. We're going to offer some refreshments shortly if you're thirsty from all of the yelling.
Winning the White House
Any Dem can talk negative about the South all they want and that is okay. Here's something for you to chew on. I find it very interesting that I can not remember the last time the Dem's had a winning ticket to the White House without a person from below the Mason-Dixon Line on the ticket. If memory serves me right Al Gore a Southern Redneck claimed to have invented the internet.
Let them talk trash
...about the South. The way I see it, the more left-wingers think the South is full of ignorant, uncultured rednecks, the fewer will be inclined to pollute our turf with their kind.
;-)
Sure wish we had some of them libarries tho, dont u? I herd they got some maggazine's & comic book's their!
Thanks for the thought
There's no censorship here. According to the logs, the only comments which have been deleted were for casinos and diet pills.
In fact, just days after launch, we were linked from Atrios and got some vile, offensive, and ignorant comments I've seen in a while... and every one of them is still visible (and unedited) in all their glory.
We have nothing to hide. How about you?
I kun spel
The "internets?"
For someone throwing bricks, you shouldn't be living in glass houses.
Funny
I just find it hilarious that our "smart" progressive is using the Bushism internets in his title, a term that is usually used satirically to show how ignorant the speaker is about networking and technology in general.
The truth is that communities are dominated by those who have the time to participate. If you're unemployed, underemployed, a student, or a trust fund baby, you have the time to post and to post a great deal. That is why the Left has an advantage because their appeal tends to be like an upside down bell curve with thick tails and a thin middle when you look at both money and education and both ends tend to have time on their hands.
Out West? Slow, due to "leaders" not party members.
They are right about the Republican Party outside of a few enclaves. It is pretty lonely out here - the party in Colorado is mainly the Country Club set, who expect to hand out marching orders and ideas from their perch, buy commercials, and off they go. The mass of Republican voters are mainly everyday middle-class wage earners. And there's your mismatch.
The Republican voters are online, but the traditional leadership isn't. The voters are playing World of Warcraft, chatting with their relatives across the US on Skype, and shopping online at Ebay or Amazon, and sending video links to each other. Whereas, the leadership still pays someone to clip and summarize newspapers - the only net they see is email, and even then, only what they need for business.
For them its a tool, for the normal Republicans, its part of life.
Its a case of Country Club versus Sam's Club.
The leadership here doesn't have a damn clue about the internet. They still think mass direct mailings and "Final Four" days of door knocking, robo calls (which only pissed people off!) and volunteer phone banks are the way to work this.
Dead wrong - it failed miserably last cycle here in Colorado. With absentee balloting, early voting, and so on, the voting periods are stretched out - so all those old 3rd generation Rove/Mehlman tricks don't work any more. Time to move on, if they can realize it.
Yet, from what I can see, they are bumbling along again, oblivious. And planning the same sorts of things again.
My only comfort is that my preferred candidate seems to have taken to the net like a duck to water, blogging, podcasting, guest-posting at places like Townhall and Redstate, and of course YouTube (the Michael Moore answer there was priceless)... Fred Thompson.
So there is hope, albeit not much outside of that. The good thing is people aren't really paying attention yet, so we have a solid year to try to build things up.
On a personal note: Too bad you are drawing such poor trolls - that old "Republicans are Rednecks and Exploiters" thing died years ago. I guess the proficient ones are all too busy trolling Hugh Hewitt, LGF and Michelle Malkin right now. What a shame you drew short straw and got the 12 year old.
Money Quote
"Its a case of Country Club versus Sam's Club."
I think that's a beautiful description and needs to be highlighted. For those of us online, it's a part of our lives, not just a tool. If you're the constantly plugged in type (Twitters), then it's sometimes painfully obvious but even for the rest of us, it's invaded every part of our lives:
* I don't check the newspaper or call a number to check on movie times like I did 10 years ago;
* I get little to no news from television, I mostly watch the morning stuff for a bit of brain candy as I get ready to work;
* On a daily basis, I work - yes, work - with people spread between Australia, Germany, Mexico, and all over the US;
* Some of my closest and longest-time friends are a thousand miles away;
* I even participated in a Bible Study online last year;
* I don't think I've entered a bank this calendar year;
My work, my toys, my life wouldn't work without being online and being connected. It's not a toy or even just a tool, it's part of what I do.
The funny thing is ...
that those on the left also tend to think of "Republicans" and "conservatives" as only the Country Club set and their poor, bigotted, mindless drones. Hopefully young, modern conservatives like Bobby Jindal will help to change the stereotype.
Why the Conservative Presence on the Internet is Smaller
You make some very good points in explaining why the conservative -- or "red" -- presence in the blogosphere is much smaller than the liberal/preogressive -- or "blue" -- presence is.
I can cite yet another reason, however: Simple demographics.
The conservative-liberal divide on the Internet often mirrors three other divides: gender, race and age. Conservatives on the Web are so overwhelmingly male, white and over 50 that it's safe to say that they create a whole new meaning to the term, "old-boys network."
Liberals/progressives on the Web, by contrast, are almost evenly divided between men and women, are of nearly all ages, and while still overwhelmingly white, you're more likely to find nonwhite liberal/progressive bloggers than nonwhite conservative bloggers.
(And by the way, for the record, I'm a left-of-center blogger who's 54 years old and biracial (Half-African American, half-Native American)
This demographic political divide on the Web is a mirror image of the divide that exists on talk radio and on the 24-hour cable news TV channels.
But the main cause of this divide is indeed conservatives' loathing of the grassroots, bottom-up nature of the Internet. They tend to fear the Internet's ability to empower individuals to communicate in ways that no other medium can -- and thus see the Internet as a threat to their own power. Which is why some conservatives have been fighting for government controls on the Internet.
Growth in the future
I think you have hit on a very good point when it comes to the demographics. I think there is one more point in the demographics.
Most people become conservative later in life. You get married, buy a house, have kids. That is when one starts to think about taxes and saving money, less government, and true conservative values.
The internet has had a larger impact on the younger demographics. I think as the internet generations gets older, the internet will start to be attractive to more conservatives because that generation will start leaning more conservative.
Fewer Conservative Bloggers
I suspect that conservatives simply have less spare time for blogging than liberals. The time demands for work, marriage, and children tend to be a larger burden on the right side of the political spectrum.
Another factor may be the lack of broadband internet access in truly rural areas. It's hard to ever get interested in creating a blog if just reading existing ones are painfully slow over dial-up.
I think it's interesting that lawyers like Glenn Reynolds, John Hinderaker, Scott Johnson, Paul Mirengoff, Eugene Volokh, and Hugh Hewitt are prominent bloggers on the right while many rank-and-file conservatives and conservative politicians are openly anti-lawyer. I guess lawyers know how to crank out lots of words fast in their day job. However, these professional very articulate bloggers on the right set a high expectations for what a right leaning blog should be.
I have not observed a conservative bias against grassroots activity. Conservatives generally don't march in the street or create myspace or facebook pages, but they do communicate with each other via e-mail, talk radio, and at the water cooler. Republicans, while generally clueless about Web 2.0, tend to do an excellent job of in-person neighborhood level political organization. In 2006, many conservatives stayed home in disgust, but Republicans didn't lose their neighborhood level organization they used effectively in 2004.
I suspect that conservatives
That is true - since conservatives typically have to work two minimum wage jobs.
Demographics
I think you're mostly right about the demographics, although I've seen other studies that suggest there's a huge number of 55+ (baby boomers) liberals on the internet. It's definitely much more male than the left side of the blogosphere, though
I think another factor in the difference between right and left is that the big blogs on the left (Kos, Atrios, etc.) are really HUGE and are more of a community with multiple contributors (not Atrios, but the commenting community is huge there). On the right, everyone pretty much has his or her own blog, so the traffic is spread out rather than concentrated in the top sites. Not sure why that is, but speaking for myself, I definitely prefer having my own site rather than being part of a huge site (such as Red State or LGF--both of which are very tight communities).
Re: Oklahoma blogs--yeah. It's like that where I am, too, and it's kind of frustrating. It's not due to lack of broadband access, though. I think it's just more of a cultural thing, at least here. People here (Alabama) do different things with their free time (i.e. outdoor activities) rather than staying huddled in front of a computer, much more than they do in (for example) the Washington DC area, where I used to live. People are also far more socially engaged, not isolated from their neighbors as one tends to be in urban areas (I'm in a 400K population city, but the feel is small-town). I imagine that's the case with a lot of "flyover country."
50-state Blog Strategy
David, I've had a vision for building a 50-state conservative blog strategy for quite awhile. Just need someone to fund it.
Redstate...
...is working on something which might fill the gap.
Stay tuned for RS 3.0.
The original Pajamas Media plan...
...could have helped with this situation tremendously, but they chose to go a different direction. I'm really looking forward to what RS is going to do.
Stay on message?
Very well-written opinion, Mr. Hobbs.
The problem of staying on message is a bipartisan one, I do believe. Or should we say a multipartisan one since libertarians have a built-in mechanism to stay off message?
I think Anonymous, above,
I think Anonymous, above, illustrates best why the conservative presence is smaller. The internet, whether it be political commentary, personal aesthetics, or any other realm, selects for demagogues, rabble-rousers, and snark over discussion, reasonable respect for divergent opinion, and courtesy.
The Usenet pioneers of online communication were the pro-evolution warriors and their ilk. Today's generation of bloggers learned from their tone, if not from their dedication to sourcing and sensible argumentation. There's a reason why Godwin's Law refers to discussion ending when one party calls the other a Nazi, not a Communist: it's the facist authoritarian regime that was most hated by the pioneers, not the socialist one.
It's not that conservatives don't get the internet. Of course we do. It's not that we like to be told what to do, though the RNC certainly could use a little distributed computing lecture as it applies to electoral efforts. It's that the net-aware conservatives took from the internet pioneers their reason, while the liberals took their tone.
In this day and age, at the speed communication happens... sadly, tone will win over reason every time.
-spool32
the clueless right
My experiences with the GOP mirror those of Ordinary Coloradan. I worked for the GOP here in my state, and by comparison, the US Army was downright democratic. They didn't even give a darn about the opinions of their own employees (except for 5-6 "experts"), let alone those of their volunteers or others within the grassroots.
The left has done an exceptionally good job at getting its message out to people who don't necessarily follow politics (but who still vote) via pop culture, the MSM, and our educational system. We spend all our time preaching to the choir with talk radio, think tanks, and most blogs. Our "Get Out the Vote" efforts focus on identifying Republicans--they spend their time creating Democrats.
If you talk to a prominent Republican about this (and I've spoken with tons of them) they usually shrug and reply that they try but the MSM leans liberal. We've damn near given up.
Things could turn around. I have tons of ideas but those who agree that something creative needs to be done and those who have the ability to make that happen are never the same people. In the meantime, votevets.org is putting airing persuasive commercials on the air opposing the Iraq war while we just hope that they don't work.
We've got some great ideas and some people with a lot of money, but getting the groups together is near impossible when those who could bring them together think that we just need more phone calls and press releases. I'm getting exasperated.
Conservatives versus Liberal blogosphere
Blogging takes time.
Conservatives are more likely to own business, have jobs, raise families, and only dabble in politics.
The very rich, the very poor and the very angry have far more time on their hands.
Anyone want to argue with that?
Totally disagree
I hope you were kidding Jim.
I'm so sick of everyone telling me how busy they are. I've got just as many irons in the fire as I ever have and I keep on plugging. On campaigns, I'm the type that gets their first and leaves last. The fight is that important.
You do it because it's a passion. You do it because it's a hobby. You do it because you care.
That's why we're here.
You Make Time
David--if your argument is true, explain the phenomenon of mom blogs. How on earth do busy moms, whether SAHM or working mothers, find time to blog? Statistics show that mommy bloggers spend around 10 hours a week updating and surfing.
The time arguement just isn't a good one. If conservatives believed that adding their opinion mattered, more would blog.
Excellent Analysis
You've hit the nail on the head with some spot-on analysis, Mr. Hobbs, re: "Growing the 'Red' Blogsphere." Here in Alaska, with our decidedly heavy Republican/conservative leanings and our "connected" infrastructure, we have little in the way of active political blogs at either the state or local level. This may be due to the vastness of our state, our relatively short legislative session (4 months presently) in far-away Juneau and our frequently pronounced disdain for "...how they do it Outside." We're the most wired state in the U.S. yet I can count the blogs that write with a decidedly political slant on the fingers of one hand. We do have some spirited discussion on the blogs of our local newspaper ("Anchorage Daily News" adn.com). How to fix that? I don't know, but your article brings another (needed) voice to the conversation I'll be having locally. Thank you.
Welcome Alaska!
This is the first time I've read anything from someone from Alaska... And a Republican at that.
Let us know how we can help up/over there.
David
Hype--Don't Believe It
To even believe the premise of that WaPo article is absurd. Numerical parity on the internet (if such can even really be measured) does not indicate who will actually win elections. The article asserts a concept in its title that it fails to prove in its analysis.
Has anyone established imperical evidence that having 100K Myspace friends is any real sort of advantage at all, given who actually votes on election day? (Older folks).
And aside from influencing political junkies, do we really think that Youtube, merely a tool and filled with more nonsense than anything else, can flip an election this way or that? The idea of a Republican Youtube is absurd, a time waster.
The article, in its bias, goes out of its way to portray conservative bloggers as somehow tools of larger forces in a losing battle against independent and authentic progressives, and it does so without any real evidence that the tool of the internet actually supercedes sound policy and real world events.
If Republicans want to win--not be hip, but win-- then they need to come up with policies that actually reach the average person. They need to dump all the cliches--"they hate us for our freedom"--and the usual methods, and just come up with some real, detailed answers to life's problems that would make the average person sit up and take notice.
You can probably narrow it down to taxes, healthcare, education, and the environment. You hit those, and in the right way, and you are there.
Republicans for too long have had mediocre policies, which were then badly explained.
The internet itself is only good for three things: 1) Low cost fundraising
2) Getting exact ideas out to the voters and allowing space for discussion and
3) Helping people organize for real world meetings.
Everything else is just hype. The internet is somewhat like a swiss army knife with most of its tools being unnecessary for a cutting edge campaign.
I wasn't kidding
David, I was providing a response to the question of why there seem to be more "progressives" online than conservatives.
I would add a second point, which is that conservatives often have something to lose, which is why nice cars in Republican neighborhoods boast car magnets that show the American flag or a Support the Troops, rather than blatant political messages.
No one wants a nice car keyed, and crazed leftists do key cars.
There's less benefit in exposing oneself online if you have something to lose, which is why lawyers, academics and government workers (and political consultants) are more likely to be political bloggers.
I couldn't do this until I ran my own company. It's why I shut down a blog in 2004.
Agree to disagree
n/t
Conservatives and Libertarians
Well, 2006 gave us a good look at what happens when the Reagan coalition gets a divorce. The net was busy... but it didn't make a difference. I haven't spent a lot of time on purely conservative or GOP-oriented blogs since I (small-l libertarian hawk) kept having to read conservatives blaming libertarians for the defeat, rather than blaming precisely the tin-eared myopia mentioned in this post.
And a big part of why folks like me stayed home is that the GOP seems to be largely immune to feedback nowadays. Email to politicians is ignored (seriously, a friend of mine got his read-receipt on an email a full year after he sent it, coincidentally two days after the election). I don't know about "conservatives..." because that definition is so nebulous nowadays. But *Republicans?* "Where ya gonna go" ain't exactly inspiring a lot of "Red Net" out my way... the Oklahomans and North Texans I know are flat-out disgusted.
Weakness and Strength
1. Pajamas Media.--minus
2. Insty's Libertarianism--minus
3. We're facing an 'operation', a deliberate attempt to overthrow by occasionally illicit methods the Conservative will of the people. Its funded by people like Soros.--minus
4. Greed and self-interest on the Right have replaced much of the generosity of spirit that seemed to have been there at one time.--minus.
We need more connections between people who can do interesting things, and people who need them done. We need a vision of actually doing what the people and the bloggers want. Instead, its more treading water that we get.
Where's the equivalent of the Prometheus Award for a Conservative novelist? When can we get rid of the Country Clubbers who hold us back because being a Real Conservative is just so lower class?
What can we in Tennessee do to help sponsor stronger links to the surrounding states: Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky, South and North Carolina?
What can we do to help foster stronger links to other fields of interest? A conservative book review circle would be nice. A service to help tech clueless pastors create a blog would be cool. We need a Republican YouTube if only to have a dog in the fight.
Tennwriter
What's needed
...is a lot more internet-savvy on our side. Those who have it are usually met with "I don't want to mess with that," or more often, "I don't have time for that" when you make suggestions about how to expand an online presence--even if it's just with Technorati, Digg, YouTube, or some other Web 2.0 joint. And God knows there's a lot of improvements that could be made on the blogs themselves--not with the content, but with the actual structure/layout/SEO/whatever.
I've offered to teach some friends of mine some of these things, but in general, there's not a lot of interest.
Libertarian
Russ,
The standard Libertarian acts like he hates Evangelical and Social Conservatives. He acts like he's always thinking about bolting to the opposition party.
I admit the 2006 elections were...(quick, whats a word for really, really uninspiring?), but that was not because of Conservatism. That was because RINO's and Country Clubbers who also share the Libertarian disdain for the largest component of the R party got their way.
I've made this offer before. Lets resort the R party. Socons are clearly in the lead in numbers, and energy. Libertarians are a very small, but highly energized (at least on the Net), and very intelligent group--we get a lot of our officer corp from this segment, more than is statistically likely. RINO's or Country Clubbers have very little principle.
See, even when I disagree with Libertarians, I usually can see they are making a principled stand.
So, my offer is this: Drop the disdain of Socons, move up to chair no. 2 in the R party, and kick the RINO's down to chair no. 3.
You'll get more Libertarian policies, and as much as you don't want to admit it....good Baptists had a lot to do with your 1st Amendment Rights, and furthermore, most Socons are actually mildly Libertarian.
You'd win some, you'd lose some (I think less), but you'd have to give up that glorious luxury of hating. I'm not sure the Libertarians can do that. But as you think about it, just remember, you and the Socons are getting played by people with a distinct lack of principle or vision...
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