Pandagon Makes a Good Point

on TPM Cafe today. She's discussing the meaning of the controversy (although I should use some less stately word for it, like ruckus or fooforaw) the right blogosphere ginned up over her and Shakespeare's Sister blogging for the Edwards campaign.

What does this have to do with the clash between bloggers and the mainstream media/political establishment? Having my words taken out of context and used to discredit me showed me how the soundbite culture contributes to anti-democratic elitism and shutting the rabble out of the political system. In the mainstream media right now, politics is a long, drawn-out game of "gotcha", and the result is that everyone who wants to be in politics is scared to ever say anything interesting or thoughtful for fear that it will be taken out of context and used relentlessly to discredit them. The result is that ordinary people are routinely turned off to politics, to the point where getting more than half of registered voters to vote in any one election is considered some sort of amazing victory.

This is where blogs step in, at least on the left. Blogging is a real counterpoint to the thoughtless, elitist, soundbite-driven mainstream media, where we're supposed to absorb an endless stream of soundbites and photo ops and our participation is limited mostly to a vote every couple of years. Blogs are bringing back the 19th century debate culture, where people would attend real debates and political rallies and listen to speeches for hours at a time. The irony about the vulgar people is that the vulgar people crave analysis, debate and participation, because these things validate our intelligence and our right to be citizens. The blogs are still appealing only to a small segment of society right now, but they're still relatively new and have the potential to reach a much larger audience over time.

This especially struck me today as I was teaching from William Manning's 200+-year-old "Key to Libberty," a vernacular critique of the press and political system of the 1790s. Manning, a farmer who had taught himself history and political science by reading newspapers, complained that the "few" had disenfranchised the "many" by bankrolling controversialists who want to keep public discourse in a constant state of ruckus or fooforaw, making it impossible for an ordinary person to find the time to winnow through all the foofaraw or ruckus to get to the actual and significant truths on which to base political action. End result: disaffection, and continued elite rule.

This history has little to teach us. Any significant concentration of power at any location in a political system will create a privileged space of discourse for itself. People always try to force light into the darkened chambers, but the talk of power keeps shifting its ground, finding new places. Once it was thought that televizing Congressional proceedings would throw open the decision making process to public supervision. But now not even the most dedicated CSpan junkie believes she's watching actual decision-making. And, by the time we're done genuflecting to the posturing, everything has moved on.

I think the right thing happened with the Edwards campaign. The blogosphere is a nice space for sophisticated controversy, and it can generate some currents in tree-tops public opinion, while at the same time enforcing certain requirements for intellectual honesty. Bloggers with a real voice--Pandagon, for instance--have credibility in the blogosphere because of their independence and integrity. Signing up with a campaign puts that influence at risk--not quite but almost like Armstrong Williams--while imposing an etiquette that does violence to the voice and integrity of the blogger. Edwards didn't bow to pressure, at least as far as I know. He earned my respect for behaving like he believes in the Bill of Rights, which is rare for a pres-o-dential candidate, even--especially--if a lawyer by training. The right wing voices didn't intimidate anyone, I hope, and don't have cause for gloating. Instead of being silenced, the bloggers have returned to their sphere of greatest influence, newly adorned with the red badge of courage, or the scarlet letter, or what have you. They are smart enough and tough enough to swing with it.

Is the public discourse richer? Yes, not because the campaign discourse has been enriched--it hasn't, and we can expect the candidates to remain insipid until their focus groups tell them to stop--but because the rest of us are still working to push the conversation onward, leftward, and into more interesting terrain.