Why I decided not to blog for Edwards

I have to say that I agree with this blogger.


I knew that if I was blogging for Edwards, anything I said on Majikthise would be a potential liability for the candidate, even if I wasn't talking about politics.

And aside from the risks to the campaign, I wasn't sure this arrangement would be healthy for my blog. With this responsibility weighing on my mind, how could I continue to deliver the independent perspective that my readers value? If I were suddenly on a candidate's payroll, yet still posting my own "independent" thoughts on Majikthise, what would my longtime readers think? Would they still trust me? Should they? Full disclosure wasn't going to solve the problem of divided loyalties.

Bob and I sat for a long time, nibbling baklava and talking strategy. He asked me if I knew of any other feminist bloggers who might be interested in the job.

I don't remember who brought up Amanda Marcotte's name first. I said Marcotte was the best writer in the feminist blogosphere. If they wanted a high-profile feminist blogger, Amanda was the best.

Bob is a regular reader of Amanda's blog, Pandagon. We reminisced for a while about some classic brawls and blowups that had erupted at Pandagon.


"The thing you have to realize about Amanda is that she's got real enemies," I said. "We've all got trolls, but Amanda gets a whole different level of abuse."

I told Bob this story to give him some idea of the kind of seething hatred the campaign might have to deal with: The first time I heard Amanda on the radio, an angry caller phoned up to say, "You're Amanda Marcotte, and you're a clerical worker at the University of Texas at Austin." He had his facts wrong, but his message was clear. He was trying to get Amanda fired while leaving some darker threat hanging in the air. The host had to cut him off. Since that incident, at least one of Amanda's trolls had called her then-employer and tried unsuccessfully to get her fired.

I tried to suggest that the campaign might not want high-profile bloggers. I thought it might be better off hiring a well-connected political operative with good connections in the blogosphere.
Bob listened attentively, scribbling copious notes. I didn't feel I was making much headway. The Edwards team was obviously looking for the blogospheric equivalent of star power, but they weren't looking for another high-powered blogger/political consultant like Tim Tagaris or Matt Stoller. They wanted a charismatic audience-builder who could connect with readers who weren't political junkies.

I tried to explain this as delicately and clearly as I could: A-list polemicists are popular because they say things you don't hear on television. The blogosphere isn't just "The Situation Room" with swear words, it's a space for writers to explore ideas that are outside the bounds of mainstream discourse.

If you hire these larger-than-life personalities to blog for John Edwards, they'll have to stop espousing many of the radical policy positions and unconventional values that made them popular in the first place.

Fans will also know when a John Edwards message conflicts with the bloggers' own record on an issue. Big-name bloggers hired by campaigns will be accused of "selling out" and open themselves up to accusations of hypocrisy from both sides.


What Bob didn't seem to realize is that the right-wing blogosphere was going to try to get Edwards' bloggers fired no matter what. Unlike the liberal netroots, the right-wing blogosphere is capable of exactly one kind of collective political action. They call it "scalping" -- they pick a target and harass that person and his or her employer until the person either jumps or is pushed out of the public eye. Whoever blogged for Edwards was signing up for a lot of bad hair days, and it wasn't going to be me.

I left the meeting feeling optimistic but uneasy. I later applied for a job as a campaign photographer. Taking pictures meant I could work for the candidate without having to type up and post endorsements of political positions I might not agree with. I felt that the Edwards campaign was going to make history one way or another. I would even have put the blog on hiatus for a front-row seat.

When the campaign announced that it had hired Amanda as blogger, I was overjoyed -- but very surprised. It's one thing to have a relatively junior staffer say your blog archives don't matter; it's quite another to see that assessment reflected in a hiring decision.

It was certainly a gutsy move, and I knew Amanda could do a great job. If anyone was inured to right-wing intimidation, it was Amanda. She's been fighting the wingnuts tooth-and-nail for years and she's already shrugged off every epithet in the book.

Upon reading the announcement, my partner Darcy said, "I hope the Edwards campaign knows what it's in for."

"I'm sure they do," I said.


Next page: Campaigns "work" bloggers more or less the same way they work the mainstream press

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