Salon is reporting that John Edwards’ campaign has capitulated to the demands of William Donohue (who, by the way, is as closely tied to the extreme right in this country as anyone) and has fired bloggers Amanda Marcotte and Melissa McEwan.
There’s a big caveat in the story here, though:
Speculation from sources that the two bloggers might be rehired was bolstered by Jennifer Palmieri, a spokeswoman for the Edwards campaign, who said in an e-mail that she would “caution [Salon] against reporting that they have been fired. We will have something to say later.”
I have no idea what that means, other than that there appears to be a ray of hope that the Edwards campaign will not completely knuckle under to right-wing nutjobs who would never in a million years vote for him.
But let’s lay this out nice and simple, so that ex-Senator Edwards can understand it. If he fires these people, he’s done, as far as the netroots is concerned. His much-touted netroots support at places like Daily Kos will vanish overnight. And it should.
Which is not to say that I agree with everything Marcotte and McEwan have ever written. I have no idea whether I do, because I’ve never read any of it — I don’t read Pandagon or Shakespeare’s Sister. Nor do I care, because I’m not hiring them to work for me. But someone who was hiring them to work for him, especially if that someone was running for president, perhaps might have done a bit of checking to see what they were all about. Bloggers do occasionally use naughty words and express their opinions forcefully.
This kind of thing just happened here in Massachusetts, under the name of Marie St. Fleur. Tom Reilly did a really stupid thing by not properly vetting her, and his campaign really never recovered. This Edwards/blogger thing probably isn’t as big a deal as that was, but if Salon’s report is right, it’s still a big black eye that is going to leave a very foul taste in the mouth of the netroots. [AOOOGAH! Mixed metaphor alert! AOOOGAH!]
There’s apparently still time for Edwards, or his campaign, to explain that they don’t take their cues from Bill “Hollywood is controlled by secular Jews who hate Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular … Hollywood likes anal sex” Donohue and Michelle “In defense of internment” Malkin. Let’s hope he seizes the opportunity.
because you already lost the the audience you were aiming at by firing them under threat of ultra-rightys.
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I was never an Edwards fan to begin with (although my mind was open), so this doesn;t affect me beyond reminding me to do my eye-rolling exercises. However, what will be interesting is to see if it has any impact whatsoever on the population at large. Most folks aren;t bloggers, and may not even be aware of this little demo of pandering/spinelessness/whathaveyou. And since we’re so far from 11/2008, this sort of thing could easily be completely forgotten by crunch time.
I think the bloggers are toast. Edwards can weather this, even among the blogs; Hillary’s Iraq/Iran waffling is a lot harder to get over than a little speed bump like who’s working for your campaign.
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The annoying thing is having the pressure attributed to Malkin, Donohue, et al; I doubt Edwards is afraid of them, but he does have reason to be concerned about alienating Catholics.
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Again, it goes back to the choice of those particular bloggers to begin with. Why choose provocateurs if you don’t want provocation?
is an idiot. Sorry to be harsh, but that’s the only conceivable explanation, isn’t it?
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And it’s not just about these two bloggers. It’s about running his campaign in a stupid way, and it’s about showing how truly clueless he is about the blogosphere, even as he sorta kinda “reaches out” to try to drum up netrootsy goodness.
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And I’m not so sure Edwards can weather this among the blogs. No, most of ’em won’t migrate to Hillary. But they’ll go to Obama, or Richardson, or maybe Vilsack, or heck maybe to Gravel. It’s not like it’s Edwards or bust, esp. if your big issue is Iraq.
At least that’s not the sense that I got among anyone in the blog community.
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I think you’re right — the damage is already done. Part of the primary is showing that you can run a tight, disciplined campaign. But beyond that, I highly doubt there’s a lot of loyalty to Marcotte and McEwan — beyond other bloggers who know them. IOW, I doubt that Kos’s and Bowers’ loyalty necessarily translates to their readers. I’ll bet they’re thinking big picture: What’s more important — Iraq or bloggers? Health care or bloggers? If Edwards has better ideas and seems like he can win, they’ll vote for him. It’s the latter that’s taken a hit.
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I think we’re actually all pretty much dispensible in cyberspace. DailyKos is not really about Kos, for instance — it’s about Scoop. Just another replaceable part, here.
Link:
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And then Bowers holds forth …
Edwards’ appeal was outside the ObaMa-Clinton Axis – they will most likely go for Richardson.
Let us hope that Edwards is smart enough to realize that being on the wrong side of Donohue won’t be seen as anti-Catholic by the average Catholic. Maybe some bona fide Catholics would weigh in on this, but I’m guessing that the avg RC will see the So. Baptist Edwards as more authentic religiously than way-out-there Donohue.
…and this only ensures that he will not.
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I’ve never trusted Edwards, and this only puts another nail in his electoral coffin.
Right here. Remember that all we know so far is that someone, whom Salon had reason to trust, told Salon that Amanda and Melissa had been fired. Then a campaign spokeswoman with a name “cautioned Salon not to report that they had been fired”. I’ve seen no hard information other than that — a few mistaken people have printed “they have definitely been fired” but they seem to be linking to a Townhall (wingnut) post that just quotes the Salon story.
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David, thanks for a very sensible analysis.
Anyone wanna bet that in the next day or so Edwards will come out swinging against right-wing intimidation of freedoms?
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Watch what he does people – not what he says.
Interstingly, this event was covered on the right side of the blogosphere as well. Here is the take of one of my favorite right blogs, captain’s quarters:
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http://www.captainsq…
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Personally I don’t really care one way or the other about those bloggers (never heard of them before now) but I have great disdain for Edwards as imo a pandering lightweight sophomore and the sooner he becomes political history, the better for all of us.
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Anyway i think the CQ article is well written and sensible. It should give a nice balance to the rather improbable charges of right wing domination that float about.
…Pandagon http://www.pandagon…. and Shakespear’s Sister http://shakespearess… , two of the more highly-regarded left of center blogs. I never could figure out why they would go to work for Edwards, but Edwards has made it clear that he does not want the nomination with this firing.
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I had more comment on a thread upstream.
You reject the cq article’s assertion that those bloggers would be so easily offensive to e.g. catholics (or at least when their quotes are brought to light by oppo) that they would doom his campaign worse than netroots approval? Isn’t Edwards supposed to have some southern appeal, some centrist appeal, the ability to bridge over from the left to the right? He can’t have that and these two, I suspect… not with the baggage that CQ points to being so easily exploitable.
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Anyway I’ll check out the blogs sometime, I’ve never really found any leftist ones that I respect much so thanks for the pointer.
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pandagon, ouch
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Its gonna be a while before I can check out the second one đŸ™‚
and the other Dem candidates will mis-step within the next 12 months, each of them pissing off the collective lefty blogosphere over and over again.
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Will this particular event have lasting ramifications on the Edwards campaign? I’m not so sure.
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As a side note: why do the candidates hire bloggers? Why not just offer (a limited number?) of them press passes, and take extra good care of them with sammiches and coffee and maybe even motel rooms and motorcade? Reach out to the blogosphere and treat them like journalists, not like hired PR hitmen. Then, it ain’t your fault if somebody digs up a not-best-moment comment a blogger made… and all bloggers make ’em. Any idea? Why pay ’em?
That is — why hire a blogger who already has a significant record and reputation? Just hire someone who can write and be spontaneous and interesting. There’s no magic about “blogging” as a thing, or a technology, or whatever. Just about anyone can do it — that’s the point.