Straight, white, dudes closely hews to the demographic breakdown of the country at large? Hmmmm...

It's not young in calendar days. It's young in brain. Are you hide-bound to old ideas, or have you embraced the possibilities of the new technological approach to politics?

I am 56, and feel young (but not when I try to stand up, when my dang knee gives out on me). I get more socialist by the day.

He must've written that before the Obama kool-aid converted most of those bloggers into the new McCarthyites.

Vince Foster! Never Forget!

Jeez, you guys are quick. I'd already edited that to "the age distribution of the political blogosphere," and then I clicked on comments to see that someone had already nicked me for this. Mea culpa.

For the record. I'm 47 and a big fan of all of the sites you mentioned.

Except Daily Howler. And I'll be sure to take a good long look.

Jeez, I'm a complete outlier at 65. I read all the blogs. Write two of my own. Am happy to be in great company. Deep and thorough going social reform, yes. But it's even deeper than that. Somehow the impulse to destroy, lie and connive keeps surfacing, even out of once good people. Where's it coming from? How do we change that source, or at least learn to drain it off into inconsequence before it wipes us all out? Social Democrat? I dunno.. me, I'm a Gandhian, Kingian, Chavezian kind of guy.

What's this Social Democratic commie stuff? You bloggers all gonna sing L'Internationale on May 1? Maybe strike with the dockworkers?

48, more left than ever. Probably because the right had their chance, and used it to demonstrate the merit of their position. It's easily to be fearless when you know that your critics are flaming idiots. They've also pissed away any claim to a moral high ground by rallying around a probable war criminal.

I mean, look at McCain -- can't tell Sunni from Shiite, totally caved on torture, caved on tax cuts, his numbers don't add up AT ALL -- what kind of joke is this? And he's the best the Republicans have to offer this election cycle.

SORRY, BUT JOSH MARSHALL AND TPM IS MILES BEYOND THE REST OF YOU BORING PASSIVE DWEEBS.

Why do Americans run away from left labels? Is the ghost of Sen. McCarthy still stalking the landscape? Are you all afraid of your shadows? What after all is the matter with adopting the 'freestyle communist' label? Remember Joe Hill when you have a chance, please. Dream a bit...

It's not clear what Morton means by "mount radical critiques of U. S. policy." That term could be describing an anti-capitalist, pro-international-socialism manifesto delivered at a White Panther Party rally in Ann Arbor in 1973, or an analysis of the actions of the Bush-Cheney regime in Iraq in 2003.

Josh Marshall and Glenn Greenwald, just to name two, have done a gigantically important job over the last several years in researching, cataloguing, and writing about the flagrantly unconstitutional abuses of power by Bush and Cheney, and about the slavish acquiescence and outright cheerleading on the part of much of the mainstream media and the right-wing blogosphere. In doing so, both have really been true conservatives, in the sense of what the term should mean. It is Bush, Cheney, and their media enablers who are the radicals.

I think a more accurate term would be "mount critiques of radical and unconstitutional U.S. policies."

I actually don't count Josh Marshall as left.

TPM Proper is largely a news organization now more focused on reporting news about muck than on getting the Democrats in power or getting them to espouse better policies for the country.

It's good to fight corruption, and since Bush reigns there is lots of Republican corruption, but his main site is not a lefty blogosphere site. It is usually frustratingly neutral.

For a very long time, people on the left have been hoping for the emergence of an intellectual A-Team, a group of writers whose example would reinvigorate the thinking of the Democratic party, in the same way that the neoconservatives helped to revive the Republican party in the 1970s. It doesn't look the way any of us anticipated, but the A-Team may have finally arrived.

Congratulations, welcome to 2003.

Interesting take by Hugh Hewitt, who, as usual couldn't buy a clue with a fist full of $100.00's:

http://hughhewitt.townhall.com/blog/g/e539f590-2989-4b0f-b308-f80c83be320c

"We have Ann Coulter and Michael Savage. They have Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews."

We have Tweety? Gee. Sucks to be us.

Twenty years ago I went to work for the SoCal city where I lived. Back then it was very white & conservative. When they discovered that I was a Liberal, I was told it wouldn't last, that I would become more conservative as I got older. They laughed at me when I told them the Bush Sr was beatable after liberating Kuwait, that coasting into the '92 elections was a mistake. Well here I am, still at the same city, now less white & conservative, a couple of months shy of 50 and just as Liberal in my views as I was then. Why? If you are true to yourself and your views, they should never change. And they haven't.

"....Because most of these writers are very young, they're not afraid of being red-baited..."

well, as an over simplification of age bias, or even misinterpretation of red baiting, which as a fear/hate tactic rises at any moment, disguised as, lets say slur for today: "liberal"...which all of the writers listed have had to endure. I think why these writers and political pundits of the new left are so effective in their message may be found in the fact that they... (a) are not hung up on old left politics & ideologies....(case in point: neo-cons & neo-liberals); (b) possess a rational pragmatism; (c) Have complete control of the moral ground due to the absolute corruption in our government today & last , but not least...(d) have a powerful communication forum and tool that was not even conceived by most only twenty years ago.

I think those, and certainly other factors make more sense then having some notion of being burned by "red baiting" or black listing, which certainly have their historical niche, but have lost the depth of their impact, and have been replaced some time ago.

how can anyone who does not foam at the mouth be described as a leftist much less a NEW leftist?

"...deep-going social reform..."

Yea, we sure could use an over dose of that. Maybe even two over doses.

"...it's the ideas that count, not the number of trees you kill to print them." - Phil Carter@Intel-dump.com

Digby's only 47? 9 years younger than I am? No wonder she looks so good in her latest photos.

The truth is, some of us actually are dirty fucking hippies, and proud of it.

Ezra Klein is only 23? That's amazing. He impresses the hell out of me.

This is a pretty accurate list of the top blogs. Digby and Bob Somerby are terrific, always thoughtful and fair. Josh was impressive going after the Duke Cunninghams and Repub corruption but has deteriorated of late. Kevin's always interesting and my first stop of the day, but he does get annoying when discussing health care.

I'm 61 and a regular blogger and commenter. Retirees like me have more time for this sort of thing.

You guys are Left-wing?
Only in the US I guess,
not at al in the rest of the world.

I always found it interesting (I am in TV engineering)that those who were designing all the neat computers we use in broadcast were older than I am, so leading edge technology is being created by both old farts and young whippersnappers.

These biases we have are a form of bigotry that shoves old folks out of the way undeservedly and deprives young people of a wealth of information.

This part is true regardless of age.

They feel "freer to mount radical critiques of U. S. policy than older generations of writers grouped around Dissent and schooled in the socialist tradition."

I'm in my 50s and was never comfortable with the 1960s new (or old) left critique of the US or the Vietnam War (tragic mistake, but unwilling to embrace Ho Chi Minh). I disliked people like David Horowitz and other pseudo-60s radicals.

In the late 1970s, I was sympathetic with the efforts to integrate market considerations into Democratic Party policies -- the nio-liberal movement centered around the Washington Monthly and Charles Peters, Michael Kinsley, James Fallows, etc. until it was perverted by "corporate Democrats" as a corporate fund-raising tool (see S&L crisis) and the DLC in the 1990s.

After the politics of the 1990s, impeachment, failures of our news media, Bush v. Gore, the Iraq War, torture, lack of oversight, dysfunctional behavior and scandals on Wall Street and in corporate suites, massive trade and debt imbalances, an incredibly expensive, inefficient healthcare system which doesn't provide coverage for tens of millions of Americans, I am very open to considering radical critiques of American politics and society without being particularly ideological in my thinking. I'm not any more sympathetic to the old or new left, but we are clearly going in the wrong direction in this country and creative thinking outside the box is definitely needed.

I enjoy Mr. Drum's blog, and learn things here. But "New Left"? "resist red-baiting?" This reads like 1963. I think of Mr. Drum as more of a "cruise-missile liberal" than part of any "New Left", but perhaps its just a definitional matter.

"Because most of these writers are very young, they're not afraid of being red-baited, and this fearlessness in some curious fashion makes them freer to mount radical critiques of U. S. policy than older generations of writers grouped around Dissent and schooled in the socialist tradition."

At least 2 of those "radical critics of U.S. policy," to my knowledge, supported the invasion of Iraq for at least a certain period. One of those 2 is our current blog host.

And if Hillary Clinton manages to emerge from this primary as the Democratic Nominee, every single one of the above "radical critics of U.S. policy," bar none, will dutifully support and vote for her, despite the fact that she just declared she would "obliterate" Iran if it launched a nuclear attack against Iraq.

If this list is "radical," then the word no longer has any meaning.

Patrick Meighan
Culver City, CA

From the article in Dissent :

All of the writers whom I've mentioned are also gifted stylists—eloquent in their outrage and often very funny. They are political writers whom one turns to not only because they are informative but because they're fun to read.

This could not be more true of everyone listed. I read blogs for both information and fun; it would be easy to say I am prophetic in reading everyone on the list since early in their blogging days. Truth is that you are all really good, clever writers. That's why you have all reached the point where big-time print journals (like Dissent ?) are paying attention. The right-wing blogosphere has nothing to compare.

I've often thought the gotcha journalism practiced by the msm is a last desperate attempt to beat back the younger generation of politicians coming up, i.e. Dean and Obama, that don't answer to the bell of class and status quo preservation first. They know they are dinosaurs waiting to be replaced, and so they think they have to entertain rather than inform.

Brian Morton is simultaneously years late and factually incorrect. Most of the writers named are anything but "very young." Many of them, including Kevin, are not that far left. Moreover, nearly all of the bloggers named have been around for a relatively long time. They are emerging as "the old farts" sitting on the top of the blogger food chain. They are among the few actually able to make some sort of living by blogging. Of course, most are tied to a print journal.

As the blogs have matured there have been fewer and fewer opportunities for fresh faces to emerge. The folks mentioned read each other. Some almost exclusively. Sadly the blogs are becoming their own echo chamber.

I hesitate only slightly to point out what the bloggers listed in the article have in common, and to suggest to the author of the article that the progressive blogosphere is more than just a dozen or so people.

There are many more than just those of us who've risen to enough prominence to join traditional media institutions. We've plenty to say, and many of us say it quite well. But you'd have to look beyond the ususal suspects to hear us.

I think the media notion you mention is part of the overall main-stream media effort to smear bloggers- you're right that bloggers aren't really that young- but I think the average age of the bloggers you mention is probably lower than the average age of a representative sampling of famous mainstream media personalities. So there's a grain of truth in it that makes it easier for them to pull off their distortion.

On another note, Morton also says that "these writers share a politics that is interested in deep-going social reform — you could say it's a social-democratic politics, although few of them would use that term."

Really? I would have called it more something like "Oh yeah and I like basketball, too" politics. There doesn't seem to be that insistent a push to get all these gains we supposedly want. Sure, the support for it is there on the blogs, but if you guys really cared so much about achieving this stuff, I think the message would be a little more focused, and we'd have a little less of the trivia posts and the "Hey do you close the door when you go to the bathroom and no one else is home" posts. So again, I think this another example of not getting it quite right, and making the lefty bloggers look like a wild pinko threat they're not living up to be.

Lets not forget the many readers of these Blogs and where they fit into Mortons demographic.
Me I'm a 63 year old white high school drop out, viet vet, ex-hippie, retired carpenter who is pissed as hell of what has happened to our country and the Bloggers are the only ones really addressing these problem.

I think the common link in all of this is less age than it is ability and viewpoint; all of these bloggers have combined some of the insights of neoliberalism into a larger narrative that supports liberal, Democratic politics. That they're really good writers who argue strongly for the positions stemming from this worldview is what makes them noticeable.

Isn't it more that these bloggers--and most of us--just want normal average decency from our leaders, as opposed to "reform" per se? Apparently, it will take huge reforms just to get back to some sort of decency, but it's not like people are seeking to set all of the government and society on its ear.

I think his site is excellent, but I haven't looked at Bob Somerby's The Daily Howler in many, many moons. It's so relentlessly depressing and the same and like hitting your head against a brick wall.

All of these bloggers have combined some of the insights of neoliberalism into a larger narrative that supports liberal, Democratic politics.

Matt --

I think you nailed it. That's exactly right. It starts with a commitment to liberal values and effective solutions.

I think the world would be better off if we could get Steve Benen a larger audience...He deserves to be on that list.

Marshall, Perlstein, and Greenwald might also qualify as "very young" I think, in terms of the age of most of our opinion makers.

Radical Left ?

I still remember the 1970's in Europe and a Radical Left position would be something like this:
- seriously progressive taxes, with a, say 90% tax at the top
- nationalize all important industries (banks, stell, transport, airlines...)
- free health care for everybody
- unilateral nuclear disarmament
- free education from Kindergarten to college, including meals, books, busing
- spend serious money on aid to the Third world

etc...

all the above bloggers are far more middle-of the road than that.

where the hell are

jane hamsher

and

marcy wheeler

in that list of brian morton's?

they are as effective as any others of the above,

strongly supportive of a new kind of journalism,

and smart enough not to have joined "new left morons for barry".

and what of

taylor marsh?

jeralyn merritt?

If all these bloggers were really such social activists, you wouldn't see stuff like the self-righteous whining when a catblogging post gets marred with a link in comments to something political that someone just thinks is cool or outrageous and wants everyone to know about. The attitude would be, "Ok, this is important- not just cats. Let it be there."

I could maybe understand the dissatisfaction if it was every post was getting filled up with 50% comments that were completely off-topic from the main post. But for post blogs + for most posts, we're not even close to being something like that, yet too often, bloggers, commenters, and moderators try to enforce some impression that you're supposed to get like one comment per post, and that is has to be pinpoint on-topic (unless people respond to you, which lets the trolls create huge, stress-filled conversations on the threads, or say anything they want about something, since they'll agree to talk to each other on the thread.

You don't create activism by shutting down activism and shutting the doors to the Internet's potential to be a tool for activism.

I think what explains this behavior is part dishonesty on the part of some bloggers, and part the kinds of pressures that are put on honest mainstream media figures being put on the honest bloggers.

But for post blogs + for most posts, we're not even close to being something like that,

Sorry, should have read, "For most blogs + for most posts..."

Digby, Alterman, Greenwald, lefties. The rest, not so much.

The wingnutz have moved so close to the edge of the earth that the "radical left" is where the center used to be.

"You don't create activism by shutting down activism and shutting the doors to the Internet's potential to be a tool for activism."

And you don't create credibility by sticking your own personal agenda in the middle of every thread, whether it applies or not. If a thread happens to be about cats, then sticking in a long winded screed about Haiti, or what ever other OT topic you want to talk about makes one seem clueless, blinkered and petty.

Greenwald is actually more of a honest libertarian than a lefty. He just came to the same political conclusions as many of us from a different perspective. John Cole did the same thing from the right.

Only in Ammerica would conservative moderates be considered Leftists.

The surest sign of mainstream acceptance of blogs is that the "they all are unemployed,live in pajamas, and post from their parent's basement" part was omitted.

I hear that comment a fair bit, and respond that there aren't that many parent's basements.

There is not one among that group that I regard as being left. You are all centerist moderates. Nor does Somerby have a blog in the technical sense because he has never had a comment section and he is a media critic by advocation.

I also find your 'social reform' credentials weak. On what for many is the signature issue, universal health care, almost all were willing to jettison that for the weaker candidate on the issue.

If a thread happens to be about cats, then sticking in a long winded screed about Haiti, or what ever other OT topic you want to talk about makes one seem clueless, blinkered and petty.

Ah, Mrs. Peel - I see you have made Swan's acquaintance. "Clueless, blinkered and petty" pretty much sums him up to a "T" - and I especially like the follow-up posts where he corrects his typos and tenses - as if we read his idiotic drivel in the first place!

The New Left...

'...none of us are socialists....'

Then you're not really the Left. Just garden variety social democrats.

As for the first comment: Glenn Greenwald is gay (and out); Digby's a woman, but Morton should also have mentioned Markos (Latino), Jane Hamsher and Christy Hardin Smith of Firedoglake, and Arianna Huffington as highly influential left-bloggers, and could have pointed out that the front-page staff of DailyKos is majority-female.

Whites are definitely over-represented, though.

I tend to think of myself and my co-bloggers as liberals or progressives rather than left, but I suppose we fall into the social democratic category.

We blog more about international politics, diplomacy and nuclear weapons issues than domestic politics, although we don't ignore that last.

Oh yes: all three female and over sixty.

WhirledView

Media critics have difficulty distinguishing bloggers from their commenters. Many commenters at the blogs referenced are much more liberal and leftist than the bloggers who allow for comments, who are mostly satisfied with the established political economy. This satisfaction is probably because the referenced bloggers inhabit the top ten-twenty percentile of income earners. The bottom ten-forty percentile of income earners is not only neglected by the political powers, but also underrepresented in the blogosphere.

Joshua Norton,

The wingnutz have moved so close to the edge of the earth that the "radical left" is where the center used to be.

Amen to that. For over fifteen years I've been saying that I did not leave the Republican party, the Republican party left me.

My moderate centrism now has me labeled a radical liberal. Sheesh.

For the record chuck me into the old farts bin with an age of 51, but age really is not such a big factor anymore. Living a healthy lifestyle I am healthier than many of my younger relatives, some of whom have sadly passed away already.

Smoking, booze, and treating your stomach like a garbage can will get you much too soon.

Under 50 is young. It may not seem so to those who haven't reached that milestone yet, but it will once they cross it.

Gratuitously broad generalization:

The 20s are for learning and for developing cooperation and a personal 'big picture.'
The 30s are for learning to do and discovering what works.
The 40s are for doing.
The 50s are for improving and refining on what has been done and sharing knowledge gleaned.
The 60s and 70s are for appreciating what has been accomplished and for passing along experience.

At 58 I can safely say that I began my political awareness as an FDR liberal Democrat and remain so (with appropriate updates for technology) to date.
As to the "radical critiques" of U.S. policy - very little I have seen on the various blogs is radical in any sense of the word. The "tone" of the writing might be more emphatic/denunciatory, but the content is conservative in the best meaning of that word - "to keep, maintain"; our rights, our democracy, our health...

What's this Social Democratic commie stuff? You bloggers all gonna sing L'Internationale on May 1? Maybe strike with the dockworkers? Posted by: anonymous on April 23, 2008 at 12:59 AM

Don't the dockworkers strike every May 1st? I know I do.

>>SORRY, BUT JOSH MARSHALL AND TPM IS MILES BEYOND

Actually, I can't bear Marshall's writing. He writes like a clever tenth-grader. He also can't decide if he is a blogger or a "journalist" and it shows. I'm not knocking the investigative reporting TPM does, but the rest doesn't do much for me.

No offence, but Greenwald puts the rest of you to shame.

Where all of these bloggers fall on the absolute political spectrum is a bit beside the point-they've moving the policy discussion leftward by virture of their ability and fortuitous timing. The rise of the Internet as a medium has to be looked at as a tremendous boon for liberals/leftists everywhere. We now have a medium that we can effectively leverage in elections, something akin to the Right's conservative radio consortium, in order to advance liberal outcomes. That the media is waking up to the fact that we have fairly sizeable popular majorities in favor of any number of liberal proposals has more to do with the megaphone provided by the Internet and people using it than some sudden epiphany by reporters. The popularity and success of bloggers like Josh Marshall, like Matthew Yglesias, Glenn Greenwald et al. has effectively clubbed the msm into recognizing that, in spite of the best rightwing spin, liberal policy ideas generate energy and interest across the nation. In recognizing this, further pressure can be applied to move towards more liberal principles as the overall boundaries of 'mainstream' discussion are expanded. Just look at how much influence Edwards was able to generate in moving both Hillary and Obama to the Left; a lot of that is because the 'acceptable' policy discussions have moved rapidly to include universal healthcare (something that was anathema to Democrats after 1994), to include a fairly robust call for withdrawal from Iraq (implementation pending) and to vociferously renounce free trade expansion (compared to the Clinton administration's steadfast support for NAFTA). Whatever one thinks of these policy outcomes, the framing of the upcoming election should be a much more representative competition of Liberal and Conservative policies than any election in recent memory and the successful bloggers in this discussion deserve some credit for that.

At 72, and a life-long socialist, I always thought that the door to the left began with the ideas of public ownership and government economic planning. For example, anything less than a government owned and operated health system isn't really of the left.
Coming from and earlier left orientation, I was never really comfortable with 60-70s radicalism. While I delighted in some of the reforms in social attitudes, I didn't like the anti-rationalism or the disinterest in economics that held sway then. With the advent of the liberal blogosphere I felt 'at home' for the first time in decades. Here was a muscular, really brainy and determined crowd. So I'm a kossack and more! What a sense of relief!
I suppose label-wise I have to call them liberal reformers, in the tradition of Ida Tarbell and Lincoln Steffens. But given the chance and the right climate I think they'd drift left. Meantime I don't care what you call them. They are the present and it works!