I've heard of Glenn Reynolds and Mickey Kaus and Andrew Sullivan, and I'll be interested if someone brings a brilliant revelation to my attention, but I'm can't sift through the musings of anyone's daily thoughts. I don't even read my favorite columnists anymore due to time constraints. Are the liberal bloggers influenced by the conservative ones? That might be an inroad that no other entity but a famous blogger could make.
I've come to consider these Internet forums (like FR) to be slow-motion blogs. Actually, any quick trip through old Usenet postings reveals that the entire Internet is one big blog.
I find a lot I agree with here. I remember back in the day when I tried to read all of the conservative columnists on Jewish World Review. But by doing so, I learned of other writers, and still more.
After a while, I realized that basically all of them were saying the same 3 or 4 things, just with slightly different styles. I've since lost all use for columnists since most have no original thoughts at all.
As for FR vis-a-vis the blogs, I think that it is they who are behind us. I often see stuff on here first before anywhere else on the Web.
One other plus about FR: live group discussions of events. You can't get that kind of interactivity reading a hodgepodge of stream-of-consciousness diary entries.