Posted on 09/21/2004 8:22:22 PM PDT by Mike Fieschko
Scott Johnson had just gotten off the phone with Tom Brokaw, even as a TV crew was camped outside his office in downtown Minneapolis, while he tried to explain Tuesday what it feels like "to be sitting in the eye of a hurricane. It's unbelievable."
Johnson wasn't getting his 15 minutes of celebrity because of his day job as an attorney and senior vice president of TCF National Bank. Rather (as it were), the attention has come because of his role in helping torpedo a story about President Bush's military records that blew up in the faces of CBS executives and their anchorman Dan Rather.
Johnson is a blogger and the blog he co-writes (www.powerlineblog.com) was among those where questions about the authenticity of the documents were raised immediately after the CBS broadcast. The mainstream media quickly followed the bloggers' lead.
And it appears that what inhabitants of the blogosphere refer to as Rathergate is fresh evidence that blogs have gone from being a cyber-niche populated by lonely geeks to a potentially powerful political force.
"This is an exceptional case study of the power of the blogs," said Daniel Drezner, a political scientist at the University of Chicago and co-author of "The Power and Politics of Blogs," a research paper published in July. "A couple of the blogs raised factual questions -- it was like firing a flare. Then the mainstream journalists did the heavy lifting. It was highly symbiotic."
[snip]
The very night of the Sept. 8 CBS broadcast, bloggers at the conservative Web site FreeRepublic.com immediately questioned the authenticity of the documents the network had used to question Bush's record.
(Excerpt) Read more at startribune.com ...
Caught part of the Debbie Norville Show tonight- she's got a "counterculture" blog-nerd reporting on blogs from the blogosphere. The MSM's cannibalization of the new media makes it unhip by definition. Like in the late 60's when your dad grew sideburns and a moustache.
Whatever. This aint going to be no sandy bergergate, though. We are not letting go of this bone.
"mainstram journalists did the heavy lifting"...? LOL!
man, now that freepers are TRES CHIC, i guess my teenage daughters can't laugh at ME anymore!!!!
Pfft. When the MSM defines something as chic it is usually anything but. Thanks, but no thanks. The MSM can own the popular culture, we don't need it.
BTTT
I think most bloggers are too bright and independent minded to give a flip in the wind whether they are chic or geek.
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