Liberal Bloggers v. Wishy-Washy Democrats

This Washington Post article posits the question- are liberal bloggers unintentionally sabotaging their party's political chances? One example they give is Hillary Clinton, the favorite '08 nominee of the Democratic establishment, but who is disliked by many on the left who seek to force her to take less calculated, conservative stances on key issues.

Blogs Attack From Left as Democrats Reach for Center

Personally, I think this new system isn't perfect (and yes, calm and rational heads should prevail), but it is good. It is merely copying the grassroots model conservatives used to launch themselves back into power in the early-mid '90s. Conservatives are getting mad at the liberal blogosphere because liberals finally learned how to play the game and stand up for themselves. The media is scared (as evidenced by the recent Washington Post/Howell brouhaha) because they have let the conservatives scare them with 'bias' charges into defaulting to the Republican point of view- and now many are calling them on their shoddy journalism. And the more moderate, politically triangulating Democrats are upset as well because they find that pandering to the right-of-center is costing them their base. It would certainly be foolish for politically concerned internet-ers to purposely sink viable candidates, but is definitely right to take them to task for foolish stances and demand they show backbone on key issues. The fact that Democrats haven't done this on their own is why they've been losing elections for the past 5 years.

Polls show consistently that the majority of Americans are liberal on many issues (concerned about civil liberties, want sensible foreign policy, are pro-choice, want strong environmental protections, etc), but are disenchanted with Democrats who seem wishy-washy. It's a testament to how strong American support is on these issues that the last two elections were still so close. Present the people with a strong, principled Democrat and he will win- period. That's all bloggers are aiming for.

(*Note: Admittingly there does tend to be a fringe ego-driven faction on some blogs, but that's true on both sides. And it's not typical. Grassroots are important and most bloggers urge sanity. After all, this is a democracy and we all deserve to participate. We've found our tool for doing that- blogs.)