Conservatives dominate talk radio.  And they dominate the smart half of the blogosphere.

Chief at True North/Freedom Dogs writes, quoting Patrick Ruffini:

The second fact is that conservative blogs, excluding Free Republic/Lucianne/etc. for a moment, serve a fundamentally different audience than the netroots. They’re more elite, focused on policy, and interested in the execution of the war. What was going on when conservative blogs first boomed? 9/11 and the American response to it. And discussions of the size of the conservative blogosphere (strictly defined) should take into account the fact that there are only so many people who can digest the kind of almost-scholarly analysis that happens in places like Power Line, Captain’s Quarters, and Red State. The conservative blogosphere today is what the liberal blogosphere would have been if elite bloggers like Kevin Drum and Matthew Yglesias had remained the dominant voices.This is not meant to be self-congratulatory. In fact, I think it’s probably a serious limitation in the size of our blogosphere, to the extent that’s a concern. If you want to be bigger, you’re not necessarily going to like the people you have to let in to make it happen.

I think Ruffini misses a key point – and a key point that anyone involved in the conservative alternative media should understand in their marrow, instinctively.

Why doesn’t liberal talk radio work?  Because lefties already have the networks, most of the cable news outlets, virtually the entire dead-tree media, and NPR.  They don’t need it – at least, not in the traditional media.  Conservative talk radio filled a niche that had gone begging since the dawn of the big political split; a place for the conservative id to come out and shout and throw things, in a way they couldn’t do at their jobs and in their homes.

But while the traditional media are liberal, they are also very top-down.  Their “gatekeepers” keep the unwashed rabble – even their own – from getting on the air or into print.  So the Sorosphere – the Kos Kidz and Atrios and Democrat Underground and Jesus General – are to the left what Michael Savage is to the right; a place for the nattering, madding horde to gather and vent. 

In the meantime, the conservative blogosphere fills a role, too, in the hands of the likes of Powerline and Ed and Michelle Malkin; an outlet for our best and brightest, which outflanks the traditional media that had frozen them out for so long. 

Ruffini:

 If and when that were to happen, the elite flavor of many leading conservative blogs today would give way to more freewheeling Daily Kos and Free Republic-like sites and comment areas.

Maybe – if there were a need for such a thing.

A need, I suggest, that does not exist. 

Chief, quoting Ruffini:

Finally and here is the larger point that I agree with Ruffini on is “if you want to start a new blog that will get read, your best bet is 1) obsessively cover 2008 and be good at it, and 2) fill a niche, especially one covering local politics True North will do just this. Bookmark us and keep coming back. I also think conservative blogosphere has misread the marketplace. To make a wild overgeneralization here, policy is boring and politics is interesting. By blogging about policy, you choose to be boring (and that’s ok). There is probably a much bigger marketplace for people focused on elections, especially in even numbered years.

Policy is boring (unless John LaPlante is writing about it); but politics is connected to the pocketbook and the future of this nation; it’s something people get emotionally involved with. 

And the emotional involvement is what people tune in, or click your link, for.

This entry was posted by by Mitch Berg on Tuesday, September 11th, 2007 at 3:43 am and is filed under Blogs, Campaign '08. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.