Danny Baseball brings the high heat to Mark Kleiman. Soundbite: Kleiman's beloved rhetorical hobbyhorse is branding as many people on the Right as he can - other bloggers as well as pundits and elected officials - as bigots, liars, and crooks, often by association. He's probably the single blogger most obsessed with a tactic we all use sometimes - and properly so, in some circumstances - but should be extremely cautious about overusing, especially against fellow amateur pundits who don't have the time to cover every issue under the sun: demanding that people on the other side of the spectrum denounce this person or that activity or the other statement.
That's what I'm sayin'! Well, not about Mark Kleiman exclusively, although he did attract my evil eye at one time. But so have Atrios and Jonah Goldberg, so it is a bit of an ongoing issue.
My deeply-thought-through position - I barely have time to write my own blog, and don't have a lot of time left over to tell others how to write theirs. If I disagree with something a fellow blogger posted, I'll let them know; disagreeing with things they haven't posted seems a bit too abstract.
This does not apply to the news media, naturally - they have vastly more resources, are getting paid to do a job, and have a much larger audience. Consequently, their decision to ignore a story means something.
MORE: Jonah Goldberg blows the lid off of the Andrew Sullivan "Will he or won't he" cover-up (later corrected), and presents some thoughts on blogger ethics:
Obviously, there's no binding code of ethics governing the blogosphere and even if there were I doubt it would have anything to say about not linking to articles you've written elsewhere or being obligated to express every significant opinion you have.
Well, yes. You'd be shocked at how many opinions I keep to myself.
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