If you keep telling me that they have marginalized you, I am going to start regarding you as somewhat marginal

Yeah, I get it, ok, I get it, the mainstream media is a bunch of sycophants. The Libby trial illustrated that control over access provides those in power with editorial control over the message. And reporters are cozy with government officials. They go to cocktail parties together. They have a milieu. And this is aptly symbolized by the white house correspondents’ dinner. Ok. I get it. And mainstream pundits, whose roles most closely overlap with those of the bloggers themselves, write under the influence of any number of professional incentives that distort the content. And when they happen to engage the more democratic elements of the blogosphere, they often do so disdainfully. They protect those incentives and the web of power, knowledge, and conventional wisdom those incentives create.
I believe you. Really. You are on to something, internet(s), you totally are on to something. It’s great that you’ve put this all in such sharp relief. It is. I love Digby. I will give my third testicle /ovary from the left for him or her, should the great testicle/ovary harvest of 2007 find him or her one testicle/ovary shy.
But seriously, folks, how big a freakin story is this? I mean, comparatively. This is America, and every single institution is corrupt, why is the media of such central concern to the enterprise of the political blogger?
And let me tell you what is not really great copy, what is sort of less than average in its revolutionary potential – a bunch of stories every week where you identify some half-obscure individual mainstream media figure who happens to engage the blogosphere, or some bloviating moderate, by his or her last name, tell us nothing at all about him or her, link to one more story or column that is just like every other piece of shit they have written, and then complain that their access to the mainstream audience is framing the national debate on some issue in a way that marginalizes a plausible and popular alternative view.
So, like, less of this then:
[Last name of a Guy with a blog I’ve never read but keep seeing everyone link to] absolutely flays [Sort of punditish Guy I’ve Never Heard of]’s most recent column in the [woeful newspaper/blog hybrid] on [name of issue, usually Iraq], illustrating once and for all the fundamentally [word they call you, e.g. unserious/uncivil/unthoughtful] nature of those who would limit political participation to the [opposite of word they call you, e.g. serious, civil, thoughtful].
And more of this:
Anyone who thinks we belong in Iraq another day is fucking crazy, and here’s why: [cogent argument, link to study].
Not there isn’t an awful lot of the latter out there. More please.