Libercontrarian

Crushed between the wheels of capitalism and big government.

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User: underwhelmed

This is The Libercontrarian:

Gun owner. Married. Ex-Navy.

A Christian, but not too sinless. Foul-mouthed, sarcastic, a little self-righteous. Sometimes angry. Jocluar. A bit of a crusader. A great friend. A pretty decent American.


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« We're sending liberals to...  |  Home  |  My letter to Greta »
Thursday, 30 September 2004
Coleman calls us ticks, which ticks me off!

Nick Coleman of Lilek's paper, the Star-Tribune, has some nasty things to say about bloggers in "Blogged Down In Web Fantasy." To paraphrase him, he puts forth the assertion that us bloggers are "ticks" who magically appeared, rendered in flesh (and pajamas) in front of our computers, without another experience in the world to back up our nasty, poorly created, and "instantly Googled" opinions. He says:

"Bloggers are hobby hacks, the Internet version of the sad loners who used to listen to police radios in their bachelor apartments and think they were involved in the world."

I don't know about you folks, but I'm no "hobby hack," and my opinions aren't issued to me by Newsweek, the New York Times, Fox News, CBS, or God Forbid, the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. I'm just a fellow whose opinions came to him as a result of his life experiences - experiences that he had before Nick Coleman ever heard of blogging.

Here's my response in an email to Mr. Coleman:

You said, "So, how is it that nakedly partisan bloggers who make things up left and right are gaining street cred while the mainstream media, which spend a lot of time criticizing themselves, are under attack?"
 
It's because us bloggers, folks who're apparently "not fit to carry a reporter's notebook," "know stuff" as well. Somehow, Mr. Coleman, I managed to have had personal experiences prior to appearing on the internet, much like yourself. I was a graphic designer during the ascension of desktop publishing in the early 1990s, and instantly understood the "mechanical issues" with the CBS forgeries; it amazes me that an organization whose base business is putting words to paper could not call upon the resources of people competent in the mechanical part of that craft to determine that their information was bogus.
 
The alternative was that they didn't care. The producers were looking for a scandal to pin on the President, because they had an agenda. It wasn't simply incompetence; they did not want to find the truth, because they knew that they had already found it when they were handed something that they couldn't be troubled to vet.
 
The public has lost trust in the oligarchies that bring us news. In the ultimate marketplace for ideas that is represented by the internet, the people with the best ideas, not the best friends or the most advertising money, have the capacity to gain readership on matters of opinion. In bringing us facts, the newsroom will always be king as you folks have the capacity to do this; perhaps it is time for editorials to be put to rest, and for news organizations to simply report - the NEWS, in a factual way, without color.
 
Nick Horianopoulos
 
http://libercontrarian.motime.com
 
We'll see how he responds.

posted by: underwhelmed at September 30, 2004 21:00 | link | comments (5) |


Comments:
#1  01 October 2004 - 21:48
 
Thought you might like to see what I had to say to Mr. Coleman.

Here's the post.

Eric
User: ecowper Contact me View user's mediablog ecowper
#2  01 October 2004 - 22:28
 
Eric, your comment was well thought out and excellently written. You made a coherent point, had positive direction in your writing, and came to a logical, fulfilling conclusion.

I didn't.

I'm my own worst critic - AFTER I've written something!
Anonymous
#3  01 October 2004 - 22:51
 
Nick, I have to say that I liked your post too. It was just different. I got inspired to write a long "commentary piece", you wrote a letter to the editor. Have you considered sending it to the editor of the Star Tribune, who knows, you might get published.

Anyhow, I have to say I like your writing, I tend to be long winded, you get right to the point. Keep on trucking brother. Us contrary right-liberpublicans gotta hang together! :-)
User: ecowper Contact me View user's mediablog ecowper
#4  04 October 2004 - 23:52
 
Nick: Thanks for the heads-up re: Coleman. I'm sure that you've seen my response by now but I wanted to swing by and thank you for pointing it out.
User: Jheka Contact me View user's mediablog Jheka
#5  06 October 2004 - 13:26
 
Thanks, Jheka Blitz!
User: underwhelmed Contact me View user's mediablog underwhelmed
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