b58c200c-2230-4383-8681-bb89c74997e1.jpgI know I've had boatloads of fun mocking wingnut bloggers for being the toenail clippings of the Mighty Wurlitzer, unable do anything but echo the messages that come down to them from on high while liberal blogs organize, raise money, push candidates and issues and create a real force within the Democratic party.  But now it seems that GOP honchos are openly mocking them too, for the very same reasons. 

Says John Linder, member of the House GOP Steering Committee:

"I really don't pay much attention to blogs," he said. "You can say anything on those blogs without any attribution and get away with it."

Liberal blogs have been influential, the Georgia lawmaker acknowledged. But he dismissed their conservative counterparts, saying, "I don't pay any attention to them."

There have been rumors for quite some time that members of the GOP speak privately about what a bunch of useless, embarrassing wankers Malkin, Instahack, the Power Tools, Red State etc. are, so it's amusing to see that they're coming out of the closet about it, so to speak. 

There's also a pretty good article in the Washington Post by Jose Antonio Vargas about how the GOP lags well behind the Dems when it comes to an online presence.  I don't know how much of the abject mediocrity of the right wing blogosphere is attributable to the fact that, as the Post article notes, the authoritarian, top-down ethos of the modern GOP is antithetical to the "often chaotic, bottom-up, user-generated atmosphere of the Internet," and how much can be placed at the feet of a bunch of second-tier minds artificially sustained by wingnut welfare that causes the talent pool to be clogged by enomous, stinking turds floating on the surface and choking out any possibility of quality writing or original thought from rising to the top.

Ah, the great questions of the ages. 

Anyway, people like Erick Erickson are pissed that their leaders are laughing at them.  I get it.  Liberal bloggers are always written off as "vulgar" and "uncivil," but I'd much rather be considered an effective barbarian than a useless tool nobody bothers to read.  Especially for those accustomed to slavering like a bichon frise at the feet of their leadership, that's gotta hurt.

(image courtesy TBogg)