Outside the Beltway

While there’s no doubt that major media outlets have far more readership than even the most popular blogs, the latter have the advantage of timeliness. A terrific example is Andrew Sullivan’s article in the Time Magazine that hits the stands today, “Why I’m Rooting for Dean.” It was a provocative idea when he floated it on his blog several days ago. Now that Dean’s campaign has imploded and his chances of getting the nomination only slightly exceed those of Dennis Kucinich, the piece seems bizarre.

Middle East

Andrew Sullivan, Dennis Kucinich, Howard Dean

5 responses to “ADVANTAGE: BLOGS”

Mike Peck

February 2, 2004 at 11:08 am

Why was it less bizarre when he posted it on his blog? My recollection of his argument was that Dean represents the Democrats’ id and he thought it would be salutary for them to get it out of their system now (which they seem to have done anyway).

Also, Sullivan had been flirting with Dean for months for the sole apparent reason that Vermont allows same-sex civil unions.

The advantage of a blog seems to be that once posts fall off the main page they’re usually forgotten.
James Joyner

February 2, 2004 at 11:10 am

Well, when he posted it on his blog, Dean had an excellent chance of actually securing the nomination–so he was at least discussing a real possibility. Now, it’s an argument about a rather unlikely event.
Meryl Yourish

February 2, 2004 at 11:15 am

Yeah, but Time pays a hell of a lot more than blogs.

Bottom line, boys. Bottom line.
James Joyner

February 2, 2004 at 11:25 am

Well, not Sully’s blog!
Josh McClain

February 2, 2004 at 3:42 pm

Is it just me, or is Sullivan’s fascination with Dean grown more bizarre as the days roll on. I’ve seen now three different columns in three different forums over the last two weeks from Sullivan defending or supporting Dean.

And on a seperate note, about the column appearing after it was posting on the blog. Most likely, Sullivan wrote the column the same time that he posted it on the blog. Most columns for weekly newsmags are written far in advance, especially if your not a weekly columnist. Time just hasn’t kept up with the online story. Another case of the weekly news mags playing catch up on a story.

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