Wednesday, February 18, 2009

There are blogs...

...and then there are blogs like Talking Points Memo, and Glenn Greenwald's blog at Salon.

(Updated with new links.)

Like so many others, this blog is more commentary/broadcast relay - like say, Andrew Sullivan's blog. We don't do any real journalism, apart from occasionally piecing together different perspectives on stories and sometimes finding patterns that might otherwise be unseen. We're also trying to hold truth to power, and trying to keep the truth on record in this post-fact society, especially with a corporate media establishment that is still so hard wired for Republicans that it is hard to tell that they are almost an irrelevant party.

There is HuffPo, but apart from the boots-on-the-ground citizen journalists in the Off the Bus section that ran during the elections, not a whole lot more goes on there other than commentary. But not to devalue that, there are some really smart perspectives and insights in the posts at HuffPo. But again, not much actual truth digging. DailyKos is more activist, but still light on investigation, heavy on commentary.

But then there are blogs that do what so few others do, and they are my two favorite political blogs at this point. TPM, headed up by former attorney Josh Marshall, as I just mentioned, and also the blog by the tenacious and loquacious, Glenn Greenwald, former constitutional lawyer turned journalist.

These guys go above and beyond just providing perspective and commentary on the reporting of the day, they also dig deep and do their own investigations, just like real journalists used to do. TPM has been a rising star these past few years, and are blossoming in to a real journalistic outfit, with a decent sized staff that is ever growing. Even some of their alumni have gone on to prominent gigs, and some not-so-prominent (come back, Greg!). But these guys are getting into some real meaty stuff. Like this nugget that sprung up from looking deeper into that story about the mini-Madoff clown, Sir Stanford.

The forever unapologeticly liberal Glenn Greenwald is also a force to be reckoned with. A good piece of advice is to never debate him unless you are armed to the teeth with facts, and not spin. There are few bloggers or journalists out there who are as well read and well versed in the facts on any topic of interest than Glenn Greenwald. Right now he is doing the hero's work of trying to reclaim America's honor from the Constitution-shredding, immoral, torturing scumbags that were the Bush administration.

So if you are a believer in the truth, and you care about the honor and dignity of the US, but you are not reading TPM and Glenn Greenwald's blog daily, I urge you to do so.



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