Over the course of the last decade, the internet has not only revolutionized the way we live and work, it has also transformed the way we vote and get our news. From the scuttlebutt about Governor Sarah Palin’s pregnant daughter to John McCain’s vague grasp of his real-estate holdings, blogs are changing politics as we know it. In the tradition of the classic book "The Boys on the Bus", journalist Eric Boehlert's "Bloggers on the Bus: How the Internet Changed Politics and the Press" (Free Press; May 19, 2009), shows us how the liberal blogosphere -- or "netroots" -- now influences political candidates and campaigns using the 2008 presidential campaign as a dramatic backdrop. The internet has radically changed politics -- from politicians' interactions with their constituents to bloggers' influence on voters.
In "Bloggers on the Bus", Boehlert examines how, at critical junctures during the election, the bloggers, and not the Beltway media, set the agenda. By communicating directly with their audience and involving their readers, bloggers helped democratize the political process by chipping away at the mainstream media’s control over campaign narratives. They infuriated the Republicans along the way by forcing a televised Fox News debate to be canceled, vetting Sarah Palin better than the GOP had, and using technology to outmaneuver John McCain whose party, still in love with AM talk radio, seemed oblivious to the political revolution unfolding online.
Boehlert also reveals the untold stories of the internet activists who have amassed so much power in such a short period of time with so little money or resources behind them. The fascinating characters that populate the liberal blogosphere include: former professional saxophonist and computer parts company owner John Amato who started Crooks and Liars; sixty-something Oakland housewife Mayhill Fowler who joined the Huffington Post as a volunteer journalist and went on to break one of the biggest stories of the Democratic primary -- Barack Obama’s infamous quote about "bitter" residents of small-town America who "cling to guns or religion"; former economics professor Duncan Black who became frustrated when he realized that no one represented his point of view online and so began blogging under the name Atrios in 2002; paralegal Joe Anthony, whose MySpace profile of Barack Obama became an online phenomenon; West Coast blogger Digby, whose gender shocked the male-dominated blogosphere; and the Huffington Post's charismatic celebrity founder Arianna Huffington, whom Boehlert visited at her gated manor in the Brentwood section of Los Angeles.
The popularity of the liberal blogosphere has grown at an extraordinary pace. By late 2008, the readership at the flagship liberal site Daily Kos was roughly equivalent to that of America's most-read newspaper USA Today. Bill Clinton cleared his calendar to host a private, two-hour lunch at his Harlem office with prominent liberal bloggers just prior to his wife’s White House campaign push. The Huffington Post's Sam Stein was called on to ask a question at Barack Obama's first presidential press conference last month. A political and media transformation is unfolding in plain sight.
"Bloggers on the Bus" chronicles how the progressive blogosphere was born, how a ragtag band of activists helped elect a new Congress in 2006 and a new president in 2008, and reveals the extraordinary and lasting role the netroots now play in the media and political rebellion.litical rebellion.
(read less)Over the course of the last decade, the internet has not only revolutionized the way we live and work, it has also transformed the way we vote and get our news. From the scuttlebutt about Governor Sarah Palin’s pregnant daughter to John McCain’s vague grasp of his real-estate holdings, blogs are changing politics as we know it. In the tradition of the classic book "The Boys on the Bus", journalist Eric Boehlert's "Bloggers on the Bus: How the Internet Changed Politics and the Press" (Free...
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