The Blog New World

One thing that I have learned since starting this Blogging thing is there are Blogs that I casually visit and enjoy on a regular basis, but consistently ignore, and do not link to, in my own postings. None of those sites are in my list to the right but they are in my bookmarks. What does this mean?

I think it is forcing me to face up to how much of the entertaining rhetoric I expose myself to daily is actual information I feel confident in. I don't want to pass on, in my name, material that I am reticent to support. And so now I find myself reevaluating some of the Blogs that I have frequented in the past.

Anybody who has read much of my Blog should know by now that I support the war in Iraq. I am far from a Republican or right winger but this is an issue, an important issue, that I frequently address so my following comments are only regarding blogs that share my position on the war.

The brilliance of Blogs, what drew me to them at the expense of MSM, was the no BS factor. If the MSM wants to peddle a questionable stack of old Guard memos, I know Blogs are going to hold their feet to the fire and force them to defend their story. If the MSM wants to convince me that Cindy Sheehan and Al Sharpton are engaged in a solemn and authentic ceremony, Blogs will point out the media circus and artifice of the press event.

But my loyalty isn't to Blogs but to truth. What I have been realizing is that there are Blogs that I frequent that are as eager as the MSM to twist a story, edit a quote, spin an event, do whatever it takes to push their particular worldview. And I read them because I happen to share a position with them on one or two issues. But my loyalty, again, is to the truth and I have to start making choices about who I want to continue to read. If I don't feel comfortable passing something from a particular source along to my readers, why would I waste my time reading it?

Of course everybody has an opinion, has a particular point of view and I'm not concerned about that. In fact I think it is more honest and informative if the writer's biases are known in advance. I am concerned that there are certain sites that are willing to intentionally distort the facts to suit their purposes. They are no better than the MSM that they are so violently opposed to.

There are many changes taking place in the Blogging world right now. I wonder if we are witnessing a demarcation point as we enter a new phase in which the most influential blogs are no longer the independent voices of the past, but the new version of the Main Stream Media. Can that be for the good? Can Blogging maintain its independence?

I said the other day in a comment about Pajama Media that the bloggers there need to check themselves. I'm thinking that I, as a teeny speck in the blogging world and as a reader, need to check them and myself as well.