John Fund--Internet Changing Politics
John Fund's piece in the OpinionJournal shows how the internet is changing traditional politics:
The old way of running for office and governing, for that matter, is a thing of the past. It's not just bloggers changing things. Everyone armed with a computer has an army of email buddies just daring errant politicos to "make their day". People aren't as easily jerked around these days nor are they as naive. That's not to say that it's impossible for the American public to be hoodwinked, it's just takes a little bit more sophistication than it once did. And this is where the bloggers take up the slack. Someone out there in the blogosphere will find the truth about any given controversy and they are able to communicate it instantly. Information brokers (the old media) are no longer necessary for those who have access to the Internet, and these days, who doesn't?
Couple the internet with AM radio and you have the most powerful distribution of information ever known to man. It's a virtual Valhalla for information junkies and a nightmare for information brokers and the elitists who use them.
Bloggers received a lot of attention for helping to expose the fake documents backing up Dan Rather's "60 Minutes" story on President Bush and the Texas Air National Guard. But that's only one of the interesting ways in which the Internet is empowering people and shaping political coverage.
Indeed, the real power of bloggers in politics is how they interact with their mainstream media counterparts. Online journalism gives critics of the media a way to talk back, a platform from which to point out bias, hypocrisy and factual errors. And if the criticisms are on target, old-media institutions can't help but take note. That's exactly what just happened in South Dakota's epic Senate race between Minority Leader Tom Daschle and his GOP challenger, John Thune.
The old way of running for office and governing, for that matter, is a thing of the past. It's not just bloggers changing things. Everyone armed with a computer has an army of email buddies just daring errant politicos to "make their day". People aren't as easily jerked around these days nor are they as naive. That's not to say that it's impossible for the American public to be hoodwinked, it's just takes a little bit more sophistication than it once did. And this is where the bloggers take up the slack. Someone out there in the blogosphere will find the truth about any given controversy and they are able to communicate it instantly. Information brokers (the old media) are no longer necessary for those who have access to the Internet, and these days, who doesn't?
Couple the internet with AM radio and you have the most powerful distribution of information ever known to man. It's a virtual Valhalla for information junkies and a nightmare for information brokers and the elitists who use them.
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