Blogging and Dirty Tricks

This may be the first "blogging" scandal. World Net Daily is reporting that Watchblog scooped Drudge on the current John Kerry scandal. They also noted that Watchblog was run by Wesley Clark blogger Cameron Barrett. While running this down I found the following complaint concerning Barrett and Watchblog:

Last August, I joined Watchblog, a group blog put together by left-winger Cameron Barrett that was supposed to represent the two major points of view on the 2004 election, and put out a call for other moderates and conservatives to join up. I was warned that Barrett's politics are pretty extreme, but I decided "hey, what's the worst thing that could happen?" and did it anyway. So I've just found out what can happen.

Barrett morphed the blog into a tri-partisan effort and then ran off to join the Wesley Clark campaign as captive blogger (no doubt thanks to his freshly-minted political credentials) and left the keys to the Watchblog in the hands of fairly loopy Green Party weirdo named David Remer. Remer promptly kicked one of the regular Republicans off the blog, and when the other two complained about it, he kicked us off too. That left him with no Republican voices so he started a stealth campaign to back-fill the blog, making no public announcement of the massacre. My posts are still up on the blog, and you would get the impression that I'm still posting there and that I endorse it.

Well, I'm not and I don't. I've asked for my posts to be removed, and I want to encourage Republicans to boycott Watchblog. The basic setup is to give two-thirds of the space to a group of Republican-haters who post as both Democrats and Third Party (that means "Green Party" really) members, so they can drown out the Republicans with the same stuff. This is no way to run a group blog, a political blog, or any other kind of blog that claims to offer a fair and balanced perspective.

Friends don't let friends support Watchblog.

BTW, it's kind of interesting in a coincidental way that the Clark campaign has fallen prey to the same kind of heavy-handedness that's destroyed Watchblog. Just a coincidence, I'm sure.

Drudge noted that the story was coming out of the Clark camp.

In an off-the-record conversation with a dozen reporters earlier this week, General Wesley Clark plainly stated: "Kerry will implode over an intern issue." [Three reporters in attendance confirm Clark made the startling comments.]

Does this prove that there are dirty tricks being practiced by Lehane and company? No. But something sure smells rotten in Little Rock.

Comments

[ESC]

Just for the record. The only scandal here is that Drudge claimed an exclusive that wasn't his -- but that's so commonplace you can't really call it a scandal. I was one of the original editors at Watchblog. Barrett abandoned Watchblog, just as Mossback's Progress said he did -- and has not had anything to do with Watchblog since joining the Clark campaign with one exception -- the blog is on one of his servers. Despite repeated attempts by Watchblog's remaining editors to move it to a new server. The blogger behind Mossback's Progress isn't painting an accurate picture of what happened at Watchblog after Cameron left. The discourse on the blog -- as with many a group endeavor -- had deteriorated into name calling and constant flame wars, to put it mildly. The blog turned into a pissing match between those who refused to give anyone else the last word. The "weirdo" MP mentions stepped in and set up some ground rules to try to keep the blog focused on Campaign 2004. The Republican editor mentioned above was not "kicked off" because he was a Republican. He was given repeated chances to play by the rules: don't post obvious drunken rants, don't troll bait, don't constantly attack other's opinions. It came down to a simple choice: let the inmates run the asylum, or have someone take a leadership role and establish some standards for a group as opinionated -- and egocentric -- as a bunch of political writers. If not for David Remer's efforts, Watchblog would have died -- and should have given what it was becoming. Just didn't want such a biased portrayal to stand uncorrected.