inside baseball-- on the myth of "doing well while doing good"

I call this post "inside baseball" because it's about blogger/"netroots" scuttlebutt and insider issues. I try to stay out of this crap normally because, frankly, for most people it's not that interesting, but I had to say something here.

Most of us starry-eyed idealists have a cause that we believe in, a vision of "the greater good" to which we commit ourselves, be it religious, political, social, or all 3. We join together in common cause and form movements to change society for the better. Some of us, however, get too wrapped up in, say, personal ambition and the desire for "fame" in whatever size circle that may be along the way, and it almost inevitably comes at odds with the work we originally set out to do. And for many, myself included, our abilities don't quite match our ambitions. In some cases, such people grow envious of others who have been more successful in the cause, and manage to lose all perspective in seeking to supplant that person instead of working together for the greater good (call this the "Cain and Abel" complex).

And the smarter members of the opposition are always ready to capitalize on it to strike a blow against the whole movement.

Maryscott's "cry me a river" act has been needing calling out for a long time. MLW gets way more traffic than a lot of sites, and is quite successful for what it is (i.e., a political blog). That being said, it will never be near the size of dKos because Maryscott and the writers there got hung up on their cliquish condescension of all bigger, less ideologically pure blogs and their needless offending of every demographic that isn't stereotypically "left." In my opinion, the scatterspray tactics and self-centered whining do more harm than good at the end of the day, but hey, it's her blog. Anyway, I'm no fan, but even I never thought she'd actually do this.

I can't imagine that interview going any better for Gibson, FOX News, and conservatism, and all he had to do was let her talk.

And, for the record: if you think Daily Kos is "centrist," you need to get out more.