The Partisansphere

Andrew Sullivan, discussing his increasingly team-less position on the Iraq war, expresses dismay at "the notion that our debates have to be about whose side are you on in terms of domestic politics," and laments that "the blogosphere has become more partisan over the last few years, rather than less."

Because part of the point of blogging as a medium is that it empowers the individual. In big media, the pressures of conformity can be as great as they are subtle. At the Boston Globe or the Washington Times, you know what you're getting. How many columnists in the mainstream media can be described as unpredictable in partisan terms? How many "liberal" columnists ever praise the president occasionally? How many conservative ones tear him a new one from time to time? … The reason is subtle pressure from suits and colleagues and readers. But the point of blogging is that it can liberate you from such pressures.

Leaving aside for the moment Sullivan's own considerable contributions to the noxious with-us-or-against-us genre, this strikes me as almost laughably off-track. There is no reason I can see why you'd expect an individual human to be any less "partisan" than a professional newspaper journalist, even those who work on the op-ed page. If you "know what you're getting" at the Boston Globe, then I'll be damned to know how that omniscience translates into predicting such diverse BosGlobbers as Jeff Jacoby, Alex Beam and our own Cathy Young, let alone those who toil on the news and sports desks. I don't doubt for a moment that there is such a thing as "subtle pressure from suits and colleagues and readers," but A) the same pressure -- without the suits, and often without the subtlety -- applies to individual webloggers, and B) it may -- may -- be more difficult to withstand such pressure when you haven't already been doing so for the last 2 or 20 years.

Those who harbored hope that an explosion of new editorial voices would somehow translate into less partisanship seem to me guilty of either ignoring all past leaps forward in publishing technology, or of ascribing to the professional media a partisan agenda -- agenda, not bias -- that does not, despite the joy of repetition, line up with reality.

Comments

[Matt]

How many times has Sullivan praised Bush's policies on anything else (which he used to very vocally support) since the president came out in favor of FMA? 🙂

The fact that Andrew Sullivan is one of the blogosphere's _worst_ examples of exactly the simplistic binary identification problem he describes, brings to mind proverbial expressions about glass houses, pots, and kettles.

If one wants principled arguments to the effect that a party or individual can be right about some issues while being wrong about others, they're easier to find in the blogosphere than in the MSM, for sure. But it's been a long time since they've been seen on andrewsullivan.com.

[Douglas Fletcher]

Mr. Sullivan has been largely unreadable since he had his hissy fit about Bush and the FMA last year. Too bad, up until that point I did enjoy reading his blog a few times a week. Since then I've rarely felt rewarded when I've given his blog another chance. Se la guerre.

[Gary Gunnels]

What's wrong with being "partisan" again?

[gaius marius]

well said, mr welch. but i do think mr sullivan feels around a point which he doesn't quite make.

bloggers are individualists, and without the institutional checks that can (but do not always) force rigor over editorial. that they should be perhaps more partisan for it is not necessary; but they clearly have that latitude.

but i think feedback selects and elevates partisan blogs particularly, and in so doing engineers a more partisan blogosphere. in a webworld of staggering individual informational choice -- in which the gatekeepers may not be dead but are almost hard to find -- people will tend to emotionally construct the "reality" of artificial clarity they wish to see out of questionable information rather than rationally construct the reality of complexity which is most objective out of rigorously checked information.

this would, i posit, serve to give greater circulation to sites like instapundit (to pick one) as they grow less moderate and further divorced from reality -- and probably hurts bloggers (maybe like sullivan) who take a less identifiably "clear" (read: common and vehement) track.

so i think it's more than just a matter of bloggers being the partisan people they are; it's also about the most partisan bloggers (regardless of, maybe antagonistic to rigor) becoming the most widely-read and influential ones.

fwiw, the blogosphere obviously isn't the only place this dynamic plays out. its the supermarket tabloid dynamic, and it has bled over into television news with the cable diaspora.

[Evan Williams]

"What's wrong with being "partisan" again?

The terminology implies a pervasive amount of "blind allegiance" to a certain party; devoid of real principles, and often in conflict with them. Supporting/defending legislation, political actions, or an even a mere argument, not because you really believe in it, but because "your team" does, is not exactly virtuous, especially when it involves a large amount of hypocrisy, as it often does.

On the other hand, from the small-l libertarian POV, partisanship among the major parties can be a blessing, given its propensity to lead to deadlock. Whenever a bill has the term "bipartisan" attached to it, you can be sure that it's pure evil.

On the other other hand, sometimes, too much of this deadlock can lead to a frustration-driven backlash against it, making it easier for the beaurocratic class to tighten its grasp on our lives. We're seeing this in the so-called "nuclear option"; the GOP is pissed that the dems are using the filibuster to block their ambitions, so they want to do away with the filibuster altogether, and make it that much easier for whichever party is in power to do as they please.

On the other other other hand....

[drf]

it's simple, Evan: on the other hand, Kerry would have been much much worse. and the Norelco is imported. it costs MUCH more.

[norbizness]

I can't take time out of my busy schedule in mounting a "paralyzing, pseudo-clever, morally nihilist fifth column" schedule to read the latest tripe from Andy.

[joe]

Does anyone find it strange that hawks' denuciations of Sullivan's heresy always involve some sort of reference to his sexual orientation? "He's just pissy because of the FMA" wink wink.

Me, I don't find that strange at all.

[Todd Fletcher]

joe, if you read Sullivan you'd know that the charge is totally on the money. Before that he was so pro-war he'd make Krauthammer blush.

[joe]

First, I do read andrewsullivan.com

Second, Sullivan is still pro-war, regularly congratulates Bush for beginning it, and complains that it is not being fought vigorously and competently enough for his liking.

Third, a number of events that could have influenced one's view of the war took place during 2004 - Abu Ghraib broke, the insurgency went from cells of 5 to battallions of 1000, an assault on Falluja was orderred, begun, then cancalled, then carried out, etc etc etc.

Yet why do people suppose Sullivan is dissatisfied with the conduct of the war? The 1400 dead Americans? The loss of moral authority from the torture scandals? The looting of weapons sites? The complete absence of chem/bio/atomic weapons? Uh, no, it's because Bush came out in favor of the FMA, and Sullivan, you know, you know, heh.

[Gary Gunnels]

Evan Williams,

It seems to me that its often used as a means to attack folks who stick to their ideological guns.

[Brian]

Andy's a world-class flake. Although he does careen uncontrollably into something insightful every once in a while. I like the Dubya as Bismarck thing he came up with around the convention.

Blogs are like talk radio: echo chamber and astroturf. But not as boring and stupid as talk radio.

[thoreau]

Partisanship maybe inevitable, and it is of course every blogger's inalienable right to be as partisan as he or she wishes. But partisanship can potentially undermine the powerful advantages enjoyed by a system of distributed information and expertise.

The basic idea is similar to how markets can predict weather, even though no individual can know with any real certainty whether the Florida orange crop will suffer an early cold snap. Each individual has a tiny amount of information and a large amount of noise. If the noise is uncorrelated, then the collective result is that the noise cancels and the information remains. But if the noise is also correlated, then it adds up and drowns out the signal.

Blind allegiance to party is a form of noise. Knowledge of proportional fonts is a form of signal. If blind allegiance overtakes independent thought in too many bloggers, then they won't be able to produce a collective consensus the next time distributed expertise on fonts, typewriters, military jargon, etc. is needed (or in any other situation where distributed expertise can punch big holes in something). Instead they will be self-organized into a handful of camps giving predictable responses.

[Eric the .5b]

Joe is somewhat right.

Sullivan didn't change his support for the war after Bush's endorsement of the FMA - he just lost any support for or confidence in Bush, including his conduct of the war. Before that point, he would lean optimistic on many aspects of the war. After that point, he leaned more pessimistic. He just felt (very, very reasonably) betrayed by Bush.

It's not a matter of "then there was the FMA, and you know, heheh." It's a matter of Sullivan being a booster of Bush and the Republican party and defending them to mostly liberal gays because he believes in conservatism and really thought Bush was better than that. And, after he takes tons of abuse from left-leaners (including the odd, mysteriously inoffensive to liberals, homophobic bash by straight leftists), then Bush throws his support to a declaration that people like Sullivan mustn't be allowed to marry those they love.

And Sullivan has to stop and go, "The hell?", (or whatever Brits say). He thought Bush was better than that, and he wasn't. This tore out confidence he had in everything else Bush said and did. It certainly tore into what little I have.

And anyone who smirked at or berated Sullivan for this was, indeed, being the prototypical homophobic conservative asshat. The sniggering fellows on the other side were just being generic liberal asshats...

[Eric the .5b]

And WRT Sullivan's infamous September 2001 "fifth column" remark directed at the "decadent left" that was already organizing protest rallies to oppose the war even as the Manhattan had a thick cloud of smoke, cement, and human ashes floating over it...

Well, big, hairy deal. I supported the Iraq invasion, but I saw opposition to it as rational and opponents of it as people worth listening to. But when I know someone opposed any military response to 9/11 or, in particular, invading Afghanistan when the Taliban would not turn over ObL, I know s/he's simply not worth listening to.

Of course, being a libertarian, I learned very quickly that month that such a useful, disqualifying opinion wasn't confined to leftists or statists.

[David T]

Gary: The problem with partisanship is that it is *not* the same thing as philosophical consistency. A conservative Republican blogger who is "too partisan" (not "too Republican") fails to criticize Bush even when he does something bad from the conservative point of view. Same thing with a liberal Democratic blogger during the 2004 campaign who would not criticize Kerry (even when Kerry was saying things objectionable from a liberal viewpoint) for fear that to do so " will provide the Republicans with ammunition."

Of course, philosophical consistency may have its own problems, at least where the philosophy in question is defective 🙂 But the point is that partisanship cannot even be defended on the grounds of philsophical consistency.

[gaius marius]

The basic idea is similar to how markets can predict weather, even though no individual can know with any real certainty whether the Florida orange crop will suffer an early cold snap. Each individual has a tiny amount of information and a large amount of noise. If the noise is uncorrelated, then the collective result is that the noise cancels and the information remains. But if the noise is also correlated, then it adds up and drowns out the signal.

mr thoreau, are you suggesting that markets are crystal balls? i think that this cannot be what you really mean. markets don't prophecize. they have zero insight into the future, and precious little on the present.

if we take your analogy (which is standard, i know -- and is pirated from the rousseauian calculation of the general will, imo...) the fundamental assumption is that there is underlying "hidden" rational signal which is "truth".

i submit to you that, among other assumptions in emt, this clearly isn't valid -- the underlying signal is usually just delusional bullshit, eg "google is more valuable than most third world countries" -- which may be the widely held opinion of a large gang of sheep who want to get rich quick, but is the assessment of no rational operator and certainly has no probability of being truth.

what little rationality that exists in the market is diminishingly small next to its emotional and manipulative components.

fwiw, efficient markets theory and its progeny should have been laughed off as a theory long ago -- and would have been if the study of economics was a science. markets are inefficient, irrational and behavioral, and always have been. pretending that they respond to something other than crowd behavior is a bit silly, imo, and even dangerous.

in this way, however, i agree that the blogosphere can behave very much like a market of blogs.

[thoreau]

mr thoreau, are you suggesting that markets are crystal balls? i think that this cannot be what you really mean. markets don't prophecize. they have zero insight into the future, and precious little on the present.

Markets aren't crystal balls. They can't create information out of thin air. However, in some cases markets can efficiently collect and process the information that is out there.

My main point was not to worship markets as infallible information processing machines. Rather, it was that factionalism and blind allegiance can undermine the power of distributed information-processing systems. To whatever extent the blogosphere can provide good fact-checking and ferret out stories, that ability is undermined when blind factionalism rears its ugly head.

I would think that you'd be sympathetic to my notion that blind factional allegiance is disruptive to the efficient operation of institutions in a free society.

[gaius marius]

I would think that you'd be sympathetic to my notion that blind factional allegiance is disruptive to the efficient operation of institutions in a free society.

you're quite right -- i am, mr thoreau.