Bloggasm

Drew Vogel: My name is Drew Vogel, and I’m a recent law school graduate living in South Jersey. Terminus started out as a more or less exclusively political blog, but I gradually began incorporating movie reviews and such, and now politics is just one topic that gets covered. Lately, Terminus has gone in some unusual directions (incorporating weird participation games to drum up comments from my friends), but the political angle is still there.

Simon Owens: Which conservative bloggers do you think create the most spin? And if you had to pick a conservative blogger to label a worthy adversary, which blogger would that be?

DV: I’m not sure conservatie bloggers, by and large, create a lot of spin. I think conservative bloggers tend to be highly reactive to the spin that comes out of Washington. In general, I think that conservative blogs function to amplify whatever comes out of the GOP spin-machine and transmit it to a new audience. Of course, there are a few conservative blogs that are so influential (at least, within the blogosphere), that they do create a lot of spin, and I think Glenn Reynolds is the ultimate example of that. Of course, he mainly just links to something someone else wrote and elevates it to the status of spin. In a way, he’s like the editor of the conservative blogosphere. Thousands of people are submitting unsolicited blog posts into the “slushpile” in the hopes that Reynolds will see one and link to it, thus bringing it to the attention of a vast new audience.

And as far as choosing a “worthy adversary”, I’m not really interested. When I’m writing about politics, I tend to have one or another particular friend of mine in mind, and I write to them. Most of my friends are, to a greater or lesser extent, liberal, and we all tend to agree with each other on most things. But I have a couple friends who are pro-life, so I think about them whenever I write about abortion. I have a friend who’s a creationist, so I think about him whenever I talk about evolution. I have friends who votes Republican, so I thought about them whenever I blogged about Kerry. I think there are good and bad aspects to that approach. I think people who are really jacked into the the world of political blogging probably feel like they’re in Kindergarten when they read my blog, because I tend to explain things that anyone who reads Eschaton or Daily Kos would already know. And the people who really might be persuaded by my posts are, for the most part, people who don’t actually care about politics in the first place.

I’ve tried picking an adversary blog before, and it hasn’t worked out. But I have often toyed with the idea of starting an anonymous anti-Terminus blog which would consist of nothing but explanations why every single post I write is wrong. The joke would probably wear thin pretty quickly, though.

SO: Many conservative pundits have pointed out that many hollywood film-makers tend to be more liberal. Why do you think this is? Do you think that stars should use their power to push their politics?

DV: I think Hollywood types tend to be liberal for whatever reason that artistic types tend to be liberal, but I’ve never really known why that was either. I don’t know, I guess I could come up with some kind of self-serving nonsense about how, as an actor, you have to be able to sympathize with every character you play by focusing on the things that we all have in common, while conservatism for decades has been almost exclusively about exploiting people’s differences. I don’t really think that’s the answer, but perhaps it’s a start.

And should stars use their power to push their politics? Of course they should. Every day. And I’m talking about Bruce Willis as much as I’m talking about Susan Sarandon. I use my power to push my politics because politics are important to me, and I honestly believe that the world could be a better place if only more people agreed with me. But I haven’t got any power. I’m just a small-time blogger with a couple hundred hits per day. But if I was a big time celebrity,
then maybe I could get people to listen. Why shouldn’t I? Who came up with this stupid rule that, if people want to listen to you, it is therefore wrong for you to speak? Rosie O’Donnell was once standing outside of day care picking up her kid, and a bunch of reporters asked her what she thought of the Iraq War. She told them. Then one journalist said “You’re just a celebrity, why should we care what you think?” and she said something like “All of those non-celebrity mothers over there agree with me, but you’re not asking them…” That’s the whole thing, right there. If some journalist came up to me and said “Drew, what do you think about the Iraq War?” I’d tell them. Wouldn’t you? Why shouldn’t Rosie O’Donnell?

SO: Out of all the political (fictional) television shows out there, which is your favorite?

DV: The West Wing. Please, is that even a question? Although I like the show for the writing and the acting, not really for the politics. I thnk it frequently gets the politics badly wrong. Sometimes, it will give an issue an amazingly thorough discussion. Other times, it cuts corners egregiously. And far more often than you’d expect of a supposedly “liberal” show, it lets the conservative arguments win by having Sam or Toby or Josh suddenly turn stupid at a crucial moment in a debate.

SO: What are the five blogs everyone should be reading (besides your own)?

DV: Five blogs? Elisha Cuthbert’s, definitely, because she is a really hot woman who loves hockey. Is there anything better than that? Seriously, though, Talking Points Memo, Atrios and Daily Kos. If you’re not reading those, you don’t know what’s going on. And Liberal Oasis. It’s almost depressing to read that blog, becasue Bill Scher explains exactly what Democrats need to do to do, and they never do it. It’s heartbreaking.

And seriously, everyone should not be reading my blog. There are better things for you to be doing with your time. Like, for instance, running Google Images searches for Kirsten Dunst, Monica Belluci, and Scarlet Johansson, and following them to my blog.