Daily Kos posted a short item about Green Party U.S. Senate candidate Rebekah Kennedy, who is the only opposition to Democratic Senator Mark Pryor this year in Arkansas. The Daily Kos posting was made at 10:19 am on April 19, and it received 554 comments within the first 25 hours after it was posted.
Some Daily Kos readers have such a knee-jerk dislike of minor parties, many posters claimed that Kennedy is just trying to be a “spoiler”. Other posters repeatedly pointed out that no Republican is running in that race. One poster said that, nevertheless, if Kennedy polls a large share of the vote, that might weaken Pryor so much that Republicans might endanger him in 2014. Some posters indicated they had not even been aware that the U.S. Senate race is between a Green and a Democrat, so the exchange (on a web page with hundreds of thousands of readers) certainly increased awareness of the Arkansas Senate race.
The Daily Kos — the finest in partisan echo-chamber blogs.
So pathetic. Clearly their attitude is in the best of all worlds there would be one choice on the ballot: Democrat.
How dare you do anything but bow at that altar or the boogie man will get you. Pathetic.
The saddest bit is the poster fearing that a large Green vote would weaken the Senator SIX YEARS IN THE FUTURE.
You’d think so-called progressives would be overjoyed. A one on one race like this can only force the Senator to want to appear as progressive as possible and make his record (in the meantime at least) more in line with their stated values.
Clearly partisanship trumps substance with the Kos zombies.
Daily Kos is a scary place. I like the “partisan echo chamber” reference. That is exactly what it is. Basically it’s a locker room or fraternity house where you can commiserate with people who are exactly like you and just want to preach to the choir. As long as you understand that it operates at that level, no problem. Unfortunately, many of the so-called Kossacks think they’re operating at the level of revealed truth, using the “if you’re not with us you’re against us” philosophy. We Greens/Naderites/etc. are not with them, so we are the enemy, period. Even a rather obscure woman from Arkansas who is the only thing standing between Mark Pryor and a Stalinist coronation. If he can’t get reelected under these conditions with at LEAST 70% of the vote, then he’s go problems and they have nothing to do with Rebekah Kennedy or the Green Party.
Don’t run a Green Party candidate even when the incumbent would be UNOPPOSED otherwise. Absolutely hilarious.
I’m a Democrat who’s supporting Kennedy. I think Pryor’s too Conservative. My beliefs trump my party.
If David Gaines is correct about Daily Kos, it sounds a lot like Third Party Watch to me.
Good for you, Obama Chris! The world needs many more independent thinkers like you!
Third Party Watch…….yeah, now that you mention it, it’s kinda like that place. LOL With a bigger budget, a lot more readers, and a whole lot more snarkiness. And no Trotskyists, that I can tell. But yeah, God help you if you post something critical (intelligent or even funny, but critical) about the Libertarians on one of their (far too numerous) threads, or about the Constitution Party on one of their threads. Naderites and Greens are used to being beat up and assaulted so you can say whatever you want on those threads. LOL
The DailyKos/TPW comparisons mystify me.
Libertarians are simply the most numerous and active commentors on TPW. That differs from DKos where you can be banned for not following the party line, doesn’t it?
If Greens (or whoever) are mad that they aren’t represented enough on TPW, then maybe they should do a little bit of party-building or something rather than ripping on the people who are already active.
Nobody said anything about Greens not being represented enough on TPW, and nobody’s ripping on anybody. The site has an undeniable Libertarian Party slant, which should be obvious once you realize that the person who runs the site is a Libertarian. The number of articles about the LP, many of which delve into incredibly detailed arcana about the most minute aspects of intra-LP squabbling, probably equals the number of articles about all the other parties combined, based on my eyeballing.
What I was referring to, essentially, is the tone of the responses on TPW, which is frequently along the lines of what you find at Daily Kos and numerous other places. People frequently hide behind the anonymity of the internet in order to insult each other, toss around inappropriate language, etc. Libertarians are as good at doing that as Democrats are. If you want to see any position to the left of Tom Delay attacked as being “socialist,” combined with a snotty tone and lightly spiced with four-letter words, TPW is a good place to go.
If you want to see rational discourse with a minimum of personal insults, DissidentVoice.org is a good place. Ballot Access News has its moments, too. 😉
Thank you very much, David. It is nice to have some support at times.
Active, Matt? Some of these people, if they are active, are probably tripping over their own feet!