Interview with Jane Hamsher: Blogger, Firedoglake.com

Interview with Jane Hamsher: Blogger, <i>Firedoglake.com</i>

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Mother Jones: Who’s doing a better job of using the Internet, Republicans or Democrats?

Jane Hamsher: If backing winners is your metric, [Republicans] fall far short. And they don’t raise any money. My understanding is that the Republican Party is very upset with right-wing bloggers and their inability to form communities, to raise money, to have any kind of cohesive group action. They just exist really as the toenail clippings of the mighty Wurlitzer, endlessly repeating what right-wing talk radio says. And right-wing talk radio has a much more powerful effect than they do.

The strength of the left-wing blogosphere comes from the communities that we’re able to create and those communities exist because we allow comments and we interact with our commenters. It’s very organic and bottom up. The left-wing blogosphere, because there’s no money in it, it’s essentially a meritocracy. You have a bunch of people who are very creative. The threshold for entry is very low. You have a lot of people with a lot to say. It leads to a large talent pool. Contrast that with the right, where they are basically subsidized through wingnut welfare to get online and repeat endlessly what people hear on Rush Limbaugh every day. They’re not great minds, you know? They are keeping really mediocre people as the voice of the right and it’s not inspiring anyone.

MJ: Can a Democrat win without winning over the blogosphere?

JH: The Democrats are still trying to play this Big Tent bullshit over a center that doesn’t exist. As they wake up and smell the coffee, they’ll realize they have to play to the base. The place the base goes to organize, get its opinions, is increasingly online. It may not be everyone, but it’s everyone who are the opinion makers, the people who collect at the water cooler in the office, and everyone wants to know what they’re thinking. They tend to have influence beyond what their numbers would indicate. In this next election cycle, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama probably don’t need the netroots behind them-they just need us not to hate them. Whereas we could be more helpful to the candidacy of a John Edwards or a Bill Richardson or somebody like that. But beyond 2008, they’re going to be dealing with a situation much like the Republicans are. They have a base and they have to be able to speak to them. They won’t be able to marginalize the netroots, because it’s not one blogger-its not Markos, it’s not Atrios-it’s the way the base communicates with each other.

MJ: Do you think that women are adequately represented in the blogosphere?

JH: On the whole, it is men who read blogs. But I think it’s a meritocracy. My blog has a much higher percentage of women readers than any other major blog, and I’ve never found this to be a problem for myself. If your writing is good, they will come. You have to put in the time to figure out how the blogosphere works. If you’re willing to do that, I don’t think being female is any barrier. In fact, I think it’s an advantage at this point. The A-list bloggers are hungry and looking to give exposure to women who write really well. Most of those criticisms of male A-list bloggers shutting out women-I really don’t have any other word to call it except just “bullshit.”

 

More Interviews << >> Politics 2.0 Index

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate