Kos: "We Are in the Mainstream of America"

Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, known to webbies and the folks here in Chicago simply as Kos, doesn't have a direct connection to YearlyKos. Though the event bears his name, it was started by followers of his website, DailyKos.

Because of his high-profile spats with Bill O'Reilly and others, Kos is often the center of attention on the blogosphere, but he's remained mostly out of sight here at the McCormick Center. In a press conference today — one of his few ventures into the spotlight; a speech tonight will be another — Kos specifically pointed out that the focus is the 1,500 folks in attendance, the "super-engaged activists" that are rapidly changing politics and campaigns.

"This really is democracy in action. This is regular Americans using technology to get engaged in politics," said Kos. Never one for understatement, he continued, "And anybody who attacks that, I think, hates democracy. I think it's that simple."

While fiery rhetoric like that won't keep Kos out of the spotlight for long, what's far more important is opening up the system, he says. "For those who want to engage, [the blogosphere] is the ideal medium. Before, if you wanted to be engaged in politics, you were limited to writing a check, or watching a 30 second political spot, or voting on election. Maybe you got to lick envelopes. Now people are realizing that they have a say in politics." And it's probably most important for those that live in deep red or deep blue states. "[The political establishment] would only pay attention to you is if you were in a battleground district. You had activists nationwide who wanted to engaged, but were shut out of the process." Now, through Politics 2.0, the people are a part of that process.

And the people want change. Asked what he wants to hear from the presidential candidates appearing later today, Kos downplayed the importance of his opinion and his priorities. But he did say, "I want to make sure they understand that there is a hunger for change. And that is not necessarily about working together and bipartisanship. This is about changing the country, taking it in a new direction."

And that's not so radical. "At this moment in time, we are in the mainstream of America on iraq, on health care, on education, go down the list," said Kos. The polls indicate he's right — the country wants out of Iraq, it wants expanded health care, it wants stem cell research and reproductive choice. Maybe the mainstream doesn't want to be associated with Kos and his claims that his opponents hate democracy, but they are far closer to him and the Kossaks than they realize. With the trails being blazed here in Chicago, they can let the power-holders know.

Comments

What about Impeachment?

Posted by: chuck nasmith on 08/04/07 at 7:50 PM Respond

Blogging and Democracy: Redux
.
There is a marvelous passage within a 7/30 New Yorker magazine article regarding the rampant increase in (citizen) journalism that was ascribed to the advent of democracy in the French artist Courbet's epoch.
The Title of the piece is "Painting by Numbers, Gustave Courbet and the making of a master, by Peter Schjeldahl." (link, page 2)

The passage so intriguingly resonates with hundreds of recent op-eds and articles explaining, haranguing or lauding the growth of internet blogging. The passage follows, below:

--"A new means was at hand: journalism. In 1836, Chu writes, Paris's daily newspaper circulation was eighty thousand. By 1870, it topped a million. Publications large and small engendered what the great conservative critic Charles-Augustin Sainte-Beuve called "industrial literature," churned out with "audacity and naïveté" by men "with this single device inscribed on their banner, 'to live by writing.' " Sainte-Beuve saw the development as an inevitable consequence of democracy. He noted, unhappily, that it was in line "with our electoral and industrial customs that everyone may have his page.""--

I found it interesting. Oui? No?

______________________

When Chris Matthews of "Hardball" condescendingly sneers the MSM adopted sobriquet, "These bloggers, they're mostly living in their parent's basements'' it shows to me that he is rattled by the phenomena and sarcasm is his little-minded response.

Posted by: cognitorex on 08/04/07 at 11:01 PM Respond

We're going to turn Chris Matthews into "Vinnie" - heh.

Posted by: Flamethrower on 08/04/07 at 11:52 PM Respond

"...regular Americans using technology to get engaged in politics... anybody who attacks that, I think, hates democracy."

Um, is it okay if I get grumpy about democracy from time-to-time? And I thought our form of government was a republic, anayway...

Main Entry: re·pub·lic
Function: noun
1 : a government having a chief of state who is not a monarch and who in modern times is usually a president; also : a political unit (as a nation) having such a form of government
2 : a government in which supreme power resides in a body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by elected officers and representatives responsible to them and governing according to law; also : a political unit (as a nation) having such a form of government

Posted by: Don Q. on 08/06/07 at 12:01 PM Respond