Blogs

The Washington Times' "Inside Politics" feature notes this:

    Blogger power
    "Bloggers received a lot of attention for helping to expose the fake documents backing up Dan Rather's '60 Minutes' story on President Bush and the Texas Air National Guard. But that's only one of the interesting ways in which the Internet is empowering people and shaping political coverage," John Fund writes at www.opinionjournal.com.
    "Indeed, the real power of bloggers in politics is how they interact with their mainstream media counterparts. Online journalism gives critics of the media a way to talk back, a platform from which to point out bias, hypocrisy and factual errors. And if the criticisms are on target, old-media institutions can't help but take note. That's exactly what just happened in South Dakota's epic Senate race between Minority Leader Tom Daschle and his GOP challenger, John Thune," Mr. Fund said.
    "South Dakota Republicans decided that the Sioux Falls Argus Leader, which dominates the state's media since it's the only paper with a statewide circulation, was hopelessly biased in favor of Mr. Daschle. 'The ability to use the Internet to circumvent concentrated media power became a 21st-century updating of 19th-century Dakota populism,' says John Lauck, a history professor at the University of South Dakota who was allied with Mr. Thune.
    "Mr. Lauck and several of his friends collaborated on blogs that constantly reminded voters of contradictions between Mr. Daschle's voting record and his statements in South Dakota, as well as the Argus Leader's refusal to acknowledge them."

A reader noted that I forgot the link to the Fund story entitled "How Daschle Got Blogged"--here it is.