Just last night I was, I swear, fondly remembering the Northern Valley Beacon. I mean, its lots of fun to exchange barbs with The Clean Cut Kid and Todd Epp at SDWatch. But they are so reasonable, and what is more, willing to respect people who disagree with them and able to take criticism without falling into hysterics. On occasion they even praise us for things we have written. It helps that Todd and I have almost identical tastes in TV shows. I argue that the conduct of our blog and theirs with respect to one another speaks well of all three.
On the other hand, arguing with reasonable people lacks a certain flair that comes from confronting someone who is always calling you scurrilous and malignant, and that sort of thing. So I missed the Northern Valley Beacon during the months it was successfully hiding under a new blog address.
Now that I have found it again, I notice that a few things have changed. The NVB no longer sports an affiliation with Brown County Democrats. This must surely come as a relief to the latter. It also seems more moderate in tone, at least over all. A casual glance at the May-July archives suggests a pretty strong blog.
But I did notice that Professor Schaff and I, as well as Northern State University, are attacked in one June entry. No doubt he will reach into his bag of nasty adjectives and adverbs if he should reply to this post, but I think that when I have been personally attacked and subject to all manner of innuendo, I have the right to defend myself. Here is the passage relating to us.
Professors Ken Blanchard and Jon Schaff joined the blog and quickly demonstrated that personal attack , insult, and abuse would take precedence over any analysis and discussion of issues. Blanchard and Schaff discovered the Brown County Democrats' web log, the Northern Valley Beacon, and took it upon themselves to systematically misrepresent and falsify the posts. For a period of time, they did this to almost every post. They used partial quotations for which they supplied false contexts, habitually impugned the mental health and competence of the Beacon authors, and degenerated political discussion to a level of scurrility and petty malevolence that was offensive to Democrats and most people who became witness to it. The Northern Valley Beacon was ended to stop the degradation of politics by the bloggers, even though it was a passive target and had no intention of engaging South Dakota Politics or having anything to do with it.
Blanchard and Schaff did not make any attempt to keep their blogging posts on a professional level. They often alluded to the fact that they were Northern professors, which suggested that their efforts had the sanction of the University. Students of theirs who had occasion to visit their offices reported that they seemed to be doing their posting from their University offices at times. When Blanchard used a newspaper column to attack the Northern Valley Beacon and falsified quotations by changing words and putting partial quotations into false contexts, many Democrats complained. A letter pointing out the falsifications was submitted to the newspaper, but the editors declined to offer corrections other than for one of the minor fabrications by Blanchard.
The efforts by the two bloggers carried over into what may well be legitimate and proper political activity by others on the campus. Their failures to observe the standards of discourse required by policy and the general rules of valid debate tainted all political activity on the campus, particularly that in behalf of the Republican Party.
Now I trust that even the most careless reader will notice that Newquist accuses us of engaging in "personal attacks" in the middle of a personal attack on us. Do you wonder why I missed him? As for the substance of the rant-that we systematically misrepresented and falsified their posts, that we used partial quotes and supplied false contexts-here Newquist is simply telling lies. We quoted generously and always supplied a link to the original, so that anyone who chose could look at it and see if we were being fair. And we were posting on a well known blog, so that whatever we wrote could easily be noted and responded to. Newquist slanders us in June from his new and hitherto secret site, and we don't find out about until now. When it comes to responsible blogging, he is utterly clueless.
Finally, he engages in the art of innuendo.
They often alluded to the fact that they were Northern professors, which suggested that their efforts had the sanction of the University. Students of theirs who had occasion to visit their offices reported that they seemed to be doing their posting from their University offices at times.
Note the weasel words suggested, and seemed. This is crude innuendo. And it is an attack that goes well beyond anything we have written to unsubstantiated allegations of misconduct. In all our dealings with the NVB I do not believe we ever alleged that their behavior was suspect. We criticized only what they wrote about us and others.
I don't expect to pay much attention to the NVB. No longer sporting a party affiliation, and virtually ignored by other democratic blogs, it is not much of a target. But from time to time I will look in. Good to find you again, Professor, its been too long.
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