GOP’s new favorite website: The Huffington Post

posted at 8:36 pm on May 22, 2009 by Allahpundit
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Understandable yet repulsive. No political site has a greater reach (their traffic dwarfs ours) and, with the possible exception of TPM, no political site is read more avidly by a lefty media that’s already known to consume blogs mainly from their own side of the aisle. If you want to put your message out on the Internet, HuffPo’s the logical megaphone. Never mind that it’s one of the most rabidly liberal sites in America.

Needless to say, the thought of Republican congressmen asking a hard left site for access says all you need to know about how badly conservatives are trailing online right now despite certain people’s best efforts. Ahem.

Arianna Huffington, who co-founded the eponymous site four years ago this month, said that increased Republican engagement “is a reflection of our traffic, our brand, and the fact that we are increasingly seen … as an Internet newspaper, not positioned ideologically in terms of how we cover the news.”…

“HuffPo and [Talking Points Memo] really are the assignment editors for many in the Washington press corps — particularly the cables,” said Brian Rogers, who was a spokesman for Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign. “That’s not just a Republican hack saying it — that’s speaking as a press guy fielding calls and e-mails daily from the MSM that start with, ‘Did you see this thing on Huffington Post?’ They were effective and they wasted a lot of our time.”…

“The reality is that at the end of the day, like them or dislike them, sites like The Huffington Post, Plum Line, Salon, and others can drive news,” said Brad Dayspring, press secretary for Cantor. “For that reason alone, being responsive and even proactive — especially on wedge issues — has become more prevalent as political communications has evolved.”…

Even veterans of the conservative movement seem to want a piece of the liberal blog action.

Grover Norquist, President of Americans for Tax Reform, said that he’s been approached to write for The Huffington Post and intends to do so in the future. It can be useful, he said, as a way to turn the tables on Democrats who claim the Republicans aren’t offering any alternatives to their policy positions.

I’m torn about this. On the one hand, I don’t want to carry water for the GOP by lending them Hot Air’s platform. On the other hand, instead of playing ball with the left-wing press by posting only to the sites they frequent, Republicans could force them to broaden the scope of the sites they read by giving exclusives to righty blogs. Exit question: What’s an insecure blogger to do?

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