With about 4.5 million page views a month, according to Nielsen, RedState does not attract nearly the traffic of other right-wing blogs like MichelleMalkin.com or Hot Air. But Mr. Erickson said his site fell into a different category, one of advocacy, and he said he measured his influence by the number of Congress members who call his cellphone and the candidates who plead for his attention.
“He has definitely become sort of an arbiter of viability, of your ability to break through, particularly if you’re an insurgent,” said Patrick Ruffini, a Republican strategist and co-founder of the blog The Next Right. “People read Erick as the barometer of the conservative movement.”
