bloggers v. mendacious bastards

I'm pretty sure Matthew Taylor - outgoing Downing Street strategy advisor - didn't quite mean what he seems to say here..

"What is the big breakthrough, in terms of politics, on the web in the last few years? It's basically blogs which are, generally speaking, hostile and, generally speaking, basically see their job as every day exposing how venal, stupid, mendacious politicians are."

.. which is that politicians are venal, stupid and mendacious and it's hard work when people keep pointing it out.

It's a story worth reading for how the centre likes to dictate terms to the margin: only the centre gets to define what counts as "mature discourse": the question of "the responsibilities of government and the responsibilities of citizens" is something only government can answer, under the pretence of "empowering" citizens.

Likewise, only the centre gets to decide when a complaint is justified, and when it can be dismissed as the "shrill discourse of demands." The voice of government is balanced, objective and responsible - mainly by defining what those things mean. So claiming that ID cards will help credit card fraud is responsible; pointing out it will do no such thing and that the people who make that argument are frauds or fools is not, regardless of the facts but simply because of who makes the argument.

Foucaultian analysis aside, one quick way to reduce being called a mendacious bastard is to stop being a mendacious bastard. Abuse wouldn't be quite as popular on the web - in the style of DK, for example - if people didn't feel frustrated enough to imagine that the people on the receiving end deserved some portion of it.

Can rage blogging fuel a crisis in the culture of politics? Yes - but you need to have a crisis to begin with. Blaming bloggers seems a rather convenient excuse when the vast majority are't foaming at the mouth (and when the foam is oftentimes highly justified) and when tabloid newspapers with vastly superior circulations misdirect, plain lie and whip up division on a daily basis. Could it be that a blogger has yet to sway an election?