Are the NYT and Adam Nagourney running a hit piece on liberal blogs?

Sounds like it from what we're hearing.

You'll recall that Adam has run a slew of pieces pointing out how the Democratic party is a mess, and our sources tell us that he's now working on a similar piece about the blogs, and his intent is to paint us as crazy, lefty, wingnuts.

Now, first off, Nagourney has a bit of a conflict I hope he plans to disclose in any such article. He's been the target of a parody blog for over a year now - it's called Ad Nags and can be found here. One wonders whether the constant funny, but pointed, barbs from that joke site have in any way biased Nagourney. We would hope not.

If the NYT is going to do a look at blogs, then it needs to go beyond the obvious. The obvious is that there is a perception out there that bloggers are all young inexperienced angry children who work in their pajamas, and they're dangerous dangerous DANGEROUS people to be around. You could write about that perception, but then you'd be writing about a preconception that's incorrect and about something we already know.

In fact, the more interesting story, is that many of the most well-known bloggers on the left and right are lawyers (not that that's a good thing, but you know, does put you a step above some crazy kid) and have other advanced degrees and experience. Markos is a lawyer and former military. Atrios has a PhD in Economics. As for my blog, I've got a law degree and a masters in foreign service from Georgetown, worked in the Senate, the Children's Defense Fund, and the World Bank. Joe in DC has a law degree and was the political director at Handgun Control. Chris in Paris is an international high tech consultant in Europe. We're people with real world experience that kind of kicks ass. And suffice it to say, all of us have far left our 20s behind us.

And as for working in our pajamas, that's an outright lie.

I work in boxer-briefs.

But seriously, the interplay of the blogs and politics is becoming more fascinating by the day. To simply write these articles about how dangerous the blogs are and how everyone is so afraid of them, well, that's sloppy and its sensational and it's something FOX News would do (and has done). We'd expect, and hope, that the paper of record could do a more serious and deeper look at just how successful liberal bloggers and blogs have been, and how the future is pretty amazing if the bloggers and the established politicians can finally get together at full strength.

That's a real article.