May 16, 2004
A Modest Proposal II
An established blogger responds:
Invisible blogger. Provocative. Funny --the eat your
babies aside-- but isn't [Instapundit] already doing it to a
great degree, the rest of us less so?
[Regards]
Dear blogger,
First, let me express my deep appreciation for your intellectual and political contributions to our country. Your blog is one of a handful which I visit just about every day. I wish you were syndicated here in New Orleans as I would add you to my listening day (which includes at the moment Neal Boortz, Rush Limbaugh, and Sean Hannity, plus several very provocative local talents).
Let's see.
Eat your babies: I'm not sure you caught my reference to the original "A Modest Proposal", written by Jonathan Swift in 1729 (here is a link).
Instapundit: one of the funny parts of being a blogger is that I wish I had a keystroke combination (Control-I?) that would simply insert the text: "Hat tip Instapundit". I mean, why link to an interesting blog entry when a) you found that link at Instapundit, or b) that link will eventually be at Instapundit anyway?
That aside, I am not sure how many loyal readers Glenn has (let's say loyal is three significant viewings a week)? 100,000? 500,000? 1,000,000? My point is that those million are the converted, the "choir" in my essay. I am asking the converted to take a moment to turn around and engage a convertable. Someone who, like my friend Tom, is engaging himself in the political process, has heartfelt beliefs about how America and the world should be, but does not (yet) see how distorted his view of the world is when seen through the eyes of Big Media.
I have two goals. One is quite simple: increase Bush's base over the summer. He MUST win (I actually think he'll win in a landslide, but one cannot assume that). A Ketchup win would be mind-bogglingly devastating to the United States.
If each converted converts just one convertable, you've just doubled the converted base. Waiting passively for a convertable to stumble upon Instapundit (or Hewitt, or Boortz, or Vodkapundit, or Buzzmachine, or Command Post, or ...) is simply an unacceptably low conversion rate. They may even stumble onto a great blog, stay a minute, say to themselves, this place sure is cool, and surf out minutes later, unconverted. Give the choir their marching orders: get off your butt, pick JUST ONE interesting friend or relative, and ENGAGE them.
Goal two is to create a significant small-l libertarian contingent (aside: why not Large-L Libertarianism? Transparent borders and isolationism went out the window on 9/11). This goal does not have the immediate urgency of the first goal. Many may eventually see the Big Media poison for what it is and remain Republican, Democrat, or Independent (although to see Big Media unveiled and remain a Democrat seems largely anathema).
Americans desperately need a third party. I call it the "two-body problem". It is borrowed from astrophysics' classical "three-body problem", where predicting the orbital paths of three significantly massed planets becomes intractable very quickly (Caution ahead! I am not an astrophysicist, nor have I played one on TV). Any one of those planets may be slingshotted out of the system by the combined gravitational pull of the other two by a mere quirk of alignment. To astrophysicists, there is no two-body problem. Two planets will orbit each forever until an outside gravitational force is introduced, no matter the size of either planet.
In American politics, having two parties is poisoning our democracy (that and the 17th amendment). No matter what a Democrat says, the Democratic "planet" is in no danger whatsoever of being slingshotted out of our political solar system. The Democratic party may shrink (until saner heads prevail), but it will continue to exist as a force forever. Enter a significant third party, and the partisan dementia being uttered by John Kerry, Ted Kennedy, Robert Byrd, and Al Sharpton will have to cease (so long as Democratic party heads demonstrate any sense at all). To not do so would threaten not just their significance, but their very existence. Ahhh, one can only dream.
I really could go on quite a bit longer, but I will stop here. Thank you for your indulging me in this rather lengthy reply. Keep up the good work!
Invisible Pundit (for now)