It’s worthwhile to get yourself involved into a little sweet controversy that can be milked for months or even years.

There seems to be some discussion of Brooks’ motive. Conspiracy? Old-guard defensiveness? Maybe. But look at the number of blog mentions Brooks has gotten since his article. Then reread the column. Rabid attack lambs? Kos as Tom Delay? Isn’t the most obvious motive simple commercial self-promotion?

With Kos hyped to the heavens, why not call-out the poster boy of progressive bloggers (and his little lambs, too)? What’s his apparent sin again? A minor hypocritical lack of transparency? Perfect. If by chance Markos really did screw up, Brooks can pretend he’s a real muckraker. Otherwise, he gets credit for forcing Markos to awkwardly explain how he wasn’t actually trying to shut down conversation on a conflict of interest (ongoing investigation, anyone?). If Markos never answers, Brooks has written the Conservative narrative on Kos.

Right or wrong, Brooks gets plenty of airtime on a hot topic. If the MSM gave out niche awards, Brooks might win “least offensive Neocon apologist” or “most thoughtful mythologizer of the Red State/Blue State distraction.” Is it really surprising he would occasionally yearn to emerge from a nearby phone booth as “Conservative MSM Slayer of Liberal Blogistan!” ? Makes for a wordy costume, but does anyone doubt it’s a growth market? The bonus for Brooks: this is one of the few positions that won’t make him even less popular in the NYT lunch room.

Shouldn’t Markos address his “omerta” request (true or untrue) and move on? Unless this is a first, his interests are best served by being as open as possible, as quickly as possible. He is increasingly perceived as a high-visibility source of power, so he’d better get used to dealing with below-the-belt questions from people who can sustain the MSM noise. Nothing personal, just business.

I don’t know, man, there is so much trenchant analysis and vicious snark that I hardly know where to begin. Enough quotable lines to serve me for months. I felt like a kid in a candy store. Just the finish:

“Whether the grown ups (Peretz, Lieberman, Hillary) actually set the Swiftboat in motion, or just watched approvingly (“Who shall rid us of this meddlesome blogger?”) as their hatchet boys did what comes natural, is almost irrelevant. The important thing to understand is that we have reached the point where the Dinos and their media allies are willing to use Rovian tactics against anyone who challenges their entrenched position—even someone like Kos, who is hardly the second coming of Henry Wallace or George McGovern.

Whether that’s good or bad for the Kossaks I don’t know—I suppose it depends on how much credence you give to Gandhi’s old saw: “First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win.” In the real world—and in imperial America, too—the truth is that sometimes they ignore you, then ridicule you, then fight you and crush you like an overripe eggplant. We’ll see if that’s true this time. Either way, though, it looks like the battle between the netroots and dino Dems is going to get very down and dirty indeed.” …Billmon

But even that seems unlikely. The above-mentioned “winnerism” of Markos is likely the cause. Plus, he hasn’t actually endorsed the guy, right? Whenever Schweitzer makes news I seem to recall Markos making mention of that on the site, as well as Jerome’s writers at MyDD. And Schweitzer has much the same appeal as Warner: a Dem winning in a red state (among other qualifications). If Feingold were to run I’m sure Kos would run it, but wouldn’t get behind him in the same way because I’m sure he sees an electability question there. And if Gore decides to run, my money’s on Kos getting behind him.

Everybody’s saying Friedman, but I think “squadrons of rabid lambs” is much more Noonanesque in its flamboyant silliness.

I think BoBo and the Pegster were out painting the town the night before he filed this baby.

Or is it irresponsible of me to speculate?

Detention for Dangerous Speech …Jack Balkin

“Posner’s main thesis is controversial enough. But in the middle, he offers the following rather surprising statements about the First Amendment:” …Jack Balkin

“Throughout American history, states and the federal government have criminalized speech that advocates the violent overthrow of the United States government and other subversive activities. These laws, which long survived judicial scrutiny, authorized criminal punishment of people who were dangerous but hadn’t actually caused harm.” …Posner

“Although in 1969 the Supreme Court held that under the First Amendment governments can ban only speech that would cause “imminent” harm—like incitement to riot—it remains an open question whether this standard is workable in an age of global terrorism exemplified by the Sept. 11 attacks. Less restrictive tests applied in earlier cases could be resurrected if the United States created a similar statute to counter the modern wave of terrorism.” …Posner

With Alito & Roberts on the court, and Eugene Debs & Emma Goldman as precedents for what might be considered “dangerous speech”;with the expansive powers granted the Executive and unknown degrees of surveillance…well, I say no more.

Ok, I say more:The MSM is giving support to the notion that the left side of the blog commentariat is an uncontrolled violent rabble. Are we close to the Bush administration dragging Kos and Atrios off to Gitmo, with the full support of the MSM? Remember blogs ain’t “real journalism”, and aren’t protected by the 1st.

How close? An attack on Iran or nuke in Chicago or another very narrow election close? Who knows?

It’s imaginable that he and his ilk consider the blogosphere, blogtopia, left blogistan, whatever, to be no more than the fever dream of one skinny Salvadoran kid of Greek ancestry, which a gust of disdain from the New York Times could disperse into a cloud of dust.

Come November, though, such rabble-rousers as Kos and Atrios will again have raised millions of dollars for progressive candidates. Funny how that works. Like-minded people working together, never giving up.

That’s perhaps the biggest challenge to the op-ed pundit parade: the tacit acknowledgement online (through links and comments) that there are people smarter or more eloquent or with greater access to information than you.

It’s an overused quotation, but I think we’re past ‘then they laugh at you’ and are now seeing ‘then they fight you’.

Chris Nolan and Jesse Kornbluth and the like think Markos is just blowing smoke when he says that it’s not about him, or that it ultimately doesn’t matter whether the punditocracy trashes, praises or ignores. But he isn’t, it isn’t, and it doesn’t. In fact Markos is just about the crappiest writer with front page access at DKos. Brooks et al may want it to be about Markos but Markos is just the proprietor, not the institution. The DKos community isn’t going to collapse over a piddly non-story like Jerome’s run-in with the SEC, but even if the orange place gets slammed, there are nearby pubs decorated in yellow, green, purple, various shades of blue, some sort of reddish taupe, and so many other colors besides.