My guess is that u.s. troops will remain in Iraq _at least_ until the
next Republican administration _after_ the next DP administration --
i.e. 2013 at the earliest, assuming a DP victory in 2008 and an RP
victory in 2112.
Carrol
I am really looking forward to the reaction of the ABB'ers if Hillary
Clinton is the DP candidate in 2008. This might just be a pill too bitter
to swallow. I would like to see Arianna Huffington run on the Green Party
against her after reading her bristling attack on Hillary today. She
certainly wouldn't have trouble either raising money or attention.
NY Times, May 15, 2006
David Carr
Building a Brand With a Blog
WHEN it began a year ago, The Huffington Post seemed like a remarkably bad
idea. The brainchild of Arianna Huffington, the blog was intended to be a
liberal counterpoint to The Drudge Report, featuring an elite list of
Hollywood bloggers Gwyneth Paltrow, Warren Beatty and Diane Keaton, among
others who would share their innermost leanings.
A year later, The Huffington Post has succeeded by failing. The promised
missives from stars never much materialized, but the site is booming,
fueled by rapid-fire news postings and more than 700 bloggers, most of whom
you have never heard of.
The Huffington Post had more than 1.3 million unique visitors last month,
according to Nielsen/NetRatings, and more than 2 million in February.
The site now has deals with Yahoo and AOL, is close to a deal with a video
company, and has been approached by Barry Diller to help build a separate
satiric news and entertainment site.
After investing about $2 million, a fraction of the $50 million it would
take to create a magazine, The Huffington Post has become a well-known,
oft-cited news media brand in the blink of an eye.
It seems that Ms. Huffington, who has taken to social climbing with the
finesse of a ballerina and the ferocity of a fullback, has found finally
found her métier. Nick Denton, founder and publisher of Gawker Media, calls
her "the only establishment figure to make the transition to the Web."
After a zigzag career that included tours as an author, socialite,
political wife, conservative maven, gubernatorial candidate and television
commentator, the glamorous Greek ex-pat known for inspired political
fan-dancing has found traction in a media space better known for rants from
people who rarely leave their basements.
"I am an obsessive, and the Internet rewards obsession," she said, adding
in passing that there is still no Greek word for blog. "We should come up
with a better name for it, but I guess that ship has sailed."
And so it has, taking Ms. Huffington right along with it. Last Monday
night, she was honored by Time magazine along with Matt Drudge, still the
unchallenged king of the blogosphere as one of America's 100 most
influential people.
AT the party at the Time Warner Center, Ms. Huffington, who has railed
against the war in Iraq, finally had the chance to face off against
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
When she finally had her moment, she asked the secretary of state, "Who
designed your dress?"
Rena Lange, was the secretary's reply. "And who designed yours?"
"Kira Craft. She's a young designer in Los Angeles."
Ms. Huffington's readers, who have grown accustomed to a steady diet of
red-meat attacks on the administration, were livid.
"I tend to agree with your positions, but this is important. You give up
your power as a journalist when you're 'afraid' to ask questions just
because you're at a social function," wrote one poster on the site. "Why,
as a journalist, would you want to socialize with those in power?"
Her readers fail to understand that her air-kissed mastery of social
conventions is how she arrived in the first place. Ms. Huffington, whom I
have watched work the room effortlessly at both political conventions and
Oscar parties, is a celebrity who occasionally functions as a journalist,
someone who throws rocks from deep inside the glass house.
"I don't think she is giving voice to people who didn't have one," said Mr.
Drudge, her foil on the right. "She is crashing the gates of her own home
in Brentwood as far as I can tell. It's not like she is disenfranchised."
But a Brentwood address alone does not push a Web site above the clutter.
Ms. Huffington smartly partnered with Ken Lerer, a former AOL executive who
was convinced that the site could blend straight news and blogging. The duo
hired Jonah Peretti, a viral marketing hotdog who has helped the site's
visibility.
Beyond the bag of Web tricks, Ms. Huffington has introduced the sparkle of
celebrity to the frat-house world of blogging.
In at least one case, she overdelivered, manufacturing a post by George
Clooney (which he quickly disavowed) out of public comments he'd previously
made.
"I tried too hard to speed up his journey to blogging," she blithely explained.
She may have stumbled with Mr. Clooney, but she has sped a lot of other
journeys. The Huffington Post came along at a time when the liberal
penchant for polite discourse was being buried by the unalloyed opinions of
conservatives, who used talk radio and the Web to tilt the playing field in
their favor.
Ms. Huffington put the same kind of megaphone on the left at a time when
the old hallmarks of civility and fairness were no longer prized, and in
this new world, a bit passé.
After just a year, The Huffington Post has worked one end of the political
spectrum to put itself right in the middle of things.
JWT, the advertising agency, has placed ads for several clients on the site
and has invited Ms. Huffington to speak at a huge ad summit in Cannes, France.
"Clients have begun to realize that you can't just play it safe," said Bob
Jeffrey, the chief executive and chairman of JWT Worldwide. "They have to
be willing to look at things that have a point of view."
And part of the reason that her site is doing so well may be simply that
the current administration is not.
"There are a lot of things that are doing well because of the failing of
the Bush administration, and while our country might not be one of them,
The Huffington Post certainly is," said Al Franken, the Air America radio
host and occasional Huffington Post contributor. "Arianna has always tried
a lot of stuff and some of it didn't stick to the wall. This just happened
to come along at a very good time."
