In a quixotic attempt to elevate online political debate, I'm going to experiment with using my blog as a forum for mature political discourse. I hope for submissions from people of all political persuasions. This wouldn't be the place to recycle stale barbs from the left and the right, but it would be an outlet for "people who are passionate about their ideas; prefer thoughtful debate to meaningless sound bites; and are able to recognize the humanity of people who see the world differently. " Hmmm...That sounds like something I wrote a few days ago!
My first thought for a journal title is Politics with Perspective: Your Antidote to the Bile of the Blogosphere. That's too long, but I like it for now.
The ground rules for submissions are simple: Articles must be a minimum of 1,000 words and should not resort to any one liners designed for Air America Radio or Fox News. Beyond that, I would not have the time to do much editing and therefore would post articles as I receive them.
I am typically a fan of brevity; one risk of the 1,000 word minimum is that some articles will be flabby. But that's a risk I'm willing to take. Most topics can be treated in far more than 1,000 words, so I believe the majority of articles would be thought-provoking.
The spiritual forefather of this humble journal is the venerable New Republic, which gives its writers ample space and presents a range of perspectives. TNR has been around 90 years, and its success demonstrates that people really do appreciate thoughtful political writing.
I'm not sure how the mechanics will work yet. I'm envisioning a separate part of the blog dedicated to this journal, while I maintain my random musings in Marcus' World. This is obviously a work in progress, and I will sort out the details soon. In the meantime, I invite everyone reading this to consider writing an article for Politics with Perspective.
It's worth a try -- see my blog for some thoughts: http://tscott.typepad.com/tsp/2005/07/elevating_the_d.html
Posted by: T Scott | July 14, 2005 at 05:27 AM