[UPDATE It only just occurred to me that being labeled a stalker by David Sirota -- and all because I took umbrage at being told to "slither back to my rathole," with the rest of the Clintonites -- has to be worth some kibble -- especially during the heating season in Zone 5b. You may feed the hamsters at right. Send David Sirota a message about his meta! Haw. Thanks for the hits, Dave. --lambert]
The least Sirota could do is get his terms straight. He writes:
I've recently become aware that I have a few blog stalkers* - ie. people who spend inordinate amounts of time blogging about how much they hate my writing see [Corrente posts] here [1], here [2], here and here for just a few recent example
Two very short, "quick hit" posts pointing out specific problems, not with Sirota's "writing," but with his content? Now, I don't know what Sirota considers "inordinate" but believe me, I didn't have to invest a lot of time finding problems in the posts I linked to. Nor would I want to spend that time. For those who came in late, here are the posts that Sirota links to:
[1] Sirota's first Corrente link was to VastLeft, who can take care of himself.
[2] Here, I point out that it's weird for Sirota come down like a ton of bricks on a random commenter, just because he (Sirota) spent a whole day with Obama. And now, Sirota repeats the weirdness, except this time he's coming down like a ton of bricks on an obscure C list blogger like me. It was weird then, and it's just as weird now. Can't the man rise above?
Again, I don't "hate" Sirota's "writing." I don't hate anything about Sirota. I can go for days and weeks on end without thinking of Sirota at all. I would like to revert to that happy condition as soon as possible.
I mean, sweet Jeebus, here is is, 1:21AM in the morning, and I'm responding to David Sirota. I happen to disagree with some things that Sirota says, and when I do, I blog about them. "Take what you like and leave the rest."
Why all the excitement?
NOTE * See definition #1 of stalker here, and especially the "Note" in paragraph 4. David Letterman has stalkers. Madonna probably has stalkers. David Sirota should be so lucky as to have stalkers.
UPDATE Now, BooMan gets into the act. Well, if BooMan has stalkers, I'm not one of them. I read him if he shows up in SiteMeter.
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Poor Guy
For someone who wants everyone to know who he is (i.e. "why did Obama call me, then?"), he sure is sensitive when people actually notice him. He wants to eat his cake, but have it, too, bless his heart.
EDIT: Actually, it appears he's genuinely loving this attention.
But, we've always been at war with Eastasia...
Lambert a C list blogger?
Only in the same world where Paris Hilton is on the A list every night for at least three club openings and no one even notices that Amanda Plummer is performing in a limited engagement and a few tickets are still available.
Oh and by the way, Lambert, Paul Krugman is stalking you.
about the stimulus and get a life.
That man really needs to STFU
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12...
Wow, lambert.
You're in great company!
Such maturity.
Shorter Sirota: Waaaaaaaaah.
He's becoming more and more irrelevant. Of course, our political discourse is pretty childish as expressed by these types, so I suppose he fits right in.
My three cents
http://www.openleft.com/showComment.do?c...
http://www.openleft.com/showComment.do?c...
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2009/...
I noticed he took out references to The Confluence
They were there earlier. Or maybe later.
Actually, we've never stalked Sirota. Ok, may myiq2xu has once in a while but what do you expect from a guy with his avatar?
Come together at The Confluence
See the Urban Dictionary on "stalking"
See the Urban Dictiionay definition of stalking. We're not stalking Sirota, you're not stalking Sirota, Cannonfire's not stalking Sirota. What we're all doing is typical posting, in the way that the blogosphere has long been accustomed to do.
So, Sirota wants to stigmatize the rough and tumble of the blogosphere as stalking, but that's just a way to tell people to STFU
. And the sequence of bullying ("slither back to your ratholes") followed by STFU
is a well known form of behavior from the primaries -- employed to drive people out of comment threads on Kos during the purge, for example. So I'm surprised, or not, that Sirota adopts that tactic here. It's not going to work, of course, because we're impervious.
Now, I can't answer for the email Sirota's getting; there may well be stalkers in his email, I just have no way to tell. But a couple three posts that got under Sirota's think skin, stalking? Hilarity.
"First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win." -- Mahatma Gandhi
I never even go to OpenLeft
unless there is some self-parody by Chris Bowers.
David Sirota is trying to provoke us to respond. I've said my peace and have no intention of engaging him. It's impossible to have a discussion with a person who wants to monopolize the conversation.
Come together at The Confluence
I go to OpenLeft all the time
And I disagree with your characterization of Chris Bowers -- I went there to read both Stoller and Bowers, and that's why laboriously panning for gold in Sirota's stuff is such a change and such a disappointment.
I attacked both Bowers and Stoller pretty thoroughly when I disagreed with them -- and to their great credit, they responded to the analysis not the snark.
That's what the left needs: We don't have any money, so the tools of analysis and truthtelling really are all we have going for us. Less about who wears what jersey, more about what's right. Truthiness rots everything.
"First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win." -- Mahatma Gandhi
Recollection
About a year ago Sirota had a smart post. I told my son that Sirota is smart, his response was that Sirota doesn't get it and wastes our time.
My son is seldom wrong.
KoshemBos
If these blog critiques are "stalking," I posit most bloggers
are stalkers -- but of the media, politicians, and their intersections. As blogging becomes more visible and important as media criticism, political analysis and watchdogging, even fellow bloggers will be criticized. Which, overall, is very good.
So, embrace the stalking! We're all stalkers now. At least as Sirota used
the wordit, a misuse, imho. Why, with his take on the word, there have been stalkers on the web since very early days.
Look back to Media Whores On Line (still missed!) and a long time media analysis of the invaluable Bob Somerby. Sirota is not yet invaluable and is tending toward MCMer behavior just now. I'm sure he'll get a grip and get over it.
And if he respects language, which is the tool of his trade, he may want to preserve the special power of the term "stalker." It should not be used lightly and ought to be reserved for those who not only follow someone closely, analyze what that person writes, but also does so in a threatening manner. Or even stalks phsically.
Just a suggestion, David (may I call you David?).
In the best of blogospheres, Sirota would not have used the word "stalker" in this way.
*MCMer--Member of the Mainstream Corporate Media
An enormous number of women have been
killed by stalkers. The law enforcement community has been loathe to take it seriously though hopefully, that has change in the ensuing years since the action has been defined. I remember a case of a woman (it's been several years, I have no link) who had a guy who was going so far as to sleep on her porch at night and made sneaking out of her house at odd times and gunning her car out the drive way to go to work the order of her life. The local police characterized the guy as being "smitten" with her and did nothing. Eventually, he killed her. That's stalking. Showing up at someone's workplace and compromising their job is stalking. Calling someone's phone over and over again until they are compelled to change their number is stalking.
Sirota and Booman co-opting the terror people in those circumstances feel to complain about Lambert, Cannon and VastLeft writing critical blogposts about him is just fucking preposterous. The point of stalking online, I would think, would be shut to forcibly silence the deviant voice. Obama won, so that makes the complainers here representative of the majority voice within the liberal blogoshere. Attacking the deviant voice as the stalker voice when the majority has the megaphone firmly in hand is an ugly thing to do.
On a side note, I just want to say co-opting words like "stalking" and "rape" (and I know that "rape was not used here) - crimes mainly committed against women and which lead to physical intimidation, injury and too often, death - makes me really uncomfortable. Booman and Sirota are not worried about Lambert or VastLeft showing up and killing them and if they are, they're too fucking deranged for even the internet. This just strikes me as men engaging in really ugly misogyny.
"Someone needs to point out that elephants produce infinitely more shit than donkeys." Brad Mays
It's really amusing that Booman
considers you stupid precisely because you didn't drink the koolaid.
I think when you've stopped asking questions of a politician and are blindly supporting him, you've become a shill and are not a political blogger.
Cripes.
Labeling you as "blog-stalkers"?
That's just craaazy.
(And I say that as a licensed psychotherapist, btw.)
Reporter to Mahatma Gandhi: What do you think of Western Civilization?
Gandhi to reporter: I think it would be a good idea.
" blogging about how much they hate my writing . . ."
Apparently someone stepped on Sirota's ego.
Ouch!
So, you know, it's not like it's his fault for having a big sore overly-inflated one, is it?
We better treat his writing ego waaay more nicely (via STFU
) or he'll hold his breath till he turns purple and dies and then it will all be our fault and we'll be sorry and learn our lesson but it will be too late.
[INSERT FROWNIE-FACE HERE]
Reporter to Mahatma Gandhi: What do you think of Western Civilization?
Gandhi to reporter: I think it would be a good idea.
Actually, what I hated...
... was that Sirota pulled rank on snark from a random commenter by saying he spent a whole day with Obama. It was like responding to a spitball with a bazooka. And then he went and did the same thing again on a larger scale!
Not to start this whole dicussion over again...
"First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win." -- Mahatma Gandhi