A Liberal Blog?

I have no desire to refight the Tacitus war here, or to contribute to the skirmishes in that war which have taken place at Daily Kos and other locations. Due fairness to the other side, however, mandates some attention to this nonsense.

Atrios professes stupefaction that this study (PDF) lists tacitus.org as a “liberal blog.” Of course, had he read the study in question, he’d see that its timeframe was the couple of months leading up to the November 2004 election: a period in which I was posting almost exclusively at Red State, and this site was, even to my mind, overrun with leftist commentary. Indeed, it’s one reason I decided to take the place back.

I’m not going to hold my breath that Duncan Black will acknowledge his error — which does, in addition to displaying his own ignorance, also do a disservice to those lefties who sunk a great deal of time and energy, admirable in itself, in this site back them. But I do think it’s worth noting, at the least, the malleability of perception here, and the evidently rather woeful effects on discourse of this manner of pigeonholing. Inasmuch as he has missed out on some allies here, Black is a fool. Inasmuch as Black is indicative of a larger phenomenon, it is even more the political culture that is foolish.

What what what?

Long time readers will recall my obsession with the insipid Bird Dog, premier poster at Tacitus.org during the months of Josh Trevino’s absence. In short, Bird Dog combined an admirable commitment to GOP talking points with a mind singularly incapable of conceiving of an original thought. His posts were both plentiful and terrible, and eventually caused me to drift away from the site. Tacitus never became a liberal blog, but it did become a bad blog during the months that Levin worked at Redstate.org. Tac’s assertion that the blog was liberal during this period is stupefying; I suppose that he must have been reading the same community as I, but at the same time can’t imagine how that is possible.

The Tacitus community has managed to achieve a more bipartisan profile than most other such communities. The cause for this lies primarily with Trevino, his appreciation of some good work coming from the left, and his general unwillingness to adopt Bush administration talking points as conservative first principles. Some on the right think that this means liberal. Nobody with any sense thinks this, however, and assaulting Duncan Black for calling a spade a spade is unbecoming.