McEwan

As you may know, Amanda Marcotte and Melissa McEwan have not been fired from the blogging wing of the Edwards campaign. I frankly am indifferent to Marcotte, who blogs at Pandagon, but I am very glad that McEwan, who blogs at Shakespeare's Sister, was not fired. It really is unfortunate that she was caught up in the middle of this, and is a clear instance in which a criticism that can be seen as entirely reasonable (the protest over Marcotte) crossed the line into unreasonable territory. The two are leagues apart; McEwan is in general a thoughtful and constructive thinker. There are posts in which I think it's fairly clear that she failed to match means (style of writing) to end (rational discussion), but there is a considerable distance between occasional lapse and stable habit. Moreover, while Marcotte at most has an occasionally perceptive comment to make, McEwan is regularly insightful, even when I disagree with her. I tend in general to be unimpressed by political bloggers; I think blogging constantly about politics is mentally unhealthy, inevitably warps one's priorities, and distracts from the fact that politics is merely one necessary condition of the good life, and not even the most important. "Shakespeare's Sister" really doesn't change my views on such a matter. But if you wanted to be a political blogger, you could do much worse than take McEwan as a model.