"Blogs Do Best At Discussing Ideas"

The other day I wrote a post about the lack of influence of talk radio and conservative blogs on the voters thus far. The Captain's Quarters blog has some further insight.

The blogosphere has influence, of course, but mainly on policy and not on candidate campaigns. They also can help raise money, but not usually in the kind of amounts that give them king-making power, a gap that Lamont's flop in November 2006 aptly demonstrated. Even with the 10-1 advantage in fundraising between the progressive bloggers and conservative bloggers, the actual amounts came to a pittance in the overall totals among the Congressional candidates.

Why do bloggers succeed on policy -- say, with porkbusting, immigration, and other issues -- and not with candidacies? The answer is actually very apparent. Blogs do best at dicussing ideas, delving into detail and utilizing rhetoric to motivate and to persuade. The candidates have to sell themselves. Blogs don't do much as surrogates in those efforts, and as history shows, have a very poor track record in elevating any but the most already-elevated candidates.

Blogs aren't irrelevant in elections. However, they do best in enlightening people on policy, which secondarily may boost candidates who champion them.