Here's why...
Liberals are an endangered species. I live in one of hotbeds of liberalism, NYC. It doesn't matter. I still can't talk about it with office mates, friends and family. This town is filthy with priviliged, rich, college-educated whites, who are convinced that the free market--hold your hats--is actually free. I meet at least three of those categories, so I fit in to some degree, but I still live like a hunted beast.
I want a space to be free. For me. Personally. Call it a liberal spin-free zone. Now, I know what you're thinking... the term liberal zone implies spin. No. I just. Don't. See. That.
I don't see all the facts sometime--it's true. I may have mistakenly been defending Harry Reid for months now. In light of the LA Times article yesterday, I admit I may have been wrong. But my defenses weren't spin--they were the facts as I had been able to find them. And I looked, I investigated.
Regardless, when I see advertisements on my space, our space, which advances an agenda contrary to my conception of what the site's agenda is-- I get mad. And then I get frustrated, and then I get scared, and then I get suspicious. I remember what my AP history teacher used to tell us, "The radicals make the revolution, and then the moderates dump them and write the new constitution."
Maybe you want to call it free speech. You have an argument there, but logic and legality are not a substitute for ethics. Or for that matter, feelings. That Chevron adverisement probably cost three or four times as much to make than it did to buy space here. That ad, from design to focus groups, is a forty-fucking-caliber rifle aimed between my eyes.
What if Chevron wanted to buy all the ad space on kos. And what if they were willing to outbid and pay more for space. Yes, the money might go a long way ... but the white and orange motif is suddenly inundated with Blue and Red Chevrons. Would it still be possible for less monied advertisers to post here? If Chevron offers more money, than say, an ad by www.studentloanjustice.org, who could justify not taking the Chevron ad... if the principle is money.
The difference between liberal bias, and conservative bias, makes more sense when you think how far centrist values have drifted to the right. An oil interest can outspend any liberal advertisement. On any number of sites. You give them an inch... And what happens when liberal adveristers can't afford the space?
It is true, that there are other sites specifically made for Blue buying, but... I think preference for ethics here should over rule the urge to bring in more money. I've been waiting for the netroots to get co-opted by special interests. Is this the beginning of the end?
Look, we're partisan. Everyone who reads this site, who isn't a contributor--know this already. Even those centrists and moderates who venture here, know the territory they trod. To me, taking the money and posting the ad is a blatant endorsement. "The Nation" be damned. I don't have a voice there. I do here. And I don't want to lose it, or have it corrupted by dirty money.
If a Congressman took thousands of dollars from big oil and then used it to campaign on progressive causes, you'd be equally suspect, wouldn't you kos? And just think... how far would your liberal credentials go, if your entire site was funded by conservative dollars.
Kos has become one of the few havens against the right that I have. And life in NYC. Don't take that away from me too. This sounds like the justification that many have made already--for selling out. The Revolution is dead, vive la revolutionne.
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