As a public service to all blogger-fearing editorial writers and pundits, I write the following generic blogger-slamming editorial, lest you worry your beautiful minds with such things.
We will guide you through the process. Step by step. Like paint by numbers, only without the numbers and paint. We dictate, you take dictation.
- Fancy Words.
You need to use fancy words, but not use them well. For example, a good word to use is "technosocial." Joseph Rago used this word to criticize all us bad bloggers. What does it mean? Well, I guess it means technology, and social. What does it really mean? Who knows?
You should have a thesaurus with you when you write. This way, you can use new words. Like "redolent." And "cross-referential and interactive". There, that's two words in one sentence. "Coagulant for orthodoxies." So you are smart. Just remember: thesaurus!
- Misusing Words
Here is Joseph Rago at his best:
"Because political blogs are predictable, they are excruciatingly boring. More acutely, they promote intellectual disingenuousness, with every constituency hostage to its assumptions and the party line."
Now that sentence looks like English. What does "disingenuousness" mean? What does "hostage" mean? What does "constituency" mean, and is that related to "disingenuousness"?
Don't let anyone tell you that disingenuousness is a synonym for "bullshitting." If they tell you that, they are disingenuousness-ing you.
- Disingenuousness-ing The Reader
Let's go again with that gem from Rago:
"Because political blogs are predictable, they are excruciatingly boring. More acutely, they promote intellectual disingenuousness, with every constituency hostage to its assumptions and the party line."
Now you may have to "diningenuousness" the reader yourself but as long as you are not "excruciatingly boring" you will be fine.
- Misplaced Modifiers
Don't let anyone tell you about writing style. You let Joseph do the talking:
"Of course, once a technosocial force like the blog is loosed on the world, it does not go away because some find it undesirable. So grieving over the lost establishment is pointless, and kind of sad. But democracy does not work well, so to speak, without checks and balances. And in acceding so easily to the imperatives of the Internet, we've allowed decay to pass for progress."
The imperatives of the Internet. It's imperative. Its imperative? Hmmm. Anyway, the blog is a force. And the Internet issues imperatives. And "we acceded" to the imperatives. And so decay has occurred, but an establishment has been lost. But grieving for it is pointless and sad. Or kind of sad. Kind of. Joseph is an assistant features editor. Kind of.
- Links
Do not use links. They are the enemy's tool. Only bad dangerous bloggers cite sources. You don't have to, that's for the pajama crowd. Don't do it. It's bad enough to use an example, but dear God don't link. When you link, you "validate their paradigm" (remember: thesaurus!!)
- Dangerous and Extraordinary
You must describe blogging as either "dangerous" or "extraordinary". When you write "extraordinary", you must imagine George Will intoning and shaking off a bad hangover when he says the word. Or Cokie Roberts outright drunk saying it, with a big old Georgetown smile. Or David Broder reminding all of us that Washington is "his town", not the seat of government for 300 million people. When you write dangerous, you must imagine the Georgetown neighborhood as a community like all good communities: with a gate. And then the bloggers come, and they try to, well, ungate the gate. And Cokie and George and David are behind the gate. What do they have? Their jobs. And scotch. You will have scotch someday too, once the Internets all go away.
- Extra Credit - Our Crowd
Our friend Rago again!
"Nobody wants to be an imbecile. Part of it, I think, is that everyone likes shows and entertainments. Mobs are exciting. People also like validation of what they already believe; the Internet, like all free markets, has a way of gratifying the mediocrity of the masses."
Now, you don't have to remind your readers that the masses are mediocre, we already know that. And the free markets exist (heh) to reward mediocrity. Which the Wall Street Journal knows. And which the masses do have. Mediocrity. But we never would!! Everyone DOES like entertainments, and that IS part of "it"! Nobody wants to be an imbecile (though some are!)
- Extra Extra Credit - Double Plus Good Backflips!
Leftward fatuities too are easily found: The fatuity matters more than the politics. If the blogs have enthusiastically endorsed Joseph Conrad's judgment of newspapering--"written by fools to be read by imbeciles"--they have also demonstrated a remarkable ecumenicalism in filling out that same role themselves.
Leftward fatuity, and it matters. To ecumenicalism.
Written by fools to be read by imbeciles, indeed. Good luck, and tell you dad I am so glad he hired you to run the front page!