Were it not for his pathetic appearances before Congress over the firing of US Attorneys, Alberto Gonzales would still be Attorney General of the United States. He would be happily presiding over what would become the Press Office of the Republican Party, churning out indictments of every leading Democrat in the country, refusing to enforce the laws and treaties of the US, and bringing civil rights back to the 1940's. Gonzales' role was the enforcer of Karl Rove's dirty vision of America, and the blind eye to the paranoic machinations of Dick Cheney.
Gonzales' Congressional testimony appearances resulted from the work of a blogger, Joshua Micah Marshall, and his small staff at TPM Memo and TPM Muckraker:
I quote liberally from Robert Niles at the Online Journalism Review:
TPM Media reporters gathered information by working phones, swapping e-mails and searching documents as well as following reporting from San Diego's Union-Tribune and North County Times, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and McClatchy's Washington bureau covering the firings of respected local U.S. Attorneys and their replacement with Bush administration loyalists.
Joshua Marshall's work crystalizes what blogging is about:
Reading Marshall's TPM reminds me not so much of reading the New York Times, but of listening to a frill-free network newscast. You've got your trusted voice (Marshall) leading you through a linear narrative of the day's most important work from his company's staff (plus other sources, see point above). With effective use of voice and hyperlinking, Marshall is able to draw new readers into the story, allowing them to catch up, while keeping the narrative moving for long-time followers.
TPM has long linked to other bloggers from its home page. It publishes RSS feeds. Marshall created a companion site, TPM Cafe, to provide a social gathering place for readers to share news and opinion with one another, building reader loyalty to the site. Marshall has worked hard over the years to develop respect, and incoming links, from other popular liberal and center-left bloggers. TPM even has a Facebook group for its fans.
All these actions helped make TPM part of a larger online community, which paid off with links to and discussions of its content, creating the echo chamber that helps sustain TPM's narratives. ...
If you break a scandal, and nobody reads it, is your story really news? The local papers that TPM cited faced that problem. Without an echo chamber to repeat and amplify the story, even the toughest original reporting has a hard time getting widespread public attention. Decades of operating as near monopolies have atrophied many newspapers' ability to build buzz. Bloggers, with no brand names to rest upon, simply work harder at it.
I say, huzzah for Josh Marshall and his staff, and for the local journalists he empowered, and to all in the blogosphere who helped, supported, contributed, commented, recommended, and researched this issue.
This is a great day.
A really great day.