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I REMEMBER WHEN TPM WAS COOL, MAN.
I tend to think that blogging and online reportage require a skill set and rhythm rather unique to the speed and nature of the medium. Just as not all book authors would be great newspaper writers, not all print reporters will prove great online voices. So I don't want to overstate the next point.
Even so, it's meaningful that Matt Cooper, formerly of Time, Newsweek, Portfolio, and the Valerie Plame trial, has signed on to head Talking Points Memo's new DC blog. On the one hand, Cooper's involvement legitimizes TPM as a mainstream outlet. His presence is an MSM Seal of Approval on their reporting. A statement that a progressive outlook can improve good journalism, rather than impede it.
But the more interesting exchange runs in the opposite direction: TPM legitimizes Cooper. They offer him something he can't get at the newsweeklies or the periodicals: A chance to participate in an outlet fluent in today's technology and constantly adapting to tomorrow's. An opportunity to change along with the industry, to figure out how the shifts in technology and medium can make journalism better, rather than trying to write against the tide. And it's meaningful, too, that this exchange is largely occurring at progressive outlets. As many conservatives have lamented in recent months, their side has not used the last few years to integrate ideas and technology and journalism. As such, there's a rapidly evolving progressive media sector that's quickly winning acceptance and wresting influence, but nothing comparable across the aisle. And as Pajamas Media showed, it's not the sort of thing that can be corrected overnight, or with a simple infusion of money, or with the presence of Joe the Plumber. TPM's expansion is the product of an increasingly impressive body of work. Cooper is no fool, and he's not desperate. He's moving to the online outlet that's likeliest to win a Pulitzer. There's just nothing of equal prestige on the Right.
COMMENTS (10)
This reminds me of the time Gore endorsed Dean.
Posted by: Jamie | January 19, 2009 4:37 PM
"He's moving to the online outlet that's likeliest to win a Pulitzer"
Doesn't the pulitzer have a rule that you have to write for something that puts ink on dead trees?
Posted by: Nicholas Beaudrot | January 19, 2009 4:56 PM
Doesn't the pulitzer have a rule that you have to write for something that puts ink on dead trees?
Not now.
Cooper is likely to have a few scrapes as he settles into the TPM stable, but if he does good work -- at a time when print outlets are shifting resources from investigative work to after-the-fact analysis and opinion, it makes sense for someone who wants to do investigative work to be in an environment that's conducive to it.
Posted by: pseudonymous in nc | January 19, 2009 6:34 PM
I think I'm with Jamie... if that comment is meant as sardonically as I think it is: Cooper's okay (I think Portfolio kind of realized he was their weak link), and TPM hasn't really lived up to its promise, so I'm not particularly blown away in either regard; I have to say I've been kind of surprised at just how "white lefty dude" Marshall's insights have been since he glommed onto Obama, and his observations outside of politics - like the endless fascination with the USAir water landing are quite drearily naive. The thing about "acquiring" Cooper is just how much more TPM looks like Politico or Swampland because of this... which is really aiming for the middle, if you ask me... and hitting it. At least I can still read TPM I suppose; Politico's the biggest dud I've ever seen... and Swampland is a hash (or... a swamp, maybe) without Ana Marie Cox's spiky off-center musings (though to her credit, Karen Tumulty, I think, has shown a fierce willingness to adapt to blogging that's admirable). And Marshall's really the reverse - someone who seemed to finally find his moment as a blogger... only to chase after the kind of "respectability" that only MSM posing can provide. Good luck with that... I don't expect much.
Posted by: weboy | January 19, 2009 6:42 PM
the Valerie Plame trial
They put Valerie Plame on trial? What was she accused of?
Posted by: Herschel | January 19, 2009 6:50 PM
Invade Iraq now Josh
and Mr.super secret
are perfect for each other.
Posted by: S Brennan | January 19, 2009 8:28 PM
weboy: YOU are calling JMM's punditry "white lefty dude"??!!
this is like Rosie O'Donnell calling Oprah fat.
Posted by: raft | January 19, 2009 9:38 PM
Amusing raft... but I am not white.
Posted by: weboy | January 19, 2009 10:11 PM
TPM also needs to figure out what really lights its fire. Hopefully we won't have another mass US attorney firing scandal, but that's what TPM thrived on.
Posted by: eskimo | January 20, 2009 9:07 AM
Marshall is a centrist Dem and and only looked lefty because of the calamity that was the bush jr. administration (maybe EK should ask someone in the office why JMM left TAP)
I believe his goal was always to use the blogosphere as an end around to become part of the CW instead of as a counterpoint
Posted by: who cares | January 20, 2009 1:31 PM