Jim Capozzola, an early political blogger and one of the originators of the progressive blogosphere, died yesterday. His essay, "Al Gore and the Alpha Girls" is not just an excellent piece of writing on its own terms, but probably counts as one of the key foundational texts of the whole enterprise. I imagine most people reading political blogs today weren't following them back in November 2002 when he wrote this and may not be familiar with his work at all. Go check it out.
« The Op-Ed That Wasn't | Main | Where's Laura? »
Alpha Girls
03 Jul 2007 08:24 am
Comments (11)
Thanks! That was a terrific article that I had not seen before.
These girls could make you or break you: male or female; student, teacher, or administrator; even parent.
What a silly conceit, and how amazing that it would persist into someone's adulthood.
My guess would be that the vast majority of students, let alone staff and parents, had no idea these girls existed and couldn't have cared less.
Certainly when I was in high school I knew nothing of these cliques and their systems of narcissistic fantasies. I only learned of them recently (in my mid-forties) from watching re-runs of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Limbaugh . . . avoided military service during the Vietnam War because of a few troublesome boils on his butt . . .
Limbaugh's medical condition is a congenital deformation of the spine. He was not the only one to be kept out of service in the Vietnam era by the same condition.
My point is not to defend Limbaugh. He deserves to be criticized for many things, most notably his hypocrisy regarding drugs and his utterly barbaric statements about Abu Ghraib.
My point is that Capozzola (of whom, btw, I had never heard before reading this post) discredited himself by resorting to such tactics. Not only did he distort the facts, he insinuated that there was something untoward about Limbaugh's medical deferment without even explicitly saying so, much less pointing to any actual evidence.
It's worth noting that this particular canard about Limbaugh comes in multiple versions. This is the first time I have seen the one with multiple boils. Usually it is a single boil, and sometimes 'an ingrown hair'.
That really was an excellent essay.
R.I.P., Big Capo.
"Limbaugh's medical condition is a congenital deformation of the spine. He was not the only one to be kept out of service in the Vietnam era by the same condition."
Part of the reason Limbaugh's radio audience dwarfs anyone else's is how he responds to attacks from the Left: with humor (often self-deprecating), instead of the shrillness one occasionally hears from the left's netroots. During the last Presidential election, when someone (Dean? Someone in Kerry's campaign? I forget) called Rush a "donut-eating draft dodger", Rush, recognizing a clever turn of phrase, started calling himself that whenever a liberal caller took the "draft dodger" tack.
Well, this thread seems to have become hijacked quite quickly with discussions of Limbaugh's medical history, but I would like to say that I enjoyed that article, although the fact that journalists are in positions where they have to be careful such that what they write does not disturb too many others in positions of influence. This should not be treated as an original sin of modern journalism that makes it full of wankers.
Well, this thread seems to have become hijacked quite quickly with discussions of Limbaugh's medical history . . .
Discussing a point mentioned in a linked article is not 'hijacking' in my opinion.
In any case my point, as I said, was not about Limbaugh but about the credibility of Mr. Capozzola. I would have made the same point about someone who, for example, uncritically repeated the Swiftboat nonsense.
Capozzola complains of 'character assassination, scurrilous rumors, and campaigns of disinformatzia' while engaging in the same himself. Another example is charging that 'the traditional-family-values-defining-and-mandating Schlessinger . . . was an unfaithful wife, and gleefully posed for nude photographs . . .' Those indiscretions happened before Schlessinger was 'traditional-family-values-defining-and-mandating', and she expressed regret for them. It also nothing short of idiotic for Cappozola to imply that a person who supports 'family values' must never get a divorce and must get along with every member of her family.
I think I should clarify that personally I see nothing wrong, or inconsistent with 'family values', in 'gleefully pos[ing] for nude photographs . . .' Many families vacation at nudist camps or resorts, and doubtless are often gleeful when they photograph one another. I guess Cappozola is as prudish as Schlessinger in this regard.
Capozzola doesn't complain of anything, Tomlin. He's dead. Some of us - this reader included - read him for years. He was a valuable new voice who let us know that our distrust and disgust with the Bush administration and the bizarrely complicit media coverage of it wasn't some sort of personal paranoia. Capozzola was a brave and important person. He will be missed.
Bloix:
Capozzola doesn't complain of anything, Tomlin. He's dead.
His writings live. Through them he still informs, argues, complains, etc. I don't think I am the only one to employ such an idiom. In any case I beg your indulgence.
He was a valuable new voice who let us know that our distrust and disgust with the Bush administration and the bizarrely complicit media coverage of it wasn't some sort of personal paranoia.
I was never in need of such assurance. Had I been I would not have found it in writings that are themselves so blatantly dishonest.
I note that you have not addressed a single one of the specific points I have raised.
Comments closed July 17, 2007.
| 
Heads in the Sand
I'll second it. AS someone who was following blogs back then, and has watched the whole thing develop, it really is one of the basic building blocks that the entire progressive/liberal/pragmatic blogosphere is built around.
Rest in peace, Jim.
Posted by Karmakin | July 3, 2007 8:54 AM