Expand Your Horizons

Before I started reading blogs, I made a point of reading four sources of political commentary: The National Review, The Weekly Standard, The American Prospect, and The Nation. I stopped reading the last two by about the summer of 2003, because American liberalism took a giant step toward the Left, the commentary that I was reading (especially in The Nation) was utterly detached from reality, and the far Left was becoming too anti-American for me to read without loosing my lunch.

But you lose a lot when you forget that there's another half to America, and I'm not just talking about bridging the Red State - Blue State divide. I mean, that from the Right perspective, there are news stories that you will never even hear of if you don't venture beyond conservative, libertarian, and hawkish blogs (and vice versa). So every now and then I hold my nose and venture into Daily Kos or Atrios and see what people are talking about.

More easily, I make a daily read of Acrentropy, which brings us a piece of inflammatory Republican rhetoric that should get a certain congressman in hot water. It should, at least. I wouldn't have known about this incident I had stuck to reading the blogs of like-minded people.

So, whether you hail from the Left or the Right, as Glenn Reynolds often urges, branch out a little. See what people who disagree with you are thinking. They'll often show you news stories that will blow your mind.