Kerry Spot    [ jim geraghty reporting ]
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Will Collier, writing at VodkaPundit, nominates bloggers, and more specifically Instapundit, for Time magazine's Man of the Year.

While the '04 election was certainly more "about" Bush than any other individual, I think it'd be appropriate this year to look beyond the big picture of the election results, and concentrate on one way in which the election of 2004 was fundamentally different than any in the past: the existence and influence of the Blogosphere.

In 1996, the web as we know it today barely existed. In 2000, the Internet was a buzz-word and a curiosity, but the only serious impact it had on the presidential race was when Al Gore claimed to have invented it. Prior to 2004, it was inconceivable that an ad-hoc group of graphic designers and political aficionados could knock down a network anchorman in a matter of hours, or that two political activists with laptops could have a major impact on the defeat of a senior US Senator, or that an entirely different grass-roots campaign could elevate an obscure vanity candidate to a front-runner, albeit briefly.

All of those things and more happened in 2004. A year ago, the words "blog" and "blogger" were obscure techno-ese. Today, they're on the lips of every pundit on television, and the print journos who haven't talked about the Blogosphere are now avoiding mentioning it out of spite, not ignorance.

I generally concur with Jonah's fed-up frustration with Time's choices in recent years.

Time has no credibility. None. I don't care who they pick. That doesn't mean they won't get it right but that hardly means we should care much if they do. The magazine which had the guts to pick dictators and tyrants when they deserved it has, in recent years, gone the rout of People magazine. Even when they go in a controversial direction, it's invariably controversial in way designed to be not-too-controversial. "Now, Twice the Controversy But Half the Calories!" What was it a few years ago? Whistleblower women? And in 2001 when it deserved to be Osama Bin Laden, they went with Rudy Giulliani. How nice! I don't bash corporations much, but this seems to be one of those conventions that gets approved by a committee of suits before it goes anywhere.

Hugh Hewitt argued that President Bush is the painfully obvious choice — so Time probably won’t pick him.

So here's to hoping that Time goes way off the rails — again. (Coleen "Andrew has to tell you who I am because no one remembers" Rowley was the first of the post 9/11 blunders, and others will follow.) Nothing more clearly underscores the madness of the left than its continued unveiling of its own, frantic pawing at the ground.

But why stop at some half-baked "Man of the Year" who isn't? Go whole hog, Time, and give us the list we deserve.

How about Bob Kerrey and Richard ben Veniste for Grandstanders of the Year? Or Dan Rather for Fraud of the Year? Or John Edwards for Lightweight of the Year?

How about Bob Shrum for Loser of the Year? Paul Krugman for Mad Hatter of the Year? Tom Daschle for Beltway Man of the Year?

I fully expect "The Religious Right" or Karl Rove or the prisoners of Abu Ghraib to be trotted out as a giant tut-tut from the magazine's editors, acting as surrogates for a disconnected and disconsolate left. Recognizing the president for the fact that he has dominated the year's events would be a sign that elites had begun to come to grips with their own rejection.

Another argument in favor of the bloggers here, with a suggested Time cover.

Ready for a really awful, only-the-hackneyed-mainstream-media-could-think-of-it idea?

Picture on one side of the cover, Abu Zarqawi and a collage of all the masked, hostage-murdering thugs and scum in Iraq. Then, on the other side, selected members of the Pajamahadeen, guys like Powerline, Instapundit, LGF, Captain‘s Quarters, RCP… (*Sigh*, and Wonkette, stuck in there too because of the unwritten law that every mainstream media story on bloggers has to feature her potty-mouth humor front and center.)

The insulting and tasteless headline: “Insurgents of the Year.”

[Posted 12/15 02:34 PM]