I don't usually blog about the blogosphere itself. Sometimes I prefer to treat this growing organism as though it doesn't exist. It's more fun this way and it keeps my writing honest and un-abashedly disloyal to anyone but my web-host, who's really the only one who can pull the plug on this whole offensive deal anyway. Today's different. Now maybe I'd been living under a rock, but up until about six months ago, I'd never heard of Andrew Sullivan, author, blogger, conservative, and gay-rights activist extraordinaire. After surfing a few of my favorite conservative weblogs, I came upon links to his site rather often so one day I decided to see what the hubbub was about.
As suspected, the hubbub was about absolutely nothing. It only took me moments to see that Andrew Sullivan was nothing more than the confused moderate's poster-boy for politics, but more specifically, same-sex marriage. Every time I write about this issue, someone always wants to ask me if I've read good old Andy Sullivan. Well I have, and I'm not impressed. I wasn't buying it then, and I'm not buying it now. Thankfully, others are starting to notice the same.
Many bloggers have recently come out (no pun intended) against Mr. Sullivan. Nathan at Brain Fertilizer cites his inability to relate to anything outside the realm of his "homosexuality" as "Why We Should Stop Reading Andrew Sullivan" (good thing I never really started). Meanwhile, reading Michelle Malkin's post on his recent stooping to the lowest of lows by starting a "sponsorship" campaign to cover costs for his blog, with varying levels of partnership (again no pun intended) and special perks when you give more money (my goodness, he'd fit in perfectly on TBN), led me to these lovely words from one of her brilliant commenters, David Blackmon
"Andrew Sullivan is a classic example of an otherwise intelligent and fairly astute political observer who allows himself to become utterly and completely consumed by a single issue, in his case gay marriage. His pathological need to destroy the institution of marriage in this country has led him to develop a similar pathological hatred of President Bush, and that in turn has basically rendered him irrational on all other political topics.
It's too bad - a year ago he appeared to have a promising future. It has been almost painful to watch over the last year as he has devolved into utter and complete irrelevancy."
Yes! If I had a tambourine right now, surely I'd play it.
The quotation from David Blackmon is inaccurate on a couple of levels with regard to Andrew Sullivan. First, he has never written anything demonstrating a "pathological hatred of President Bush". He simply gives both praise and criticism, and the criticism is what most people like to focus on. Second, he has hardly becom consumed by a single issue. Going to his blog right now, he has entries about Armstrong Williams, hateful emails Michelle Malkin has been receiving and a sample of what he gets, Social Security reform, and it goes on. Yes, he includes gay/lesbian issues, so what? Should Michelle Malkin not be able to mention anything regarding Filipinos, or Jonah Goldberg about Judaism? Also, his strategy for same-sex marriage, as recently stated as 1/16/05? Take it slow and steady, don't force it on the populus. Hardly militant, in case Mr. Blackmon made that accusation also. Brilliant, perhaps on other issues. But a blathering idiot on Andrew Sullivan. What you said yourself was criticism without being a load of malarkey.