Matt Welch, the outgoing associate editor at Reason magazine, has an insightful (and fun) column in the April print edition (pp.16-7, not yet available online). The set up: in the early days of blogs (post-9/11), Welch expected blogs to democratise public discourse and improve quality. Quoting his own earlier essay, Welch writes:

"'What do warbloggers have in common, that most pundits do not?' I enthused. 'I'd say a yen for critical thinking, a sense of humor that actually translates into people laughing out loud, a willingness to engage (and encourage) readers, a hostility to the Culture War and other artifacts of the professionalized left-right split of the 1990s...a readiness to admit error [and] a sense of collegial yet brutal peer review.'

Man was I wrong.

Michelle Malkin, to name one writer revered by warbloggers (her site recently won Best Blog in an annual poll organized by Right-Wing-News.com), is to critical thinking what Ralph Nader is to libertarianism---a very good example of the opposite."

Laugh out loud, all right.

Welch goes on to describe how blogs have become powerful tools for the most partisan of opinion dishing and mutual bashing not to be bohthered with standards of logic, fact checking, or grammatical competence. He continues:

So what's wrong with a bunch of human beings using technology to organize themselves into political groupings? Absolutely nothing. The purpose of enhanced freedom is to enhance people's ability [sic] act freely in the ways of their choosing, and we shouldn't be surprised when they choose to do the same stuff they were doing before, only more efficiently."

Indeed. I think it's without controversy to say that current events blogs have democratised American (and world) debate, moving it outside the major media outlets, AND reinforced whatever status quo, partisan-based polarization existed (and exists) in American debate, AND much more. Blog on.