To the dismay of the MSM, the blogosphere didn’t go away in 2005. Here are some of the more memorable moments in the clash of the bloggers vs. MSM:

10. Commentator Bill Press’s condemnation of bloggers as people “with no credentials, no sources, no rules, no editors and no accountability.” Press’s idea of good journalism can be found here and some of his shady financial backers can be found over at the Radio Equalizer.

9. NYTimes editorial writer Adam Cohen’s whine that bloggers post personal attacks without calling their targets first. Cohen himself would never do something so unprofessional. Yeah, right.

8. WSJ editorial writer Bret Stephens’, uh, meltdown over bloggers who shined the light on former CNN exec Eason Jordan’s unsubstantiated claim that American troops deliberately murdered journalists in Iraq.

7. New Republic editor Michael Crowley’s clueless diatribe arguing that conservative bloggers march in lockstep with the GOP leadership to “to provide maximum benefit for their issues and candidates.” Two months earlier, conservative bloggers helped bring down George W. Bush’s nomination of Harriet Miers for the U.S. Supreme Court.

6. Far-left cartoonist/columnist Ted Rall’s sneering, elitist attack on Ed Morrissey, whom Rall regards as unqualified to engage in journalism. A few weeks later, Morrissey published documents that led to the collapse of the Canadian government.

5. The late LATimes media critic David Shaw’s critique of blogs, including his now-famous claim that Times articles are vetted by at “least four experienced Times editors,” who check for “accuracy, fairness, grammar, taste and libel.” We all know how well that works.

4. Forbes magazine’s front-cover hit piece on blogs, which suggested that Eason Jordan and Dan Rather were unfairly “hounded” out of their jobs by Powerline and other conservative blogs. An excerpt:

“Web logs are the prized platform of an online lynch mob spouting liberty but spewing lies, libel and invective….[Blogs] are the ultimate vehicle for brand-bashing, personal attacks, political extremism and smear campaigns….”

3. Columbia Journalism Review editor Steve Lovelady’s description of bloggers who helped bring down Eason Jordan as “salivating morons who make up the lynch mob.”

2. Syndicated columnist Kathleen Parker’s description of bloggers as “creepy” wired squatters who are “untempered by restraint and accountability” and “insidious enemies of decency, humanity and civility - the angry offspring of narcissism’s quickie marriage to instant gratification.” MSM outlets, by contrast, “are filled with carpal-tunneled wretches, overworked and underpaid, who suffer near-pathological allegiance to getting it right.” You know, those poor, truth-telling, underpaid ink-stained wretches like Jayson Blair, Mitch Albom, Stephen Glass, Eric Slater, Janet Cooke, Barbara Stewart, Patricia Smith, Mike Barnicle, and Jack Kelley.

1. Former CBS News producer Mary Mapes’ attack on conservative bloggers as “far right,” “hard-core, politically angry, hyper-conservative sites loaded with vitriol about Dan Rather and CBS” who anonymously slime “anyone and everyone who raised questions about the president.”

Judging from the thoroughly unhinged tone of the old media, I’d say bloggers had a fabulous year.

Cheers!

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