The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

A Venn Diagram Might Be Helpful

Posted on | October 19, 2011 | 50 Comments

LAS VEGAS, Nevada
Last night at the CNN debate, somebody said, “Hey, have you seen Erik Telford?”

“No, is he here?”

“Yeah. He was on Twitter asking who was coming to Vegas for the Western Republican Leadership Conference.”

Well, I’d been busy covering the debate and hadn’t seen the Twitter message, and by the time I hit my deadline for The American Spectator, the fact that Telford was in town had slipped my mind.

Fast-forward to this morning. I had to go down to the drugstore to buy a razor, and was walking through the lobby of the hotel when a familiar figure walked past me. So I reached out and slugged Telford in the arm.

“Dude, why didn’t you call me?”

“I didn’t know you were in town — until you slugged me in the arm.”

“It wasn’t exactly a secret that I was coming to Vegas,” I said. “But I guess nobody reads my blog.”

“Well,” Telford said. “I figured you wouldn’t get invited.”

“Yeah, I invited myself. Because nobody ever invites me anywhere. Like BlogCon — can you believe Tabitha Hale left me off the list?”

Telford laughed. Because, of course, I’m always left off the list, unlike Stephen Kruiser, Katie Harbath, Cord Blomquist, Peter List, Frank Keegan, Dana Loesch, Larry O’Connor, John Nolte, Meredith Dake, Matthias Shapiro, Will Franklin, Brandon Stewart, Bill Beutler, Michael Sandoval, Ari Armstrong, Todd Shepherd, T.L. James, Kelly Maher, Andrew Malcom, Melissa Clouthier, Michelle Malkin, Steven Crowder, Jim Pethokoukis, Dean Clancy, Max Pappas, Ed Morrissey, Deneen Borelli, Ace of Spades, Kristina Ribali, Russ Walker . . .

Just like Telford didn’t call me when he got to Vegas — because nobody wants to hang out with me, right? — Tabitha didn’t invite me to BlogCon because she wants it to be a fun, exciting event featuring people who are actually important, influential and popular.

In an effort to understand this situation, I mentally envisioned Tabitha’s worldview as a Venn Diagram:

There is no “Set AB,” because these are non-intersecting sets.

Ergo, the very fact that you’re reading my blog means that you are not important and don’t really matter.

UPDATE: Tabitha accuses me of harassment? A historic first: Harassment with Venn Diagrams.

Meanwhile, this might be a good time to remind you that I’ll be speaking Oct. 29 at the Maryland Conservative Action Network’s “Turning the Tides” conference in Annapolis.

Category: Blame Erik Telford, Blogging, Fear and Smitty in Vegas, Tabitha Hale

Comments

50 Responses to “A Venn Diagram Might Be Helpful”

  1. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 1:17 pm

    Okay, this self pity is getting old.  Speak for yourself.  And BTW, since I know Insti reads this blog and I would suggest he is an important person who really matters (although I would say that of all your primary commentators, contributors, and people who link you in a good way), let me say you are wrong. 

  2. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 1:25 pm

    Stacey, I think I’ve found your theme song…

  3. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 1:39 pm

    We are the 1%? 99%?  53%? 9-9-9?

    I can’t keep up with all the numbers…

  4. Adjoran
    October 19th, 2011 @ 1:39 pm

    Ergo, the very fact that you’re reading my blog means that you are not important and don’t really matter.

    Whew!  What a relief!

    I was having trouble dealing with all the pressure . . .

  5. McGehee
    October 19th, 2011 @ 1:44 pm

    …the very fact that you’re reading my blog means that you are not important and don’t really matter.

    They told me if I could fake that, I’d have it made.

  6. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 1:48 pm

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NL1U7F0-QbU

    This works too…although that one guy looks a lot like Adjoran!

  7. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 1:50 pm

    It is not “self pity,” Joe to call attention to such objective evidence of one’s failure. If I were respected as someone whose blog was successful, innovative or influential, my friend Tabitha would have sought my participation in the conference. If my participation in BlogCon had been sought, certainly I would have celebrated it as evidence of my success. But my participation was not sought, and I therefore call attention to it as evidence of my failure.

  8. Adjoran
    October 19th, 2011 @ 1:51 pm

    Yep, when you are ignored by HOUSEHOLD NAMES like Erik Telford, Tabitha Hale, and Conor Friedersdorf, you surely need to examine your life.

    Because they are such important and influential people. 

  9. The Free Pioneer
    October 19th, 2011 @ 1:58 pm

    Hey I read your blog. Oh yeah, I get your point now.

  10. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 2:13 pm

    I’m in Set C, which does intersect with Set B (People who read this blog).

    Set C = the unimportant people to whom the people in Set A will look for protection in the event of a major societal breakdown. 

  11. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 2:13 pm

    Making a list ……checking it twice.
    So when your dissed by the elitist blogosphere we are by extension being dissed? I don’t know about Joe but I’m feeling picked on.

  12. Svenster
    October 19th, 2011 @ 2:22 pm

    Tabitha obviously has a point regarding harassment. Note the circular nature of your so-called “Venn” diagrams, their pairing side by side, the reference to “Sets”. Clearly a not-so-subtle reference to the female anatomy. Misogyny rears its head again!

  13. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 2:26 pm

    RSM’s venn diagram also works part time as a model for the “3 Foods Never to Eat!” campaign.

  14. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 2:26 pm

    I feel the slight too.  But I am pointing out it is counter productive to say those of us who like you suck too because Tabitha is the sort of friend who has a party and doesn’t invite you. 

    This is about as depressing as this.  October 18 is about perfect for you Stacy. 

  15. Finrod Felagund
    October 19th, 2011 @ 2:31 pm

    Heck, I’m not even terribly welcome at RedState any more; I posted on one of streiff’s little rants about Herman Cain that I expected him to be posting ‘Herman Cain Ran Over My Dog’ soon.

  16. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 2:35 pm

    @pinkelephantpun Tabitha Hale
    @rsmccain Hey remember when I offered you a scholarship and you ignored it so you could continue you harass me?1 hour ago via TweetDeck

    I mean she offered you a scholarship.  She wants to teach you how to be a real blogger.  Give a man a fish and he eats for a day but teach a man how to fish and he…Well anyway, you should be greatful. 

  17. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 2:37 pm

    Maybe you are right.  Perhaps you should fly to Ohio, put on a bear costume, and walk around. 

  18. DaveO
    October 19th, 2011 @ 3:09 pm

    Maybe if you cleaned Glenn Reynolds’s home weekly, and gassed up his car. Or babysat the Malkin children.

    You know: something to get noticed.

  19. DaveO
    October 19th, 2011 @ 3:10 pm

    Funny how important basic marksmanship can be.

  20. JeffS
    October 19th, 2011 @ 3:29 pm

    That’s a Venn diagram?  I thought it was a drawing of two breasts walking a blogger.

  21. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 4:07 pm

    He’s not saying we suck, he’s saying Tabitha is saying we suck. Just keep kicking the dog that don’t bite.

  22. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 4:08 pm

    Let us know how that works out.

  23. Edward
    October 19th, 2011 @ 4:08 pm

    “Ergo, the very fact that you’re reading my blog means that you are not important and don’t really matter.”

    Set BC: People who read this blog and are very very sexy!

    🙂

  24. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 4:09 pm

    Better than kicking the other kind.

  25. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 4:12 pm

    She offered him a scholarship.  I bet she might have even spotted him a lunch voucher and given him a ride to Goodwill to get a sports coat. 

  26. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 4:32 pm

    I am guessing badly. 

  27. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 4:34 pm

    Meanwhile, this might be a good time to remind you that I’ll be speaking Oct. 29 at the Maryland Conservative Action Network’s “Turning the Tides” conference in Annapolis.

    Well you will always have Annapolis.  And Jimmie Bise will be there too. 

  28. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 4:36 pm

    Yeah but does anyone even read redstate? 

  29. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 4:36 pm

    Check the last month Stacy for self-pity posting.  Its getting more frequent and more boring.  Almost as boring as cyber stalking Alyssa Milano but at least she didn’t complain ’cause she is in the business of teasing.  Are you in the business of complaining about not being noticed? 

    Using a Venn diagram is just another self-pity pot  for your antics.  Like Class warfare in 7th grade.  “Whaaa wahhh  no one likes me.”  Its going to destroy your blog just like the guy at the bar, who sobs, poor me, poor me pour me a drink. 

  30. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 4:40 pm

    It could be a cross section through these things hanging off the back of the the KIA (also known as “The Deerslayer”).

  31. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 4:59 pm

    Ohio mostly sucks anyway without blasting innocent giraffes (sorry Ohioans, but you know it is true).    

    The cops are using assault rifles to shoot big game animals?  Are you telling me that in Ohio they could not go to someone’s house and borrow a decent rifle with a caliber above 30.06? 

  32. ThePaganTemple
    October 19th, 2011 @ 5:02 pm

    How do I go about getting a scholarship from Erica? Would a cyber pinch on the ass do it?

  33. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 5:09 pm

    Sometimes that blog con organizer she looks right into ya. Right into your eyes. And, you know, the thing about a blog con organizer… she’s got lifeless eyes. Black eyes. Like a doll’s eyes.

  34. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 7:50 pm

    I’m not saying you suck, Joe. I’m saying that I suck. Because if I didn’t suck, maybe somebody would have thought, “Hey, maybe we should invite Stacy.” I feel that my readers are being disrespected because somewhere along the line, influential people decide that what I do is unworthy of attention or consideration. What other conclusion can be drawn from the available evidence?

    Now, there can be one of two explanations:

    1. I suck; or
    2. Even though I actually don’t suck, for some reason influential people think I suck.

    The second possibility is, however, no less a personal failure on my part than the first part: If people have a falsely perception of my work, is that my fault or theirs? I say it is my fault, because if success in New Media requires convincing influential people that what you do is important, then I evidentlyhave failed — and in a quite spectacular manner — at convincing them of that.

    What kills me about this, of course, is the knowledge that my coverage of the NY-23 special election in 2009 was viewed as essential reading by many people. During my first trip to the district, I spent two days covering Dick Armey, who had come there to endorse Hoffman. And it is Armey’s FreedomWorks  that sponsors BlogCon, yet my previous service to the cause (as it were) is evidently counted as worthless by Tabitha Hale, Matt Kibbe, et al.

    Yet they say they are my friends, which leads me to the conclusion that if my friends think my work is utterly without merit — well, good Lord, what must my enemies think?

  35. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 8:52 pm

    I have no clue who most of those people are.  The only time I see their names is on this blog.  If success is speaking at BlogCon, then I’m right there with you, you big pile of failure.  Seriously, though, not getting the recognition you think you should get sucks.

    I guess if you’re the Huntsman of the blogosphere, we’re the inhabitants of asteriskville.

  36. Zilla of the Resistance
    October 19th, 2011 @ 8:53 pm

    There’s less than a half dozen people on that list of ‘important people’ that I’ve even heard of. If BlogCon is filled with people I know and care nothing about but devoid of The Last Real American Reporter (who happens to run one of my favorite blogs), all I have to say about that is:
    fuckum.
    Not one person on that list has ever linked to me that I am aware of, and I have been linked to by some really important people, ergo, you have your Venn diagram mislabled; Group A is for the self-declared important, Group B is for the actually important.
    So I think it bears repeating regarding snobs who snub you:
    fuckum.
    They are not as important as they would have you believe.

  37. Zilla of the Resistance
    October 19th, 2011 @ 8:56 pm

    The closest I’ve come to reading RedState in the past year or so is when Stacy quotes something from them, otherwise, they ain’t on my radar at all.

  38. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 9:37 pm

    They also might be jealous of you.  Did you ever consider that? 

  39. Joe
    October 19th, 2011 @ 9:37 pm

    That are all minor players (backbenchers as Levin would say). 

  40. Adjoran
    October 19th, 2011 @ 11:15 pm

    Cage go in da water, you go in da water, blog con organizer go in da water?

    “Farewell and adieu all you fair Spanish ladies . . .”

  41. Adjoran
    October 19th, 2011 @ 11:16 pm

    Hey, I resemble that remark!

    (Nyuk nyuk nyuk – OW)!

  42. Adjoran
    October 19th, 2011 @ 11:26 pm

    But at least with Alyssa you could possibly end up with a framed restraining order on the wall and a dandy FBI tale to tell over a few beers.

    If this story gets any sadder, they will write a blues song about it.

    I woked up dis mawnin’
    Thought I might be dead
    Den I done realized
    Dat I jus’ suck instead

    Can’t get no lovin’
    From my no-‘count bloggin’ friends
    Put my head in de oven
    ’cause dis nightmare nebba ends

    Yeah I’m suckin’ hard y’all
    Jus’ as hard as I can be
    ‘Cause dere ain’t nobody in dis worl’ child
    Suck near as bad as me.

  43. Anonymous
    October 19th, 2011 @ 11:28 pm

    It’s fun, Joe.  I like the Rodney Dangerfield vibe…LOL….

    Honestly, I like a blogger/writer not afraid to do his own homework.

  44. Joe
    October 20th, 2011 @ 12:07 am

    It’s a mystery.  I do not think you suck.  Be glad you are not a giraffe in Ohio. 

  45. Anonymous
    October 20th, 2011 @ 1:05 am

    Are you referring to the “Great Wildlife Escape and Massacre” because I don’t recall hearing about any giraffes in the news coverage. On the other hand if a giraffe is stupid enough to join in a breakout with dozens of carnivorous felines not to mention grizzly bears he should be shot.

    Snack the Giraffe: I don’t know fellas we might get in trouble maybe we should just stay here.

    [Carnivores caucus for a moment]

    Elder lion: No c’mon man it’ll be fun we’ll take care of you what’s the worst that could happen?

  46. Anonymous
    October 20th, 2011 @ 8:11 am

    I came across what I think is a similar post to this one, albeit apparently on the left (I got there via a link from Tyler Cowen…I’d never heard of this L’Hote guy before).  Key quotes:

    ….the capture of the blogosphere by the media and think tank apparatus means that there are now a whole host of gatekeepers who rigorously police the online discussion and determine which voices are heard. It’s hard to think of anyone who has come up in prominence the last few years who was not quickly co-opted into the service of a large media or political entity.

    ..blogosphere as high school…

    tl;dr; RSM is still that high school weirdo who doesn’t quite fit in with the jocks or the cool kids.

  47. TrogloPundit
    October 20th, 2011 @ 10:16 am

    I’ll say it.  Joe sucks.

  48. Joe
    October 20th, 2011 @ 10:37 am

    They dissed Jeff Goldstein too and he lives near by.  And look on the bright side, they did not invite Patterico. 

  49. Patrick
    October 20th, 2011 @ 3:07 pm

    meh,

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