Red bloggers see RED

While I spend (very) little time on the political side of the 'sphere, this is an interesting article. Interesting to me from both the "irrelevance" point (I'll get to that later)...and interesting how much more the opinions of bloggers are being monitored. From the article:

"But no issue in recent memory has united conservative bloggers like the debate over immigration. Their frustration has culminated in a full-scale revolt against the Bush administration and a Senate bill that activists say does little to solve the country's border security problems.

It's increasingly clear from Web postings and interviews with top conservative bloggers that the immigration bill has done serious damage to the president's credibility among the conservative netroots, the grassroots bloggers on the Web.

Said Morrissey: 'I think that they are going to continue to support him on the war on terror. As for the rest of it, they are looking for ways to reshape the party agenda going into the next election. That's a nice way of saying they are going to consider him irrelevant.'"

I've always admired what I call the "strategy of irrelevance" as it can be very effective...but what I'm most enjoying is how the conservative community's voice is being heard loud and clear by media and, in-turn, the general public (and I'm not against the immigration bill--and if you haven't noticed, I'm not conservative, either--so that comes from a place of delight that bloggers are being heard, dig?).

In recent months I've seen a dramatic increase in companies and media outlets leveraging social media to "listen" and of course I couldn't be more pleased. Sure we've got a ways to go but there is definite interest over "what's being said in here". I'll cover that stuff and provide specific examples in upcoming posts but it will continue to be a theme (and hopefully, a trend).