Awright fine. I'll just shut up and take my stuff elsewhere. Sheesh

The hell you will. You started this thread. Git back here. :D

To where? Fox? Sky News? World News Daily? :)

Well I suppose I could start a blog view section just for my own stuff for example. But that's pretty presumptuous.

"I'm not readin' that crap--summarize it in one word." --Bender, from Futurama :-)

Plus you would still get a beatdown.

Besides, you consider yourself as just another member of the gang here. And I think that most of the Cellar "establishment" would agree. It's not like you're being held to higher scrutiny b/c you own the place...we established that with the whole Goethean deal in IotD.

Now, whenever I hear the "I toured, I saw good stuff, we're doing okay" reports, I can't help but wonder what the tours are like. Do they actually let the Congressionals walk around wherever they want - the slums and such included? And if they do, how much security is around them? Enough to obscure the bad parts? I don't know what they saw, so I can't make a judgement on whether or not to believe them.

This guy also has another liability - reelection threat:

Warch hit on it. A southern Congressman who barely squirted onto the Hill two years ago, facing a challenge from the same person he barely beat, and he's hitting every major media outlet - conservative and liberal - with his "We're all good" message. I have trouble believing this guy.

Once upon a time, we could not trust anyone over 30. Now we are the establishment. That sure did bloody happen quickly.

Speak for yourself ol' man...I still have 2 years before I hit 30. :)

Bullshit. Well, OK, yes, you're right, it IS presumptuous. But come on, the whole blogging phenomenon is based on nothing if not on presumption. It's based on the idea that all of us wing nuts sitting around nattering on our computers can write stuff just as interesting (if not necessarily more accurate) as what the established Pundictocracy puts out. Hell, even I've considered starting my own blog (called, oddly enough, "Punditocracy"), and I'm a self-proclaimed bubble resident. 20 years ago if a person had self-published a zine devoted almost exclusively to his or her own musings and opinions, with an occasional excerpt from somebody else, it would probably have been considered the height of arrogance and self-absorption. Now, everybody's doing it.

If you don't want to set yourself up with a blog, fine. But don't stifle your impulse to do so because of some sense of modesty. I guarantee you, you wouldn't be any more pretentious than any of the other blogs out there, and probably less so than many.

I was busting on Syc more than anything...

When you read the following, take the word "you" to really mean "any potential blogger".

I think the Cellar offers you more than a blog situation does. The one thing that you can't get here is individual attention, because it's never "you-centric" like a blog is. But you have better readers here than you would get in a blog situation, because they're broader.

More importantly, here you know everything you say is gonna get examined, and people will bring out their differences; and they are on an equal basis to you. If you're right, and you can communicate, you will bring people around to your point of view. If you're wrong, better the chance you'll learn and get smarter, with people trying to disagree with you.

The worst-case blog situation, IMO, is that you're writing to a bunch of people who agree with you. A community of people where we're all the same is no fun.

It's funny to see how, when I titled the thread this way, it was "me-centric" and kind of against the Cellar norm. It was really just a playful sort of thing, to title it that way.

I usually operate on the policy of trusting no one at, over, or under 30. That baby in the stroller over there...man, I don't know what the hell he's plannin'.

Just remember Toad...I know where you live.

Not that I was necessarily discouraging you from creating a blog...it just doesn't seem Sheppslike. But hell, you own the place...

Sound and fury, told by an idiot, signifying nothing.

Yer chemically altered...hell, you could be 80 and wouldn't feel it.