Shit Outsells Shinola
Kathy Shaidle gives indelicate vent to a bit of short-person blog-size envy.
Zerb’s Star blog gets “900 hits a day.”
Mine gets close to 3000.
Just sayin’.
Yes, well…
Number of Big Macs sold annually: 550,000,000
Number of portions of chilled Scottish langoustine in a rich nage caviar from Aquitaine served annually at Alain Ducasse at Dorchester: approx. 1,100
Annual visitors to DISNEY’S MAGIC KINGDOM: 17,060,000
Annual visitors to the Sistine Chapel: 3,000,000
Amazon Sales Rank, “Remembering Michael Jackson, 1958-2009″: #10
Amazon Sales Rank, Mark Helprin’s “A Soldier of the Great War”: #37,044
According to Alexa (FWIW…I don’t really trust web statistics), 50% of Shaidle’s traffic comes from the US.versus 14% for Azerbic. She’s the Canadian darling of the American “elite” wingnut blogosphere because she simply repeats all the same irrational things they believe about Canada, and thus enforces their confirmation bias.
The only time American progressives link to a Canadian blog is when Shaidle says something so startlingly wingnutty that they are moved to make fun of her. So really, she can’t lose. Except of course, in a real contest involving actual standards of quality.
Shaidle is becoming increasingly like Oakland – there’s no THERE there. Just an ugly spirit, some wasted talent, a growing feeling of bitterness, and a stack of confused contradictions.
A self-proclaimed Christian trying to make a living as a hate peddler (no real contradiction there, I guess…it worked for Father Coughlin).
A Free Speecher who allows no comments on one of her sites and censors them on the other.
An obsessive proclaimer of her own indifference to what others think, whose every second post is a catalogue of times she’s mentioned by Mark Steyn.
Meh. Zerb actually writes. Shaidle cuts, pastes, and links.
Mine gets close to 3000
Maybe, but 2500 of those are Arnie.
“2500 of those are Arnie”…
Do you really think that he’s that devoted or insane?
Intriguing. I get more hits than Shaidle. Just not on Bowjamesbow.ca.
And you’re a much nicer guy, too.
What’s not “quality” about repeating “Mark Steyn sed X about me” ad nauseum?
Well, nothing, of course. That’s why I keep going back.
On a side note, I just had the oddest experience.
I followed a link back from Dr. Dawg’s site to Jay Currie’s (a site I seldom visit), and suddenly experienced a wave of deja vu. Strange – I knew I hadn’t been there for weeks, but I felt as though I had read every single one of his posts.
Then light dawned. I had been to Mr. Shaidle’s site early in the day to collect a url for some future snark.
Compare Jay’s piece on Jennifer Lynch to Arnie’s piece on Jennifer Lynch .
Followed by Jay’s piece on Michael Coren , with video clip, compared to Arnie’s piece on Michael Coren, with video clip . By pure coincidence both employ nausea metaphors and the phrase “check your moral equivalence at the door”.
Then Jay takes on Jim Corcoran, with a really witty phrase about holy homo hostesses . But wait! Here’s Arnie, just SCATHING on Jim Corcoran, with a really witty phrase about …err… holy homo hostesses!!!
Hey, Jay, how about following that up with a video clip about Hamas and kids and a bombing from Jay (/)? Well yeah! And then, to my total shock – there’s Arnie’s video clip about Hamas and kids and a bombing! Those ones are really different, though:while Jay says “One more reason I’m grateful Israel has nukes”, Arnie comments: “Yup, one more reason I’m grateful Israel has nukes.”
It’s a subtle distinction.
At that point I quit – my interest in mutual parasitism is finite – but couldn’t help pondering the notion discussed by Peter and myself of a single, highly charged, very rapid particle comprising ALL matter and energy in the universe. I now suspect there’s actually only one Blogging Tory out there.
I sure hope it’s NOT Dr. Roy.
Arnie’s actually been moderating the comments at Jay’s blog. He “lost” quite of few of Dawg’s and mine a few weeks ago and “lost” one of mine this morning.
Yes, he “lost” a couple of mine a few days ago. Oddly, enought, they both had to do with a certain vertically and truth-challenged hatemonger.
It reminds me of that scene from La Grande Séduction, where the two old biddies who are charged with tapping the doctor’s telephone disrupt his conversations (via a short in the listening equipment) whenever they hear something they don’t like.
…except not amusing or charming at all.
At that point I quit – my interest in mutual parasitism is finite – but couldn’t help pondering the notion discussed by Peter and myself of a single, highly charged, very rapid particle comprising ALL matter and energy in the universe. I now suspect there’s actually only one Blogging Tory out there.
I sure hope it’s NOT Dr. Roy.
This is why I hang around here.
There is something funny going on at Jay’s site. It wasn’t letting me post either from work or from home. SO I started to play around and found that it was my name that was keeping me from posting. If I post using the name JC instead of John Cross, no problem.
John
What if it were less than just one single Blogging Tory? Maybe it’s just a bot script.
Just for fun…note that I am not and never have been a “Blogging Tory”. I find Harper far too irritating and regularly call him on it. Apparently one does not make the Blogging Tory roll if one calls Harper a chickenshit which I do occasionally. So far as I can see, Arnie is not a Blogging Tory either. But by all means spin if you feel the need.
Arnie is helping moderate comments because I am away a couple of days a week and, from time to time posts material from his site. I am fine with that.
On comments: poor John seems to have been consigned to comment purgatory for no reason that I can figure out. I am working on it and am happy to try to post whatever he writes.
Ti-Guy, on the other hand, is a trial. Hell, Dawg and the National Post banned him. I usually let his comments through. Arnie is less tolerant.
“Arnie is helping moderate comments because I am away a couple of days a week and, from time to time posts material from his site. I am fine with that.”
Jay, perhaps you missed the gentle implication that either you or Arnie was writing all the material and posting under the other’s name. It was, I grant you, an uncharacteristically subtle tease. I’m glad you’re fine with it. Given Arnie’s style, I myself would insist that he clearly label anything he posts under your name “NOT BY JAY! ATTENTION! BEWARE! THIS IS ARNIE! NOT JAY!!”
But your generosity of spirit does you great credit. And in the spirit of maximizing limited resources (e.g., the pool of wit on your side of the fence ), I encourage you AND your associates to make the greatest possible use of such sparkling Wildean gems as “holy homo hostesses”. Columbo’s Canadian Quotations may not be approaching you immediately; but to echo James MacNeill Whistler, “A poor thing, but for once, I suppose, your own?”
“and the National Post ”
What? I’ve never even signed up for The National Post. Retract that vicious calumny at once, Lying Jayckal.
How exactly would one KNOW who was banned at National Post? Is this usenet or something now?
but couldn’t help pondering the notion discussed by Peter and myself of a single, highly charged, very rapid particle comprising ALL matter and energy in the universe.
balb, it’s time to submit our theory to peer review. I suggest we call the phenomenon the BT singularity. The distance between the particles is zero and their density and temperature are both infinite.
Seriously, Jay is a very bright and decent guy worth listening to. He’s monomaniacal on the HRC stuff and Kinsella, but measured and quite eclectic on other stuff..
Bright I will certainly concede. The “decent” he lost a few points on when he joined, and defended, the contemptible horde “celebrating” the death of Rachel Corrie.
3000 hits a day? Is that all? When I was blogging, I got more than that on a bad day.
Marti DiBergi: Would you say their appeal is waning?
Ian Faith: Oh, no, no, no. I’d say their appeal is becoming more…selective.
I’m ashamed to admit it, but I visit her site a thousand times a day,… just saying,…
NARF!!!
Personally, I think Ti-Guy is the best commenter on the Internet, which can be annoying to some bloggers. THAT’S why s/he gets banned from blogs.
I don’t see that the hit count of a blog is even remotely relevant to actual worth. And in the case of Zerb vs Shaidle, well, there isn’t a case of Zerb vs Shaidle – Zerb’s a professional columnist for the fattest newspaper in the country.
Ti-Guy can get back on mine in a heartbeat. He knows what he has to do.
Hey, no need to explain. I deleted my comments section. It was either that or ban everybody. The only vox populi I really appreciate is my own.
I prefer to think of mine as more a vox dei.
I keep mine free of Latin.
Ti-Guy can get back on mine in a heartbeat. He knows what he has to do.
I don’t want to. I don’t want to be associated with the vile wingnuts you accommodate so lavishly. That banning is a badge of honour.
Hey, wait a minnit. Are you saying that the Dawg accommodates viler wingnuts with greater lavishness than we do? Pfff. We lavishly accommodate viler wingnuts than Dawg ever even thunk of. I shall have to ask you to step outside if you’re about to disparage our vile wingnut accommodations.
Wingnuts welcome at my blog. They just rarely show up.
Well, you did have Louise there for a while. God, what a sour, dim old bat.
She still stops by when I talk about trains being good
And don’t disparage my wingnuts please, ageism isn’t becoming of someone with a gray beard and mustache in their cartoony avatar.
I get the highest calibre and most extreme version of nuts on both sides of the spectrum. You can ask Peter, and he’ll back me up on that. A current contributor is so delusional that it almost constitutes an artform.
We need a wingnut-off. Whoever has the wingnuttiest wins.
I meant “dim, sour old bat” in the nicest possible sense. And you must undstand that in that phrase, “old” is the only complimentary adjective, implying, as it does in my case, wisdom, balance, insight and maturity.
Oh, you can be dim and sour too, balb. By which, of course, I imply an admirable skepticism about received wisdom and a measured, reflective transcending of the modern. You also can be a curmudgeon, by which I imply an empirical reliance on experience and critical observation. You can also be an old fart, by which I imply the clock is ticking and fewer and fewer are paying attention to you anymore, big guy.
That’s why I run my own company, son. People HAVE to listen to me. Can’t imagine why anyone else would.
After some serious investigation I really must give it to Raphael in regards to hosting the best wingnuts. The reply in his comments about windmills killing bats so there is a rise in global flu is one of the most creative things I have read all year. To quote In Dashiell Hammett:
I was reading a sign high on the wall behind the bar: ONLY GENUINE PRE-WAR AMERICAN AND BRITISH WHISKEYS SERVED HERE – was trying to count how many lies could be found in those nine words, and had reached four, with promise of more ….
John
I’m not sure I’m willing to concede the Wingnut Crown to Raphael’s commenters. Although he often attempts to disguise his identify, we boast the intermittent presence of my good friend The Canadian Sentinel, a man who sincerely believes that a secret cabal of radical feminists and gay Nazis have conspired to take over management of the MIss America Contest.
Well, you did have Louise there for a while. God, what a sour, dim old bat.
On other, more lavishly-accommodating blogs, a remark such as this would have resulted in a reprimand. Since every utterance from a “conservative” (even the best and brightest) is a catalogue of each and every single logical fallacy known to man, only lengthy analyses and extravagantly argued counter-rebuttals are permissible. Anything else is an affront to good faith dialogue, a primitive reaction that displays indifference to the imperatives of emotional stoicism and a betrayal of intellectual and scholarly rigour.
Remember; *we’re* better than they are. And the more *we* demonstrate that, the more they’ll like us.
But sometimes a dim, sour old bat just IS a dim, sour old bat. Does one not owe a debt to truth?
But sometimes a dim, sour old bat just IS a dim, sour old bat. Does one not owe a debt to truth?
Don’t you know that suggesting that the truth is that obvious is offensive? Don’t insult me by being unmystifying.
Cripes – being unmystifying on the Internet. What’s next? Polygamy?!
Cripes – being unmystifying on the Internet. What’s next? Polygamy?!
OK, you get serious points for that.