A grand theory of Drudge’s decline

Matt Drudge, media agenda-setter of yesteryear, is no more. No, he’s not dead; but his influence, once massive and unmatchable, has been greatly reduced in the Obama era. I began to make such an argument a few months ago, in this blog. This month, I expand on that idea for the Columbia Journalism Review, offering a grand theory for his downfall.

I’d love if you read the whole thing, but here’s the essence:

[Once], Drudge was the right’s one-man wrecking crew, feared by liberals and respected by bookers and editors around the country.

It’s easy to look back now and laugh at the hyperbolic quality of Harris and Halperin’s claim, but here’s the thing: at the time, it was strikingly close to the truth.

Since then, though, a number of things have changed in ways that have diminished Drudge’s power. The field of online news has welcomed several explosive upstarts, such as Politico and The Huffington Post (Talking Points Memo, which launched in 2000, has also expanded rapidly since 2004). Such sites have built on the promise of Drudge, mixing hard news and chatter into a stew that generates enormous traffic and an ability to shape the conversation. Meanwhile, the Republicans, to whom Drudge hitched his star, have fallen into disarray, and the mood of the country shifted dramatically with the election of Barack Obama and the onset of the financial crisis.

Since the piece has came out, I’ve already heard from a number of friends and critics, who contend that Obama’s brutal August disproves my theory. If Drudge really were on the ropes, we wouldn’t have just witnessed such a no-holds-barred, right-wing free-for-all, with props, themes, and arguments seemingly out of the Drudge playbook. So the argument goes. (Ben Smith, whom I’ve been reading obsessively since his Daily News days, makes this point.)

This objection misses several things. First, I hardly see how Matt Drudge can be said to have spurred the town hall protests or the Tea Parties that preceded them. They were signs of real grassroots outrage and anxiety–they didn’t need to take cues from any single media outlets. The folks that confronted Chuck Grassley in Iowa about “death panels” were not familiar with Drudge, I’m willing to bet; they were angry and confused all on their own. Now, the constellation of right-wing Internet media, of which Drudge might be considered the originary point, did have a role in amplifying the outrage. But Drudge himself was a bit player this past August.

Second, this objection misunderstands the kind of impact Drudge once had. He was responsible–in part–for helping forge the contemporary Republican mentality. It’s a mentality built on anger and anxiety, especially on issues related to culture. It raises the stakes of every debate to the height of the absurd, and practices the politics of personal destruction as if it were sport. This mentality defined the Clinton impeachment process, when Drudge was at his zenith, and still defines a good portion of the Republican Party rank-and-file.

But helping create a mentality that’s persisted is a lot different than continuing to play a monopolizing role at setting the media agenda.

ALSO: Read this piece in the New York Observer, which drives the nail further into the coffin.