A certain paranoia is justified by the left--they keep ramping up the rhetoric and the passion, they protest and demonstrate, they watch the polls telling them that they are winning hearts and minds and...nothing. The conservatives just keep coming like some bad science fiction plague of creepy-crawlies. Incomprehensibly, all the top cable programs are *shudder* conservative!

So when Ben Domenech's Red America suddenly appeared in the Washington Post, a lot of moonbats spewed their cornflakes.

Is nothing sacred? The paper that brought down Nixon hosting a conservative blog?

The over-caffeinated liberals at Media Matters immediately fired off a challenge to James Brady, executive editor of the Post.

Presumably, this decision grew out of reported complaints both inside and outside of the Post that online columnist Dan Froomkin is too liberal. It's worth noting that Froomkin himself has argued, "I do not advocate policy, liberal or otherwise. My agenda, such as it is, is accountability and transparency. I believe that the president of the United States, no matter what his party, should be subject to the most intense journalistic scrutiny imaginable."

But even if one were to grant the debatable premise that Froomkin is, indeed, a liberal, he is also a journalist by background and training, having spent 18 years in journalism, working for the Winston-Salem Journal, the Miami Herald and the Orange County Register in addition to nearly a decade with the Post. He is deputy editor of niemanwatchdog.org, the web site of the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University.

By contrast, while he does claim previous employment as a "political journalist," Domenech is first and foremost a partisan activist -- a Republican operative who has worked for the Bush administration and Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), is currently an editor at a conservative publishing house, and who describes himself as "the youngest political appointee of President George W. Bush." He is also a co-founder of RedState.org, which describes itself in nakedly partisan terms -- "a Republican community weblog. RedState is focused on politics, and is dedicated to the construction of a Republican majority in the United States."

David Brock at least had the sense to appeal to Brady's elitism, but in the day of shrinking staff and disappearing journalistic institutions, a man's gotta do, what a man's gotta do.

The Post has been doing a lot of blogger-friendly things, like that little box besides their articles that says whose blogging their stories, or Howie Kurtz's regular blog rundowns.

Adapt or die.

The Post has responded to agrieved inquiries by (mostly lefty) bloggers.

Question 1: Was the hiring of Ben Domenech motivated by a desire to placate right-wing critics upset with Dan Froomkin's frequent criticism of George Bush or upset with the recent Dana Milbank appearance poking fun at the shooting episode involving the vice president?

Straus: "When WP.com launched Opinions we said we wanted this new area to be about a variety of voices across a broad spectrum of political and cultural thought. Ben Domenech's Red America is simply another reflection of that effort.

"Ben Domenech brings an original and authentically conservative voice to the site's Opinions area, where we're committed to presenting the most provocative, informed and ideologically diverse policy debate on the web.

"He's an Internet pioneer, an accomplished writer and someone who is willing to challenge sloppy thinking even if, occasionally, he finds it on the GOP side of the aisle."

Question 2: Does WashingtonPost.com have any liberal bloggers who can act as a counterpart to Mr. Domenech?

Straus: "Washingtonpost.com hires writers for their ability to add something substantive to the national conversation. As best as possible, we look for that ability regardless of political labels."

Question 3: Does the Post feel that conservative voices in general are lacking at the paper? Do you think the Post's stable of columnists and bloggers is in some way over-representing liberals?

Straus: "From George Will to Charles Krauthammer and others, conservatives have always had a voice at the Washington Post. And the site certainly also features a number of liberal writers and bloggers from E.J. Dionne Jr. and Richard Cohen, to Harold Meyerson and William Arkin."

Subsequently we returned to spokesman Easter and asked him if WashingtonPost.com intended to hire a liberal blogger to act as a counterpart to Domenech.

In response, he referred us back to Opinion editor Straus's answer to question 2: "Washingtonpost.com hires writers for their ability to add something substantive to the national conversation. As best as possible, we look for that ability regardless of political labels."

Now, the careful reader will no doubt be left unsatisfied by many of those answers. Nonetheless, I'm passing them on for discussion. Have your way with them.

Let me translate--The Post is faced with two prospects for the future--a knock-down, drag-out for a dwindling liberal-left market with way too many competitors, or expanding into the underserved redstate markets (read conservative readership). They have opted for the latter. They have realized that George Will speaks for no one these days although we all love Dr Krauthammer like an uncle, conservatives have a free-market sensibility when it comes to choosing their pundits. As to whether they will address the issue of "balance", its basically a business decision. As David Brock and Greg Sargeant both pointed out by asking whether Red American was intended as balance for Froomkin, Milbank or Dionne, the paper doesn't need more left-wing voices.

The irony is, at least for me, that I wasn't particularly impressed with Domenech, and I considered, however briefly that he may be the Alan Colmes or Tucker Carlson figure in all of this--a deliberately mediocre pick as to not to outshine the real stars of the show. That's really unfair of me, after two postings, of which the first was the obligatory introduction. I hope to see him pop in the near future.

I should also point out that I normally don't get my predictions validated so quickly, but yesterday I mentioned that the new enabling technologies for blogging, video and sound work, would produce "stars" from a free-market paradigm--complete with their own built-in audiences. Domenech is a safe bet because at very least, people who have always read him, will still read him and in all likelyhood his audience will grow. Compare this with a "professional journalist" who labored for years in obscurity. They may have the "experience", but that's not the same thing as the free-market imprimatur. People like that are more of a risk.