Just call me, ‘Political Animal’

August 19, 2008

Now that my friend Kevin Drum has made the announcement

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, I can pass along the big news.

Starting this Friday, Aug. 22, Kevin will be leaving the Washington Monthly, heading over to a new blog at Mother Jones. He’ll be replaced at Political Animal by … me.

Yes, five-and-a-half years and more than 16,000 posts later, I’m giving up The Carpetbagger Report to blog exclusively for the Washington Monthly. I couldn’t be more excited about the opportunity.

For years, I had this idea in mind — start a site, work hard, build an audience, and wait for some wonderful news outlet to come along and hire me. Given this, and my love for the Washington Monthly (which I’ve been reading assiduously since I was an undergrad), I’m genuinely thrilled. Joining me at Political Animal will be Hilzoy of Obsidian Wings, who, as one of my very favorite bloggers, only makes the news even better.

For Carpetbagger readers, the only thing that’s going to change is the url and the layout. I’m going to keep doing exactly what I’m doing now; just update your bookmarks and follow me to my new home.

My first day at the Monthly is this Friday

antibiotici-acquista.com

, Aug. 22. The schedule will remain the same until then, but starting Friday morning

buy-levitra-usa.com

, I’ll be posting full-time at Political Animal. Hope to see you there.

Congrats. I’ve posted here, I think, all of once…but TCR is one of the first sites I visit every day.

  • Congrats. I’ll definately follow along as I find yours the best/most interesting political blog (and no one seems to update as compulsivly as you, which is great on those long work days when you’ve got nothing to do).

  • Congrats, Steve; Political Animal is lucky to have you! Now please exercise your new influence to get them to do a horrendously overdue redesign over there.

  • Congrats! I rarely posted but often read – obviously a soul mate of D.N. Nation. I’ll have to include Political Animal in my bookmarks for oft-daily, compulsive reading!

  • Steve, your format here at CBR is better than PA. Easier to follow between the post and the comments. The most reader-friendly format I’ve found. Can you take some of that with you?

  • See, Skitso says it, too! Not only is this format more reader-friendly; it’s about 1000 percent more visually appealing. WM currently looks like about 1996.

  • Wow, congratulations.
    Best of luck to you at the Washington Monthly, but I’ll miss this place.

    This site has really become my first stop for daily political info, and was the first political site I really got into online. So thanks for being so great for so long.

    I look forward to great things from the new “Political Animal.”

  • Good Job. I was wondering when you were going to announce.

    The series of tubes have been buzzin with the news for a while now.

  • I’ll add another congratulations to the pile. I’ve been enjoying the Carpetbagger for about six months now and I look forward to following you over to the Politcal Animal.

  • Gotta agree, the layout and color scheme of Polical animal sucks by comparison, it’s harder to read than CBR

  • Wonderful news. I’m happy you’re getting this new opportunity. As a loyal reader (I check your site everyday, and often link to your posts from my own blog), I’ll definitely be following you over to the new site.

  • Wow!
    I initially gasped in fear of losing this great site, but now we will be getting better trolls!

    Every best wish in the transition, I’m so happy for you.

  • I’m sorry to lose TCBR, but I’m glad for you, Steve. Now I have to reorganize my bookmarks (AGAIN!!) so that you are still in the first list.

  • Congrats! I started reading you because of your guest blogging over there in the first place, and now you will be blogging there full-time. Good job!

  • Congratulations!

    Now you should “promote” a promising B-list blogger to TCR, and then that person can find a C-list blogger to run their blog, who can then find a D-list blogger, etc… And so the cycle of life continues.

    It’s disappointing that I spent all this time to figure out what color an orange is; I’d hate to not have opportunity to use that knowledge.

  • CONGRATS!!

    It’s nice to know that a liberal who got the Iraq war correct from the beginning is finally getting rewarded — other than Greenwald, it seemed for a while that the folks who were wrong would be the ones who got paid gigs (the interesting, if overrated, Yglesias comes to mind).

    Now if some news outfit or magazine would sign up Digby, my faith in the world would be restored (at least a bit).

  • This is by far my favorite blog. It’s always breaking the stories first, with lesser sites reporting the same stories, or linking to here, days after your original post.

    Congrats, you’ve earned it.

  • EOC has the right idea: Who the hell is going to take over CBR?!?!

    I have no idea how much ad revenue you get, but I don’t make all that much now … meaning it wouldn’t take much to lure me away from my current employer.

    Just FYI …

    😉

  • I just started reading you a couple of months ago because Rachel Maddow always talks about how great you are and she’s almost never wrong about anything 😉 She wasn’t wrong about this either, I’ll definitely be following you over to your new spot!

  • Congratulations Mr. Benen! I originally found you via Political Animal so this just closes the circle.

    Beware commenters: the commenters at Political Animal can get pretty crazy. They are nowhere near the refined bunch we are!

  • I will miss being able to state my opinion in a sometimes profane manner though…

  • Oh dear… my heart sank and my hands shook when I read this: I thought my favorite blog was going away! Imagine my relief to know I’ll still be able to read and enjoy your postings and insights.

    CBR is one of the FIRST things I read every morning, aside from my email. And your postings are SO much more interesting than ads for Viagra and requests from former Presidents of African nations to help retrieve lost funds.

    Keep up the good work!!!!

  • Now if some news outfit or magazine would sign up Digby, my faith in the world would be restored (at least a bit).

    The New Yorker could do worse than to sign Digby up.

  • Awesome news, Steve! Of course, we’ll follow you to Washington Monthly. Make sure you take the Official John McCain Flip-Flop List with you.

    Also, I hope you keep the Carpetbagger Report’s archive available — it’s been valuable when acquaintances send around anti-Obama e-mails, nice to have a quick resource to help bring people back to the reality-based world.

  • Congratulations and best wishes with Political Animal! I will definitely continue to read your work. Thanks for helping me pass so many days not accomplishing any work.

  • Congrats !!! As others have said, this is the first political site I go to 3-4x’s a day to get my news. I’m looking forward to seeing the new place. Please include a link and keep up the outstanding work. We need you.

  • To paraphrase Hunter S. Thompson, “When the going gets weird, the talented turn pro.” Congratulations on turning pro and have fun cashing your first paycheck.

    After reading Steve for about 4 1/2 years and maybe about 8,000 comments in the comments section, I hope the family in this comments section stays tuned in as we get joined in with Kevin Drum’s old regular commenters.

    Will we still get to answer “what color is an orange” over there, even if it’s just for old time’s sake?

  • Congratulations Steve. I wonder how many times I’ll log in here first in the mornings before I love that “phantom limb” sensation.

    Note to commenters. At Political Animal they turn your email address into a link but they don’t turn your url into a link. So if you want your site available make a signature for your comments.

  • Very happy for you, Steve, but not for me. The commenters at Political Animal drove me from that site long ago. TCBR was an island of (relative) civility and thoughtfulness, and I am sorry to lose it.

  • Congratulations! I haven’t read at the Political Animal very much, but I’ll definitely be following you there.

    But I fear that our excellent cadre of commenters at TCR will be diluted at your new home. As much as I enjoy your blog, I enjoy the regular commenters here just as much.

  • All of the above (especially what Dave @ 35 said :-)). I followed you over here after you guest blogged for Salon’s War Room, and now I’ll have to re-arrange those bookmarks again. . .

    Congratulations! And well earned!!!

  • Yay, Steve. In addition to multiplying your readership at the new host site through Washington Monthly, I hope this brings you more benefits too. Just keep doing what you do so well….

  • NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Ahem.

    I will miss this blog tremendously, as much for its readability as for its intelligent and insightful corps of commenters. I will, of course, follow the crowd over to the new location but I have absolutely no doubt that I won’t like it anywhere near as much as I have always liked this one.

    Well done, Steve. You deserve it. Just hang on to the TCR domain for a while in case it doesn’t work out, ok? Ok. 🙂

  • Congrats. I don’t post nearly as often as I would like but I ready TCR daily. I will definitely make the move.

  • Congrats, and since Political Animal’s bookmark is right under Carpetbaggers, all I really have to do is add Kevin’s new url

  • Let me add my congratulations too, Steve. Best of luck. I’ll be following you there (actually, I already read Kevin daily so not much will change. I’ll just have to go to MJ to continue to read him).

  • Congratulations on your success, though I’ll miss the community that’s formed around this sight. Even the trolls were more fun here.

  • Most excellent! Best wishes. Will this mean that Mrs. Carpetbagger is no longer tasked with competing efforts – being “she who must be obeyed and the true master of you” and also the technical guru of the TCR website? Hee-hee…

    Life is always about change… here’s to it being positive!

    Congratulations.

  • Very best wishes, this site has been my first read for a long time now, but change is a beautiful thing

  • Congratulations, Steve!

    Wow, that’s really exciting but a little sad. It’s like moving to a new house or apartment. You always leave a little of yourself behind in the old place. I will miss this place.

    I really love the community here, and I hope to see most of you over there!

    Let me know if you need a new icon for the Official McCain Flip-Flop list! 🙂

  • I will miss being able to state my opinion in a sometimes profane manner though…

    I’m guessing you’ve never been to PA, have you? It can get much, much more profane than here.

    Combine that with trolls like Al (who’s a scourge on numerous sites) to mhr (whose posts Kevin auto deletes), and it could be a tough transition for some folks … although Al and mhr are likely to follow Kevin, while we may get the same clueless and easily-destroyed trolls we currently have here.

    Time will tell …

  • As has been said many times already, congrats, Steve! See you (and hopefully everyone else, minus the trolls) at your new digs.

    …all right, the trolls can come too. They’ll be there, invite or not anyway.

  • TuiMel @ 40 and Curmudgeon @ 47 expressed my views, too. This is the only national political blog I read (along with Green Mountain Daily for primarily home-state stuff). One reason is the vast majority of commenters are rational and reality-based and not so into ad hominem attacks and frothing at the mouth in ALL CAPS!!!

    I’ll try out PA for awhile and see how it goes. I can always skip the comments section, I suppose.

    Really — good for you. Does that mean you’re giving up Huffington and TPM, too?

  • Congrats! Kevin’s constant quoting of The Carpetbagger Report brought me here. And I’ll follow you back to The Political Animal. Kinda ironic. 🙂

    Cheers!

  • Good work Steve,

    But like others who like the community here, sigh. Well maybe it will be great at the new place.

    Will we still have to remember the color of an orange?

  • Congratulations Steve!

    Carpetbagger has been one of the best news information sites available in any form.Thank you for all of your hard work for many years.

    Good luck!

  • Nice going, Steve. Do us all a favor and don’t change your blogging style & content. You + Hilzoy should equal an excellent product (and minus one bookmark).

  • I would like to add my well-wishers to everyone else. I have to stay the first blog I read was Stupid Evil Bastard and that’s how I found this place and that was over two years ago. I’ve been addicted every since.

    Like some others, I read this first thing in the morning. I’ll miss it but I am happy you are moving on to greener pastures. I will definitely check out the new digs.

    Best wishes to you!

  • Woo hoo! Recognition won! Well done, sir. Looking forward to reading and commenting at the new digs. And congrats to Drum, as well!

    And remember: The Answer Is Orange.

  • You and hilzoy, both in the same place, huh? Can’t beat that with a stick – I’m a big fan of you both. I’ll be rearranging my bookmarks accordingly.

    Does this mean we won’t have to say what color an orange is, anymore? 🙂

  • Lance,

    I remember when Steve first added comments. I was looking through some of the older content a while ago and found my first comment ever. It was a response to you! 🙂

    Man, I’m gonna get choked up. The ‘community’ here has become a living and breathing member of my family, and I will certainly miss it.

  • congratulations…you will be missed…and tracked down…and followed….looking forward to your new digs

  • Congrats. I like the group here though. Hope they don’t get lost among the others.

  • Great news, CB. And I agree with so many other posters: Please take the McCain Flip Flop list, and kindly get them to agree to your design. It’s soooo much easier to read than other blogs. I’m glad to see someone else recognized the great insight you have into the political issues, your clear and concise writing style, and the great body of work you produce every day! All of which are much appreciated among those of us who depend on you for news and commentary. You can tell WM that I’ll be one of many who will check your new site every day. Congratulations.

  • Congrats and yes I will follow. I’m going to miss the insight of some of the regular commentators though. I’ve learned to completely skip certain Sns and I look forward to reading others. And seriously, you are the hardest working man in the blogospehere and this was the first and last place I visited every day. I do hope you take the flip-flop list with you. And do let MsCarpetBagger continue popping in occasionally. ( I like her taste in tv programs.)

    But, damn I am gonna miss this joint, So readable. But hurray for you, you did deserve a much wider audience.

  • Best of luck. Like you, I am a long-time fan of The Washington Monthly (probably longer than you’ve been of drinking age!) and I think you’ll find a very congenial home there.

    But watching you and Hilzoy move to Kevin’s old place and watching Kevin move to MoJo is like being a voyeur of blog incest!!!

  • Congratulations! I’m late as usual, but not last (I hope!).

    I’ve been reading you for over two years and you are my main stop every day! I look forward to following you over to PA!

  • Stai facendo il tuo lavoro magnifico, sempre ! Bravo il mio amico Stefano.

    Ci vediamo a presto o alle agusto 22!!

  • Hey Doubtful, (All) I remember that day too doubtful…I can’t believe that TCBR is gonna be gone! Ah, progress progress progress…kudos to you Steve, I’ll follow you where ever you land. Congratulations.

  • Congratulations Steve! I’ll be sorry to see The Carpetbagger Report go but am glad you’re moving up in the blogging world.

  • Wait a minute.

    This is all smoke and mirrors. Obama picked you for VP, didn’t he? I’m on to you.

  • Okay, Steve, congrats and all that to you, BUT – and this is very important if you’re going to succeed Kevin.

    DO YOU HAVE CATS?

    Particularly cats as beautiful as Domino and her brother Inkblot?

    Because, if you DON’T have cats, you’d better aquire some before you move. We Political Animal readers expect – I repeat – expect, two beautiful creatures gracing our computer screens every Friday afternoon.

    Oh, and also, bring this format with you. PA’s format sucks big time and is not user-friendly.

  • Wow, have I really read 16,000 posts from you? As one of your 6 original readers, I must say I’m a bit sad to see TCR go. I’ve gained so much here, and I’ve always really liked they way it was entirely yours. I’m truly happy for you, and I congratulate you on the new employment. I know how exiting and overwhelming that can be. Forget about E.F. Hutton., when Steve Benen writes, people read. I’ve always known that given the opportunity to provide your opinion and analysis, people would want to know what you have to say. I’m so glad that this blog has given you the opportunity to demonstrate that. I won’t wish you luck in your new location, you don’t need it. But in the interest of keeping you grounded, I’ll remind you about that time when you would be thrilled if you could ever reach 30,000 hits per week. I knew then that you would eventually exceed that goal exponentially. Sometimes I think you don’t realize how valued your honest, fair, well thought out, viewpoint on the political world is.

    So remembering the like poll day, and the oddities like cat blogging, I again send my congratulations and look forward to what else Steve Benen has to say.

  • This is a great. A bigger audience for one of the best bloggers in the blogosphere. This helps us all.

    Thanks for everything CB! We’re lucky to have you.

  • HUZZAH!!

    I remember wandering over here from a Washington Post article. Until then I didn’t take blogs seriously.

    Congratulations, and here’s hoping you get a better class of trolls.

  • Congratulations to you. I too will follow. I want to echo the comments about this format–it is by far the best I’ve ever seen and I hope you can carry it with you to your new home. The amount of work you do is just astounding. This opportunity seems richy deserved. Best wishes. I’ll miss orange.

  • Congratulations, Steve. Like my fellow Carpetbagger bloggers before me, I wish you well.

    BTW, what is the color of an orange? Would we have to learn the color of another citrus fruit when you’re at the helm of Washington Monthly’s Political Animal for us to post there?

  • I’ll see you over at the Washington Monthly site.

    Will you be staying in Vermont?

    In my English classes I teach a unit on blogging (as part of media literacy). I use you as a prime example of blogger and show the flim made about you. They think it’s pretty cool that someone in their hometown is a blogger with a national audience.

  • Nice work Steve! This is the first commented I’ve posted on this site, but (like others who’ve already commented) I read your site every day. I will look forward to your work on the other site. Also, I’ll be happy to stop having my browser suggest thepage.time.com when I get a hankerin’ for some real journalism.

  • I am always pleased when a talented friend has their talent recognized with the kind of credit bank managers recognize, which is what you’ll be getting there – Kevin got a Nice Tidy Sum as he once told me at one of his Farmer’s Market meetups, and I am sure you will too.

    That said, the main reason I stopped going there once I discovered this place four years ago was because of the Toxic Waste Dump, er, I mean the comments section. Have you gotten an application in yet for a Superfund cleanup??? Having to wade through the sludge and the muck to find the people here who I always enjoy reading (several of whom I suspect would be surprised to find themselves on TC’s Must-Read List, but they’re there for demonstrated intelligence) is going to make it tough.

  • hope you do not become the apologist for the current administration / yet another arm of the pentagon propaganda apparatus that kevin drum has become.

    good luck and hopefully you will not become corporatized.

  • Well done, Mr. Carpetbagger, well done!

    As someone who has read your blog religiously for nearly 5.5 years I could not be happier for you and for the new audience who gets to meet you. Keep making the general discourse more even-handed, nuanced and pithy.

  • Congratulations! I too followed a link to TCR from Political Animal. It quickly became my favorite blog. I look forward to reading your work at PA and following Kevin Drum to Mother Jones.

  • Well done Steve. As long as Mary does not know of this news I’m fine with the idea of following you to WM. I suspect she might be back here soon with her pearls of wisdom seeing that the msm is refocusing on Hillary with the convention coming up next week. Also as long as posting in WM is as easy as it is here (unlike in the Huffington Post, which has as a frequent query to the webmaster “problems logging in”)I’m in.

  • One other thing: Could mrs. Carpetbagger be turned loose on that site so it doesn’t take for-bloody-ever to load – even with high-speed cable? Technologically, that place is soooooooooo yesterday, only liberals who are afraid to work on their own cars would think it any sort of good technically. Not quite a Yugo, but definitely not the reliable Honda one finds here – sort of a 10-year old Ford.

  • … (several of whom I suspect would be surprised to find themselves on TC’s Must-Read List, but they’re there for demonstrated intelligence) …

    Well, even though you’ll probably never read this comment … 😉 … I agree with you on the comment clean-up that’ll be necessary over there.

    While there are some great and very intelligent people over at PA — a majority, I’d say — there are quite a few hybrid trolls (ones who post something interesting just often enough not to get banned, but not enough to consider them decent contributors), outright trolls, and just general assfaces (both liberal and conservative).

    Combine that with a 1998 layout, a comment form that doesn’t remember any info, and a crappy spam filter (some threads would have dozens of comments of Chinese characters, sanskrit, viagra ads in Finnish), and there are some issues for CB to address.

    I’m sure CBR’s aware of them, however, and trust that they’ll be corrected.

    Well … I hope they will …

  • Wow! A hearty and sincere congratulations to you, Steve. I look forward to being one of many readers who follow you with the move.

  • Congratulations! Kevin pointed me to you and you pointed me to Hilzoy so I don’t really lose any of you. Please find a way to drag Morbo along. I looked forward to reading him (?) every Saturday. Best to you and Mrs. Carpetbagger!

  • Unfortunately, I was out at lunch when this news came up so I am now 109th though I can assure you I follow this blog close enough to be a lot lower. That be said, be sure to send along a link the the RSS feed as well. And it would be really neat if you turned TCBR to another blogger as said above.

  • Wow! My perspective as a long-time reader who has always valued your posts, this just ensures that (A) you keep doing it, and (B) you reach a lot more people. Congratulations, this is a win for everyone!

  • Dang! Z beat me to the comment about keeping this a secret from Mary.

    Congratulations! I’ll be following you to PA.

  • Typical. No one in the androcentric media even notices a woman moving to a new job. When a man gets a new position he puts up a post angling for fulsome compliments, which is the blogging equivalent of Senator Egorama renting a stadium holding 75,000 just to hear everyone coo about how great he is. What about all the women bloggers quietly doing the work of the world, thanklessly, at 3 a.m.? Why didn’t Washington Monthly hire one of them? This stinks.

  • Well done Steve. As long as Mary does not know of this news I’m fine with the idea of following you to WM.

    Mary is already over there posting as NanInBoston, raving about Obama’s secret Muslimitude and fake birth certificate and expressing the opinion that our nominee has not yet been selected.

  • STEVE – A QUESTION

    Will the archives still be available from this site ?

    (I can’t tell you how often I refer to them)

  • Congratulations, it could not have happened to a harder working man. Because of course you are the hardest working man in the blogosphere. It is good to see hard honest labor rewarded. WooHOO!

  • Congratulations, Steve. I’ve never posted before but this is not just any occasion. I’m sorry to see the Carpetbagger go but you deserve your new gig and the WM’s readership deserves you, too. I check your site maniacally several times a day knowing that you always have something for your readers. See you at the Political Animal.

  • well, it’s either irrelevant or hack now, but…

    How does Steve leaving The Carpetbagger Report…hurt Obama?

    Mary?

    Best wishes. Don’t forget all the awesome times we had in Homeroom English. Have a great summer & stay as cool as you are.

    slappy

  • Sometimes it’s not what you’re doing but who you’re doing it with that counts the most and I never commented before your site. Learned a lot.
    Don’t know what the comment section is like at PA but I know the posts will be great.

    TCBR was a wonderful experience so in many ways I hate to see it end…but we are always either accepting or changing or both and I will have to adjust to the fact that if I want such good political analysis as I’ve found here I will have to follow you to PA. Congrats. and thanks. Glad to know you’ll keep up the good work….Joey

  • Let me add my congratulations, so glad to see you getting the recognition for your hard work and great insight! Like so many others, this is my go-to blog, the only one I read on a daily basis.

    I’m a little sad to lose the sense of community here though. I had to stop reading Political Animal because of too many troll pissing matches. I’ll certainly follow you there, but I’m not sure I’m going back into the comments (entertaining, sure, but I just don’t have enough time to read it all).

  • i’m telling you, this is just a scheme to keep us from getting cbr t-shirts.

    now i have to rearrange all my booksmarks to put polimal on top.

  • This is unfortunate for only one reason: TCR may have the best layout of any political blog out there. It’s clean, attractive and easy to read. Conversely, the Washington Monthly site sucks. Big time. I hope they re-design their website in the near future — say, next week or so.

  • Congrats!! Wonderful news!
    As a long-time (and compulsive) reader, I look forward to reading you at your new home. Keep up the fantastic work!

  • I’m a little sad to lose the sense of community here though. I had to stop reading Political Animal because of too many troll pissing matches. I’ll certainly follow you there, but I’m not sure I’m going back into the comments

    Perhaps the influx of CB people will improve the PA comments threads. I like this community, too, and hope that people will make a try at continuing it at PA.

  • Congratulations! CBR has been a daily must read for me.

    In addition to your cogent, reasonable writing, I hope you find time to lead by example in website design…..because this one is elegant.

    Off to add the bookmark.

  • This is a site I visit multiple times per day along with TPM. I come here because the writing is so good (and plentiful). I think it’s great you’ve earned such a promotion. Congratulations.

  • petroado, et.al.

    Will we still get to answer “what color is an orange” over there, even if it’s just for old time’s sake?

    How about all of us Carpetbagger Report regulars do our best to work in the word “orange” into everyone of our comments?

    That way we’ll know who we are (at least for a while). Alternately, we could all start our comments with “orange” and then post the rest of our comment. That way we could easily scan the comments and quickly know which ones are from regulars here. I might still read some other comments, but I’ll definitely read all the “orange” ones.

    just a thought.

  • Congratulations. Political Animal is my second favorite blog. Now, it’s number one.

    aka: colonpowwow

  • Steve:
    Hooray, congratulations, but it won’t be the same. I’ll miss the ‘family atmosphere’ here, but, as i said in a letter, it’s like fans of a small ‘club band’ seeing it begin to play large stadiums. You can’t be upset that they are becoming who they want (and deserve OH ABSOLUTELY DESERVE) to be, but it won’t be the same being part of 200 fans in 20,000 instead of being part of the group that shows up every concert, hangs out together, and knows all the in-jokes and even can ask for a particular song from the floor.

    I also agree about the format, if you can bring it over, I hope so. (And maybe I’ll finally see “The Cat” you mentioned but didn’t tell me the name of.)

    There are bitter-sweet moments, but hey, NOBODY deserved it more, and Hillzoy (my #2 blog) joining you is even better.

    This is less coherent than even my usual, and I don’t know how my wordiness will fit in there in the comments, but I sure as hell will read you every day.

  • As a long time reader (years!), I hold you personally responsible for keeping me politically informed, and of passing along that info, along with a link to your site (and sometimes slipping a bookmark to your site onto another’s computer). Besides the great, readable format and informative articles, I really enjoyed the commentary here. I hope I don’t get disallusioned with crazy commentors at Political Animal like I’ve seen on other sites. Thanks for it all, Steve. Oh and save the archives!! and let us know how to access them!!

  • As a New Zealander bewildered by American politics I have been a regular reader of your blog and found much sense, and my faith in American’s generally restored by your words. I am pleased you have been favoured by good fortune and will be among those who follow you over. All the best with the new role – keep up the good work.

  • Aloha Steve, Long time listener, first time caller. CBR was the first blog I began following. Your combination of insight, wit and humor keeps bringing me back. Congratulations and I’ll be updating my link on Friday.

  • I’ll be there. This is by far the best political site on the net and my first stop every day. Congrats!!!

  • Congratulations! Well-deserved, you’re one of the hardest-working bloggers in the ‘sphere.

  • Congratulations Steve. You certainly deserve it. I haven’t commented much but your site has been my first stop for years, keeping me up-to-date with what was happening on the US political scene.

    Like the others above, I hope you can do something to make PA more reader friendly and to clean up the comments thread. I often skipped it because of the trolls there. On the other hand, a great deal of the pleasure in visiting CBR has been the quality and caliber of the many commenters here. I hope the community here successfully migrates as well.

    So thank you Steve, for creating this terrific site and thank you to all the people who commented here for adding thoughtful insight and occasional hilarity that made this blog one of a kind.

  • I will miss Carpetbagger Report, but I won’t miss your commentary at the Political Animal-see you there!

  • Well… Good for (and very smart of) the Washington Monthly. And congratulations to you, since it’s obviously, what you wanted. But, as someone who started reading both at the same time (at my son’s recommendation, about 2,5 yrs ago) and who dropped the Political Animal within a couple of weeks, I must say I’m dismayed.

    It’s not just the writing (yours is better than Kevins); it’s — like many people said before me — the community. Ours is small but select; here, I read almost all of the comments, because I have so many “favourites”. There, not so much. And the format there is *terrible*; it makes responding to a specific comment very difficult which, probably, discourages some people from responding, while it encourages people to just keep on blathering. And I sure as hell don’t like the idea that my e-mail address will be available to all and sundry, instead of being required but not published.

    So, for me, it’s like moving from an orange to a lemon.

    I’ll certainly follow you there to read your stuff (but not on Fridays, if you’re gonna go into the cat blogging), but I don’t think I’m likely to post or read others’ comments much. And, certainly, not *this* Friday. Funnily enough, just as you’ll be moving house, we (town and county Dems) will be having a big open house and I’m the designated cookie provider (nothing to do with ‘puters, all to do with a hot oven).

    Insane Fake Professor, @116,
    My heartfelt congratulations! “Senator Egorama” is as excellent as as ever the “Senator Ebony Tower” and “Prince Smarming” had been.

  • Congratulations, CB. I’m a daily reader but infrequent poster, and TCBR is the often the only blog I read, so I’ll be following you to your new home. Like many commenters before me, I hope our community doesn’t get lost in our new neighborhood.

    But again, kudos on a well-deserved step up!

  • congrats…well deserved and please, regular commentators keep it up…you all are a big part of why this is my first read…

  • Congratulations! May I just add my voice to those who love the layout here, and hope you take it with you, as well as the delightfully civil, intelligent, and welcoming commentators who have made this place my first stop on my Yahoo page.

    Please keep up the good work.

    Thanks,

  • Congratulations!

    You and Hilzoy both. Wow. Good readin’.

    But enquiring minds want to know: will an orange still be the same color? 😉

  • Steve and Ms. Carpetbagger, there’s not a lot that I can add to what’s already been said except I hope with the increase in stature there’s a monetary increase as well. As a reader who’s been here almost since the blog’s inception I know at times your work had to more of a labor of love than a means to put a roof over your head.

    See ya at the new digs.

  • doubtful said: “Lance, I remember when Steve first added comments. I was looking through some of the older content a while ago and found my first comment ever. It was a response to you!”

    Jeez! I beat you here? I don’t really know if I can handle that.

    “Man, I’m gonna get choked up. The ‘community’ here has become a living and breathing member of my family, and I will certainly miss it.”

    You know a community is real when something wonderful happens and you are sorry someone is no longer here to witness it. Ed Stephan, we miss you. We are so sorry you couldn’t be here for the last week of The Carpet Bagger Report.

  • Who’s to say that he’s not here, Lance? If we remember him, he lives on.

    Anyone up for a “last night out” for TCBR? Wednesday or Thursday PM, perhaps?

  • Insane Fake Professor, @116,
    My heartfelt congratulations! “Senator Egorama” is as excellent as as ever the “Senator Ebony Tower” and “Prince Smarming” had been.

    Thank you, libra. IFP always appreciates your compliments. 🙂

    And please give Political Animal a try before giving up on it (you don’t have to give a real email addy). I would really miss having access to your significant wisdom and exceptional wit. Hope to see you there–I go by “shortstop” on those threads.

  • Having spending the day in shock, I just got back from checking out Steve’s new digs. After reading ALL the comments there and ALL the comments here, I say we just need to pack it up and move cross town. I mean everyone.

    I know, there’s a creepy aspect to it, like in the movies when the young couple finally moves into their own, nice new place. And the next morning, the in-laws and the aunts and the uncles and the cousins and a few stray people they picked up along the way show up in the driveway in busted down old cars with arms and legs hanging out the windows and steam coming out of the radiator and doors and fenders that don’t match. Surprise!

    (Deep down, didn’t you always want to do that to someone?)

    Congratulations, Mr. and Ms. CB.

    (Will this finally put an end to the rumor that Benen IS the liberal blogosphere?)

  • I congratulate you and wish you the very best. I hope this does not change things. I love this site and the easy comment system with the hoopla. You deserve all you are getting.

  • I congratulate you and wish you the very best. I hope this does not change things. I love this site and the easy comment system without the hoopla. You deserve all you are getting.

  • steve i will be honest, yours is one of three blogs i check daily (other than mine), and none of them are the “big” box blogs.

    i’ll certainly check you out at washmonth.

  • CB, I’m really happy for you. This is a great move.

    Like many of the others above I have my concerns about Political Animal’s comment section. But perhaps, we Carpetbagger regulars can show them over there how comments are supposed to be done.

  • Wow. Busy day. Just checked in and find I’m number 163. If I hurry. Very exciting news Mr. Benen and a well deserved acknowledgement of the breadth and quality of your work. Many folks have said they check TCR first but I actually leave it for the end each time I cycle through my list to see what’s going on and then get The Carpetbagger’s take on it all. And inevitably, by the end of the day you had somehow addressed pretty much all the issues worth addressing and put a bow on them and I could start again tomorrow. It’ll still work but it won’t quite be the bar in Cheers any more.

    No matter. It’s time for you to have a larger stage. And kudos to Ms. CB as well. A good hearted woman in love with a hard bloggin’ man. And helping plenty with the foundation that TCR was built on.

    Good luck with it all.

  • I lurk as a rule but I have to say how pleased I am to have you and Hilzoy in one place. I am a fan of both of you.

  • I just checked out Political Animal again. Bleh.

    No list of “recent entries”… what am I supposed to do if I’m in a hurry and want to pick only a few? No problem with Kevin; I can scroll down the lot, since he’s not very prolific. But, with Steve’s work ethics? That’s an invitation to carpal tunnel syndrome.

    And the comments… I can read them via “Comments” — a royal pain in the butt, since it’s a tiny screen and the script looks worse than that in samizdat books of 30yrs ago — and come back to where I left off (by closing that extra screen). Or, I can read them through “Permalink” — just a garden variety pain in the butt; it’s still missing the nice shading here, which separates one commenter from the next — but then, when I’m done and want to read on, I get all the way back to the top posting. Scroll, scroll, scroll your mouse…

    Nah. I’m definitely going to save me some time avoiding those comments. But, if I can’t resist peeking (on a particularly interesting subject) or even posting once in a blue moon, I will have to change my screen name. At the moment, I’m debating one of the two: “citrus carpal tunnel” (a mix of orange and lemon) and “liberum veto”. The second has some resemblance to my current name and is a practice which is directly responsible for the fall and partition of Poland in 18th century…

    Maria,
    Shortstop??? Athletic? I’d have thought shortcake (scrumptious) would have been more appropriate 🙂

  • Congrats Steve! But I am gonna miss this place, I’ve been coming here for a long time now to get the skinny. Move on little doggies, we have new things to accomplish.

  • Steve,

    I’ve been reading for a long time. You might remember me. I’m Chuck who used to run thepopulistblog.com. Well, needless to say, my political views changed quite a bit.

    On one hand, I’m glad to see that you’re getting a paying gig in Blogging. 😀

    On the other, I’m sad to see another independent voice selling out to corporate interests.

    I will miss the ol’ carpetbagger report. You’re opinions were interesting and always well versed. I’ll check in on you at political animal, but it won’t be the same man. 🙁

    Good Luck and Godspeed.

    -Paleo Pat AKA Chuck Adkins

  • Mrs. Jack-A-Roe here. It’s truly heartening to see truly talented people get ahead, in these days of “Heckuva job, Brownie” cronies who fail upward. Congratulations Steve…we’ll be following you!

  • I’ve been reading you for a long time and will continue to do so. Congratulations on the well-deserved recognition for all your hard work.

  • CB – I’m really happy for you although I must admit my first thought was a selfish “WTF?” I definitely echo all “this is the best format” comments made above. I have thoroughly enjoyed the community here and the relative lack of trolls here. Just mostly good honest discussion. I think the lack of trolls has to do with your posts which are just blurbs but “thought-pieces.” I have no doubt but that you will keep that up over at Political Animal.

    What color is an orange?

    Homer

  • Just one more for the heaping pile of congratulations. This has long been a favorite site of mine and usually is my starting point for political reading for the day. I’ll miss our little community here but I’m happy for your increased profile and new readership.

    Congratulations!

  • My dad was a professor of American History and a great Democrat. When he died in 2005 I lost one of the few voices of reason I had in my life. Especially after the 2004 election emboldened so many idiots. Dad was one of the few people I knew who could make sense of daily events.

    The Carpetbagger Report is the first blog I ever read. And it quickly became my favorite. I think it’s because so many intelligent people congregate here and work together to make sense of daily events. I won’t go so far as to say you people are like a father to me. You never grounded me for scratching Stanley Willis’s boat with a nail. But god knows it’s good to come here and hang with you all and listen to so many voices of reason.

    Congratulations, Steve. Wherever you go, I’m following. But not in a creepy way.

  • CONGRATS!!!
    You have worked tirelessly on this blog and truly deserve this honor
    I will follow you to the gates of hell my friend

    Congrats again….

  • Nooo! Washington Monthly truncates posts after like 500 characters in their RSS feed! Is there anything you can do to get them to stop this barbaric practice? I don’t even mind if you embed ads in your feed, just please don’t make me leave my RSS reader to see what you have to say!

    Moreover, truncated RSS items are inadequately Sharable in Google Reader etc.

    I’m serious here. I do not read Drum’s posts for this reason. Straighten them out, for the love of the God Machine.

    Ditto on the comments comments as well. Please get on their case about their grotesque and horrible web design. This site is such a pleasure to visit; it won’t be the same unless you can muscle them into a code change.

  • Congrats! Well-earned. My son always like to say, “Change is foreign, different, and not to be trusted!” (also McCain’s campaign strategy). Not this time, if you are there to greet us! I’ll be movin on over as well then! See ya there!

  • For Carpetbagger readers, the only thing that’s going to change is the url and the layout

    Except that Washington Monthly’s RSS feed is only the first few dozen characters of the post. With all the feeds I subscribe to, I very seldom click through to read things via HTML. I stopped reading Political Animal when I began to live life fully within NetNewsWire; I’m unlikely to read Steve much anymore if his new home doesn’t provide a full feed.

    Shame, really.

    Dave

  • I agree with all the kudos and all the concerns above. Carpetbagger has always been a place of calm in the storm of the blogosphere. Here’s hoping you can take the sanity with you.

  • Thanks, rege! Much better. Now why isn’t that the default feed? Their webmaster needs to fix the LINK tag at the top of the page to match the “rss feed” link at the bottom.

  • Congratulations, Steve. I am hoping your clan go with you as I have always been impressed by the audience you keep.

    • Comments are closed.