Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/RedState

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 18:17, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] RedState

An un-notable blog with NO assertion of notability - the only possible claim is that one member (Ben Domenech) wrote for one week on the Washington Post before getting fired (and that info is duplicated on his article, anyway). Fails WP:WEB, and probably WP:VAIN. It was tagged for prod, but untagged by a user with a grand total of 14 edits. Delete. Proto::type 15:03, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

• Delete per nom. I'm also uncomfortable with the tone this article takes. Words like "excoriated," "castigation," and "inflammatory" don't often appear in Neutral Point of View encyclopedia articles. I'm inclined to agree: this fails WP:WEB and possibly WP:VAIN as well. Scorpiondollprincess 15:19, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. It is the conservative counterpart to Daily Kos (though, arguably, not nearly as popular). It is notable per WP:WEB#1 because it gets cited all the time in the press, usually because notable people comment there. See, for instance (a random selection):
  • Editorial. "Blogged Down in a Sea of Anger", Washington Post, 2006-04-07.
  • Mike Madden. "Bloggers analyze Bush speech quickly, with partisan fervor", Seattle Times, 2006-02-01.
  • Edward Morrisey. "How Harriet Unleashed a Storm on the Right", Washington Post, 2005-10-09.
  • Editorial. "Best of the blogs", Pittsburgh Tribune Review, 2005-10-30.
  • Staff Writer. "Political Parties Use Technology Differently", Washington Internet Daily, 2005-05-18. (RedState is a subject of this story.)
  (A ProQuest search gives 32 hits on "RedState". A LexisNexis search over the previous two years gives 40 hits.) Founder Ben Domenech is a notable (and controversial) figure, and all articles about him generally namedrop RedState. — Kaustuv Chaudhuri 19:05, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

• Keep per Kaustuv. --TheFarix (Talk) 19:43, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
• Weak keep - it's somewhat notable. I rm'd the irrelevant links. SB_Johnny | ^talk 19:45, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
• Keep as a very well known blog that has received coverage outside the blogosphere. Vickser 20:44, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, although ranked lower than Daily Kos it is the most serious of the top three right-wing political blogs. "Blogosphere Ecosystem" (political blogs) ranking of 85[1], Technorati ranking of 502.[2]. As the Domenech deal shows it has a Beltway audience. --Dhartung | Talk 02:20, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

• Keep This whole jihad against Wiki articles on weblogs and online fora-which I believe began with Ben Burch's spurious recommendations of Protest Warrior and Conservative Underground for deletion-strikes me as a bit absurd.

First of all, traffic rankings are not dispositive-and many times, not even very accurate-as far as determining a website's potential audience, and concomitant influence, is concerned.

Secondly, RedState does have a Beltway audience, but as its companion site, Confirm Them!, demonstrated during the debate over the confirmation of John Roberts, the abortive Harriet Miers nomination, and subsequent nomination and confirmation of Justice Alito, it also exercises an outsized impact in terms of shaping public opinion on Capitol Hill, the White House, and within the Washington D.C. press corps. At least, with respect to nominations for the federal judiciary.

Finally, this entire debate illustrates the utter subjectivity of what constitutes a "notable" weblog.

The DailyKos is the most popular political weblog in existence at this time-and has garnered an enormous amount of media attention for its owner's success in drawing a Web audience-however it has been a miserable failure in achieving its purported objective, i.e. electing stridently left wing Democrats to office, both in general elections and in primaries.

Does that mean we should ignore its influence among Dem. Party powerbrokers, or the millions of individuals who have perused that site, or thousands who view and contribute to it on a daily basis?

Conversely, does the dismal traffic ranking of Red State negate the incredible influence it had on the debate surrounding the composition of our federal judiciary?

Ruthfulbarbarity 08:14, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

• "Delete" - #85 in technorati for political blogs is nothing to write home about.

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.