C&L named a Top 25 Blog of 2009 by Time Magazine
By bluegal Tuesday Feb 17, 2009 5:00pm
If John were to ask his hard-working staff to "go boldly and seek the accolades of
AOL/Time/Warner", well, you can imagine what their reaction would be.
But Time Magazine thinks we rock anyway.
Everyone at C&L works long and hard to make this corner of the internet worth the visit seven days a week. It's not done for the awards, naturally, but it's always nice to be recognized for what we do.
John Amato:
I'm very grateful for everyone who helps put this blog together and for all the help our readers give. I think it was Dan Manatt of Politics TV that called me the Vlog Father a few years ago when we were talking on the phone. I thought that was pretty funny and we laughed about it. TIME used it.
When professional musician John Amato launched the Crooks and Liars political blog in October 2003, it featured something that was quite novel in those ancient pre-YouTube days: video clips. Today, Crooks and Liars is among the most widely read political blogs on the Web, and Amato — now known in blog circles as "the Vlogfather" — is recognized as a pioneer of video blogging. The video selections — snippets from government press briefings, Congressional hearings and TV talk shows — are the sort of clips that Jon Stewart uses for fodder, but this is a chance to see the video in its original unintentionally humorous context. Amato leans liberal, but his blog is an equal opportunity attack dog, taking a bite out of the crooks and liars on both sides of the aisle.
Thanks, team.
(Correction for TIME: I started C&L in September of '04)
Login or Register to post comments.
This is a great blog! I check it out every day.
Keep up the great work...and keep the feet of those right-wingers to the fire.
one and all. You are number 1 in my view!!!
Keep muckraking. Keep exposing the crooks and liars.!!!
Every morning, once the caffeine has started to seep into my brain, I log on to C&L to see what's shakin'.
I appreciate all the incredible research Amato and his team does and I also VERY much appreciate the input of those who come here to share information and ideas.
I must say, Crooks and Liars is my favorite website, particularly for an intellectual "to and fro". It's informative and quite entertaining!!!
Thanks to everyone and many congratulations!! Well deserved!!
Hey, congrats, John, staff, contributors, and posters!!!!!
Keep on keepin' on!
...that time picked up on how we don't pull punches, on either side.
I want to take a moment and say THANK YOU to all of you who have contributed in some way ..to all of you who took the time....*hugs
You guys/girls rock! - Thank you
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZsppOw2Mxk
cue the right-wing neo-con trolls in 3... 2... 1...
(seriously, kudos to C&L! I visit your site every day and I think its hawt!)
Congratulations! There aren't many blogs that I make sure to check every day, but yours is one of them - and it's usually more than once a day. Thanks for all the hard work and great information.
C and L
A daily must read for me !
Nice to see you recognized.
And I still think John deserves a spot in
the sexiest bloggers category.
xoxo
appreciate all you do kids !!!!!!!!!!
C&L, you rawk! This is my favourite place to visit.
Kudos to all!
I was also pleasantly surprised at finding Bad Astronomy on the list.
...I can't say the same for Time and I don't believe a word they say, so I'm never coming back here, ever again, ever, not ever, never, never again.
OK, I'll come back, but Time sucks.
know what you mean...
Woo-hoo!
Now, of course the wingnuts will claim bias, when of course, teh stupid hurts at Drudge and the rest.
Huzzah!
Thank You!! ...to John and the C&L staff
your efforts are truly appreciated by the many lurkers like myself
"Only the man who crosses the river at night knows the value of the light of day"
wondered when you where going to put this up!
i read about it in this morning's ThinkProgress FAST thread...
reading through the 25 right now on another tab...
CONGRATULATIONS!
but now i realize how long my blog habit has been going on! egad!
thank you. thank you. thank you. to john and the whole C&L team.
the great community of commenters! thank you!
Job well done. One of my top bookmarks :-)
... as a commenter, what i really love is the collection of weirdos that show up around here.
obviously john and the columnists do the real legwork, but i love the diversity of the commenters. i can tell you, i've really enjoyed reading everyone, even the writers i've sometimes squabbled with.
we have our unsung korean war hero tyree, our pissed off jew uncle joe, our calm dot-connector orangutan, our maternal presence nonny mouse, truthbtold to keep it real on both sides of the aisle, our hard-working journalist rightwinghater, our pragmatic alice x, our hilarious wiccan ysbdadden, and about a million others of you out there who care about saving our country...
the commenters here are the best -no annoying filters, like at huffpo, no latte liberal @$$-slap fest like at kos (sorry markos -couldn't resist buddy ;).
the vlogfather -too funny.
got...which is even more amazing
a true american success story
so when is obama gonna have his blogger get together
i wanna see the pics of the prez, john, kos, all the tpm dudes, sullivan and the rest of the muckety mucks...all sitting around the oval office
... is what led to the thinning out of most of the interesting commenters, and all those annoying filters that have commenters breaking up their words in all sorts of ridiculous ways.
i can barely read the comment threads over there anymore -they're so damn dull.
* although i will give a shout out to kevenseven.
a long time ago. And Commondreams.org
I really don't appreciate my comments being "moderated" and deleted all the time.
They NEVER do it here or on Salon.com. or at Informationclearinghouse
FREEDOM OF SPEECH BABY, YEAH!!!!
Moderator blows comments away here quite a bit. Not that some comments aren't indeed in extremely poor judgement and highly offensive. They also do a bit of finger wagging here too.
Personally, I don't find that too offensive (although, should I?) Its the number of uninformed, those ready to visciously attack one's own person, relative or associate, and the mind numbingly dimwitted comments that seem to irk me more than anything.
You can tell a whole lot about a blog from the comments sections.
Congratulations, John! I'll celebrate with a Sam Adams :)
A Yuengling!!!
This is my home page/portal. I come here to learn how be an educated participant in the functioning of my government.
There is no greater gift that could be given to a citizen than to be honestly informed.
Thank you John and everyone!
... for their tireless efforts slaying trolls.
that.
John, congratulations. You were an important voice in a crucial year. Enjoy!!!
OK, I admit I read C & L at least 10 times a day. C & L rocks!
Thank you to everyone who makes C & L happen!
for those early days, pre youtube, where his was the only site to post vids
john is a vlog pioneer
its too bad that the guys who made youtube are now millionaires and not john
Great work! Big congrats to you and the C&L team!
-- Brent
what all the loyal C&Lers already knew.
Congrats!
Bill O'Reilly just said it was another leftwing loon-a-tic blog anyway. And TIME is really a rag that gets by on its legacy rather than the content of its reporting, but hey, congrats anyway!! Nice to know this place is so popular, I understand why.
most here are not wackjob lefties....those guys hang out on kos
of course, loofa boy thinks media matters are a bunch of lefty nutjobs
hes a funny guy
Hardly, they purge all the real progressive types they come across there. Mention a topic that is considered CT and bang banned.
That place is HRC territory, consensual PC group think, and cat diaries.
they lean way far left
although they have moderated more in order to gain more political clout
which that blog certainly has...noting by the size of the readership
i just find it really hard to follow
but it is also a pioneer, in that many rightwing blogs copied its layout
One thing leads to another and dissent on certain topics isnt approved of by certain Kossacks.
if we ever get an independent investigation and the facts bear out a story different from what we've been spoon-fed.
i will PROBABLY accept your apology.
and Puppies and other assorted critters. It's enough to make a person gag.
http://www.chartingstocks.net/2009/02/oh-hill...
Drk, drk....
and its about time
they really have to fix the blog look and slant
and i see that sullivan is the only mod-right wing blog mentioned...which makes sense....cuz the wingnuts still really havent figured out the blog thing....they are either total ripoffs of left wing blogs (ie little green footballs doing the vid thing, and badly) or just more wingnut boring skreed (ie, redstate and malkin)
the new media has come of age
bravo
... the right wing blogs censor dissenters as a rule of hand, whereas around here, they're allowed to stay, if they stay civil and don't cross the line.
...the dissent concerns 9/11 !
I've been censored a couple times on that certain subject which doesn't make me very happy, but overall I really enjoy this site and appreciate that this place has a lot of folks with big brains! So, contrats are in order.
As a side note, I didn't realize that John is a pro. musician. Good on ya!
I just wrote to somebody that the blogs are the new Nightly News.
yep...
Most Overrated Blogs
Daily Kos: State of the Nation
http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/ar...
who make this blog my happy hour 24 hours a day.
Just goes to show you.... something.
Congrats for the recognition.
Hey doesn't Joe Klein work for time? Just wondering.
how about expanding the name of the blog to "Crooks, Liars & anti-American, self-loathing, right wing whiners"?
and frequently
this blog has always been about truth seeking
and when people like pelossi, reid and feinstein deserved to be spanked...you can find that spanking here
How about "Crooks, Liars & anti-American, self-loathing, right-wing and pesudo-dem whiners??"
Works just fine.
There's plenty of unscrupulous folks on the Democrat side of the Congressional aisle.
Just look at the laundry list of creeps unfolding in the Stanford scandal.
Crooks and Liars is apropos.
Corruption knows no political allegiance.
Nor does integrity.
8 fucking years of laisez faire capitalism....and of course ponzi schemes popped up everywhere
the bushies knew this shit was going on...and they turned their backs...because it made the economy appear to be booming
more than one Dem in this mess called congress.
Murtha, corrupt pig.
Feinstain...a corporate whore and a disgrace.
Rangel, expect indictment.
Reid...
And every single mutherfucker that voted for telecom immunity and the extension of this Iraq quagmire. That's a trillion dollar black hole too.
This mess is a bi-partisan mess. Mostly due to Democrat spinelessness.
But Dems need to clean house too.
Oh, and it's been more than 8 years too, they been pushing deregulation thru congress since Ronnie Reagan.
The simplest and most effective way to do anything.
.
ask Bristol Palin.
.
I dont see how more conservative people are anti-america, self loathing or whiners. I am more conservative and if asked i would gladly lay down my life to protect the freedom of speech so you can have this blog, how is that anti-american??
Got a sense of humour?
Congratulations. Keep doing the good work so i can keep coming back and arguing the conservative moderate pov.
John, congratulations. You were an important voice in a crucial year. Enjoy!!!
And to everyone else. Nicole, David, Cernig, Susie, Silent Patriot, Heather( that girl works her butt off), Steve Benen(gone but not forgotten. Best wishes Steve) ,bluegal, Mike Finnigan, scarce, and nonny.
This is a testament to our diversity. We call out our own. Thanx everyone.:)
Oh yeah, them too. In fact its a lot of them.
Congrats to John and all involved.
I've learned so much since joining C&L and look forward to learning so much more in the coming year.
So many times, I've laughed, cried, agreed and disagreed, shook my head sadly and applauded vigorously to the posters comments. I only wish I had more time to visit.
Thanks again to everyone who has made this a very special place to visit.
Maestro...
"Unity is strength... when there is teamwork and collaboration, wonderful things can be achieved."
[Mattie Stepanek]
Well deserved recognition. Great blog that keeps getting better.
Praise:
Congrats big time! You guys beat out Daily Kos and almost made the top ten according to this list. I feel somewhat vindicated by this because while it appeared that everyone was tripping over themselves to be a part of the Daily Kos phenomenon, I found refuge in this site which I emailed John about three years ago to tell him I considered C&L to be the CNN Headline News of the blogosphere. The format was simple and clean while others are busy and confusing, and very hard on the eyes. And while I eventually branched out to other sites and check in from time to time, I am working on starting my own humble corner of the blogosphere mansion and can't help but to emulate this video model. The title Vlog Father is a cleaver and well deserved title and as I posted elsewhere John Amato is a hero of mine and there's nothing he can do to get off that short list, not even banning me.
Criticism:
The Great Hillary/Kennedy/Assassination Omission of 2008 brought out some real demons from some of the staff that I found a bit rough and shocking. I consider you guys to be professionals, and apparently so does Times Magazine. Also, I will not go down in flames defending Chris Matthews, but if he must be called "Tweety", from now on I'd leave it to your readers to do so and not the contributors. Just my humble opinion.
Keep up the good work.
i really enjoy this site. thanks for the info./entertainment.
Congratulations!
Crooks and Liars is like political coffee. It gets me going, and without it, the day seems off kilter. I have made this the #1 site I visit daily since 2005. All others pale by comparison.
You are truly in a league of your own John. And I really appreciate that!
Well deserved.
Congrats and thanks for all you do. For the record, I don't need Time or any other corporate outlet to tell me new media has "arrived". I knew that years ago when I started my own news page and have kept running for over ten years now. Keep on rocking the political world with the truth!
Very glad to know you are one of the best blog around. You are always at the right side, keep supporting the real good people of America.I read your blog since you were in the internet, keep your excellent job
eugenefromcanada
You guys are definitely the Fathers of Video Clips Online. I tend to think of "Vlogging" as what Malkin does, and Joshua Marshall does, and Joe Smooth does.
yay.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/17/b...
this couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of bloggers. you guys deserve this recognition and plenty more, too.
every person @ crooks&liars has been so supportive of not only my blog but all the smaller blogs in blogtopia and yes, i coined that phrase.
and c&l is literaly on the top of my "skippy's daily reads" section in my blogroll.
john, mike, nicole, bluegal, david n. & all the other editors of c&l, you guys do a majorly bang up and damned important job, and here's to many more years of your productive output.
Well done!
Personally, I think this blog stinks. AlterNet is a lot more readable and better presented. This blog was more interesting about a year ago. Right now, it is lagging.
Congratulations to John and the Site. Thank you for letting me comment here.
which will be never, I expect to keep coming here every day. It's an unbeatable theme and your source material will outlive all of us.
The only real weakness being overzealous moderation. If anyone dares stray too far from the 'accepted' party line on a specific subject, they are labeled a 'rightie' by the frequent posters/trolls, and attacked viciously. And if they dare respond in kind, they are threatened with banning.
I don't normally buy into the whining about politically-correct censorship, but I've seen it here, and been victim of it. I agree with the majority here 99 percent of the time, but I've learned to keep my mouth shut when I don't, or be bullied and harrassed and threatened into silence.
Rules of conduct should apply equally to all, regardless of their politics or opinion.
Shut your pie-hole.
The moderation is totally appropriate.
Number "One"...that's "Numero Uno"! That's fitting. It's perfect. I send all of my musician friends to Crooks and Liars whenever they want to know what the "real truth" is all about. Thanks and congratulations. Please, never give up. You are NUMBER ONE for a reason.
The Geezers Rock!
Login or Register to post comments.