Morgan is still finding it hard to accept the truth:
Oh, as an aside, Vox, another reason I have a hard time buying your argument that you don’t *really* want to be published in the mainstream is because of your reaction to the failed syndication of your column. You’ll probably say now that you don’t really care that the syndication fell through, but the fact that you even tried to get syndicated is proof that you do really wish you had a forum beyond this blog.
What Morgan and almost everyone who reads my political column don’t realize is that the most recent and failed syndication by Universal Press Syndicate was the THIRD time I was nationally syndicated. Fourth, actually, if you want to stretch the definition.
The first time was with Chronicle Features, which syndicated my game review column back in 1992. They only managed to place it in 13 newspapers, ranging from the Boston Globe and Atlanta Journal/Constitution to my personal favorite, the North Bay Nugget. The reason most editors wouldn’t pick it up was because they knew that no one wanted to read about video games….
The second time was when Universal Press Syndicate bought Chronicle Features, dropped a number of their columnists and kept my video game column. Despite their supposedly greater sales power, they didn’t manage to sell it to a single additional newspaper. When they finally gave up on that syndication, the Atlanta Journal/Constitution contacted me and asked me to continue contributing to them, which I did. Some of their sister papers asked them if they could get me to agree to release the column to the Cox News Wire; I did and this is the not-really-syndication to which I referred. It’s also what saw the column appearing not infrequently in the same Star Tribune that had turned it down as a non-starter before it got started in the Pioneer Press.
So, I was extremely dubious when UPS contacted me and wanted to syndicate my WND column, seeing me as an eventual replacement for William F. Buckley. UPS only syndicates 10 columnists, including Ann Coulter, and they chose me over Eric Alterman, Jonah Goldberg and others they were considering. Since it cost me nothing to let them have another whack at it and since my column was running a strong second to Ann Coulter’s at the time, it seemed like a good idea, theoretically.
However, since I happened to slightly know two editorial page editors at the St. Paul Pioneer Press, I was pretty sure that there was almost no chance that a genuine libertarian would be allowed to crack the mainstream op/ed pages. The Dallas Morning News actually bought the column, but before the first column had even run there, they cancelled their order. UPS said that the most common reason given for rejecting the column was that the language was over the heads of their readers, so they asked me to dumb it down. As I mentioned before, I experimented with rewriting my WND column for three or four weeks, then told them that I wasn’t interested in doing so.
They finally gave up on the column about six months later when the syndicate’s editor called me and admitted that my original skepticism had been proven entirely correct, and we parted on friendly terms. He’s a good guy – a Bears fan – and I’m only sorry that they wasted a fair bit of effort on something with such a low probability of success.
As for the theorized jealousy factor, Jonah Goldberg is having 10 times the success of Malkin and Shapiro combined, and when have you ever heard me harsh on him? While I certainly disagree with him on a number of issues, he’s not a charlatan like the other two and generally deserves the reading that Ms Research-free and Captain Obvious don’t.
I write my column and this blog because I enjoy writing them; when I cease to do so, I will stop without thinking twice about it. The other thing Morgan fails to understand is that by and large, I believe the die is already cast and that Americans basically deserve what they’re going to be getting in the near future. I know very well that most people have no desire to hear what I’m saying, and I accepted that long before I wrote my first op/ed.
If I wanted a successful syndication, I’d simply write Republican talking points and slap Spacebunny’s picture at the top. I’d be getting offers to appear on Fox News within three months. But if I’m going to sell my soul, I’d much rather produce Strip Club Tycoon, hang out with loads of strippers and make 500x the money.