Part II: Re-blogging

The last few months have been busy with school and work, so I haven't had the time to blog. But I'd like to give this a shot again. It's been fascinating blogging. I've been an avid internet consumer since the end of the early days of it, in the mid 1990s, but creating even a tiny, niche blog like this and following very closely its traffic -- how people are finding the site, what posts they're interested in, and what geographical areas/domain names they're coming from, has given me a new perspective.

I started the blog because: a) I wanted some perspective on the internet from a content-producer perspective, b) micro-histories of institutions fascinate me, and c) there are some questions about Kenyon's history and alumni, in particular, that I've become more interested in since I graduated.

Which brings me to the specific motivation for why I'm reblogging.

Earlier today, I was googling for Mao's policy on drug addiction. I came across this article on it: the condensed answer seems to be that he managed to reduce drug addiction and drug use more generally via shooting drug sellers and users. So I clicked on the home page for The New Atlantis, a conservative periodical, and the first name I saw was that of a Kenyon College classmate of mine. (Hi, Jeremy Axelrod! Congrats on the article.)

This seems to happen a lot: pick a conservative movement or institution, find a Kenyon College grad. Tea Party Movement? Here's John M. O'Hara, '06, talking to Jon Stewart about his new tea party book: he also blogs for Andrew Breitbart. Charles Stimson is at Heritage, Stephanie Hessler at Manhattan, Hillel Ofek at National Affairs and is affiliated with the Claremont Institute. ACORN criticism? Daniel Z. Epstein contributed to this report on ACORN from the Republicans on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Like I wrote about before, Kenyon grads founded American Thinker, there's a Kenyon grad at the white nationalist site vdare,

Evan McLaren is at Taki's Magazine. Sarah Longwell went from ISI to lobbyist Rick Berman's organizations. David Donadio is the managing editor of Doublethink, where David Skinner, former editor at the Weekly Standard, used to hang out. There was, of course, the Taylor Somers incident, which got my blog traffic to spike to about 10 - and he hasn't even graduated yet. Chris Brose, of course, was a speechwriter for the Bush administration and is now on the McCain staff. Kenyon went for Kerry in '04, but the Press Secretary for the Republican National Convention 2004 was a Kenyon graduate, and so was Alex Novak, the publicist for the Swift Boat book and co-founder of the Kenyon Observer: he is at Regnery. In 2008, guess who was the Deputy Director of the RNC Convention? Yes, a Kenyon grad. Advising the Romney campaign? Working on finances for the Romney campaign and now for the Boston Republican Party? Kenyon Kenyon Kenyon, etc.

Trust me when I say there is no analogue on the left. There's Zack Space the blue dog Democrat. There's Matthew Segal, who started making a name for himself fighting for the voting rights of that most disenfranchised group, college students, after the 2004 voting lines in Gambier. There's Pia Catton, who made it into Matt Taibbi's

Wimblehack!: The search for America's worst campaign journalist has begun. She's now the Life Editor of Politico. Politico is not generally describes as partisan: while it has been described as a right-wing cesspool, I think it's just hackish. Beyond that? Kenyon Bulletin profiled two recent grads, one for the Republican one for the Democratic governor's association, so we'll see how that goes. Kenyon grad Will Bower is a PUMA leader, and I don't even know how to characterize that particular ball of crazy, but it could be argued that puts him on the left. Not argued very persuasively, though: his last article for HuffPo was entitled An Open Letter to Secretary Clinton: Save Us from Obama. There's a former Democratic Senate staffer, and another former Democratic staffer who left because of pedophilia charges. There's Jeff Bridges, who left Democratic politics for Divinity School. Nida Chaudhary, who left the DNC for the DOE. The situation is not comparable: there are fewer Kenyon grads in the Democratic Party or leftist movement, particularly among writers, pundits, and the leadership. And two of the highest-profile - Space and Bower - aren't liberal to the extent that most of the folk in the last paragraph are conservatives.

Given that the Kenyon student body has a significantly higher proportion of Democrats than Republicans, and liberals than conservatives, I think it bears asking: what the hell is going on with our alumni? My ideas include:

1. Kenyon, because it's known for being conservative-friendly, attracts a core of students who are already very conservative.

2. Kenyon nurtures conservatives better than it nurtures liberals. (See, the Kenyon Observer compared to the much more marginal Kenyon Voice.)

3. Liberals at Kenyon don't make a particularly strong case for liberalism, possibly because it's the status quo; conservatives make a stronger case for conservatism.

At any rate, this continues to interest me, as do a few other bits of Kenyon microhistory. I'm planning on blogging when I get the chance. Also, I'd really like to interview some of these people, so if you found this via a google alert for your name or similar means, e-mail me at kenyonalumniinthenews@gmail.com.