Missouri Record Review!!!

I've always contended that EVERYTHING humans do is ruled by ideology . . . From watching our favorite lame-ass TV show to what clothes we wear . . . Search closely enough and a set of political principles and beliefs can be found at play.

To wit, a recent blog war over The Missouri Record represents yet another death rattle from print media and not anything close to a balanced perspective on the endeavor.

Here's a bit of background on the pouty post from The Pitch on the subject 0f a new Missouri online publication. . . UNDER THE RADAR THE PITCH IS IN WORSE SHAPE THAN THE STAR ACCORDING TO STAFFERS GRUMBLING TO ANYONE WHO WILL LISTEN AT LOCAL HIPSTER BARS!!! They have fired people, taken away hours, they're looking to aggregate user generated content rather than pay writers . . . It really is a mess over there as all of Village Voice media seems to want to go the way of Facebook and abandon their Independent Newspaper Chain roots. But I digress . . .

The Missouri Record is touted as an online journal of opinion regarding politics and policy. It's really a Centre-right website . . . And there's nothing wrong with that . . . Especially considering that centre-right is the way that Kansas City has voted for most of modern political history.

There are a lot of things that impress me about the online journal's debut but here are the most important:

The design is sweet and looks like it took more thought that the average online endeavor . . . I'm a big fan of gradients.

The Pitch really shows their ignorance by characterizing Patrick Tuohey as "a Washington, D.C.-trained political operative." He's the dude who was the spokesman to beat light-rail . . . Again. And in my brief conversations with him, what I saw was an extremely smart guy, new to this town who was a Republican but could work better with most rabidly liberal Democrats than most elected officials in this cowtown. Seriously, if Mayor Funky would have hired this guy instead of Jeff Roe's stooge . . . Maybe he wouldn't be finding himself facing recall and essentially a lame duck.

Again, I think the centre-right stance in Missouri holds merit because it speaks to the ethos of this State. Additionally, what's missing here is a bit of reporting that THERE'S A NEW STATE WIDE NEWS, OPINION JOURNAL PUBLISHING ORIGINAL CONTENT!!! Again, pouty print people may be justifiably worried because this makes them even more irrelevant.

Finally, to me this online publication shows a bit of progress because it offers a bit of a middle-ground between Obama-worshiping Democrats and the reactionary Republican do-nothing set that's quickly losing power in the real world and only holds on to the most rural and backward areas of Missouri by default. In that sense, The Missouri Record could be one of the best places to read up on state wide issues without the cultural war circus that makes most discussions useless.

As an Internet denizen . . . Unlike backward print people I realize that the more folks taking this online thing seriously . . . The better. I've found my niche with rumors, gossip, smart ass comments, KC breaking news and bit of slapstick all mashed up and served with a healthy portion of cheesecake . . .



So, unlike print folks afraid for their jobs . . . I welcome a new perspective discussing local and statewide issues with far less political and emotional baggage than the average big media reporter and that's why I don't mind adding The Missouri Record to my daily list of reads.