to some flying-monkey minion of Kleinheider's over at your vaunted NashvilleisTalking.com:

OK, so I didn't quite get the guy's name, but I think I can be excused for that; I don't spend a lot of time poring over the letters in the name of a guy who claims his last gig was as the proprietor of a weblog called "Hard Right."

I noticed another URL leading to Volunteer Voters was a stem off WKRN.com:

(link...)

So I think I can be excused for believing he's an official representative of WKRN.

Secondly, I found his weblog using Google, and noticed a quite prominent link to WKRN on the Volunteer Voters home page. Sure didn't see anything about "Nashville is Talking" there. If you guys are going to endorse this fellow, you might ought to ask him to mention you in the verbiage on his "About" page, because right now his website gives every appearance that he's the only officially endorsed blogger for WKRN. Doesn't help much when his former weblog, "Hard Right," discusses his "new gig" with WKRN at length and links directly to VolunteerVoters.com.

And I'm entitled to call him a hack when he claims his weblog is for the purpose of political discussion in Tennessee, and he has not one iota of credibility for representing the progressive community which is alive and well in Nashville. Furthermore, nearly every blogger on his blogroll (Les Jones, Bill Hobbs, Say Uncle) is a right-winger.

Nope. I'm just out here making wild claims without one shred of evidence to back them up. Guess again, sister.

A bit more info for Brittney, who I'm sure is reading this: You'll notice the front page of KnoxViews provides a space for any blogger who'd like to post a diary. It's a way of keeping things, you know, egalitarian. Not that right-wingers like Kleinheider would know anything about such a concept.

However, as I just posted to your buddy Brittney over at NashvilleisTalking (guess I'm going to have to go back over there so I can cut and paste, even though I've sworn off News 2 till they fire Steve Gill...sigh)

I'm not sure *you* understand. What I'm saying is that VolunteerVoters.com is easily Google-able; that it's full of links to WKRN.com, which could easily give the casual reader the idea that it's the official blog for WKRN.com - an idea also supported by the fact that it's actually hosted on News2WKRN.com; and that it mentions no other WKRN blogs whatsoever.

Sure, get all santimonious and call ME out for being ignorant. I have no idea what dog you have in this fight, but if I were you I'd have a long talk with my boss about the way the weblog system on WKRN.com is organized. And about the fact that it's going to take some fancy steppin' to pacify Nashville progressives over the fact that Steve Gill is now on the WKRN payroll.

(What the hell am I doing here? I don't even watch News 2, and won't as long as Gill's there, and now I'm posting on its weblog? Think I better go rinse my keyboard down with Lysol and ammonia.)

Frankly, Mr. Kleinheider, I don't plan to read your weblog because I'm not interested in the right-wing POV on most issues. No disrespect to you personally. Of course you have every right to link to whomever you like, but I think WKRN should have you mention there are other weblogs available that are hosted by its site if it hopes to avoid stirring up a few folks who are already mightily pissed off over the Steve Gill thing.

Personally, I'm not convinced WKRN gives a flip. It wouldn't have hired Gill if it did. I just think it's pretty hilarious this Brittney person claims to be representing some political designation that's not-"Hard Right" - yet she's all over my ass for being pissed off that it looks for all the world like you are the sole WKRN blogger and you make no pretense about your rightward-leaning sympathies. I'd think she'd have bigger fish to fry, like the wholesale corruption and cynicism that's running rampant in the Tennessee GOP these days.

"Actually he could add it himself, and actually any registered user could as well using the 'create local link' option."

I did, but someone took it down.

What are you so bent out of shape about? As a "lefty," I'd think you'd be happy as hell people would be furious over WKRN hiring Steve Gill, and threatening to write letters to management complaining about their lurch to the right. But then, it seems they're the ones signing your paycheck, and that must be why you're so hell-bent on defending them.

Are you disputing what I'm saying? That VolunteerVoters.com is full of links to WKRN; that it's hosted on their server; that it mentions you - or any other WKRN blogs - not at all; and that it'd be easy for anyone stumbling on it using Google to assume Mr. Kleinheider is their sole blogger?

You know, this'd be laughable if it weren't so pathetic. Go ahead, call yourself a "lefty" and defend Steve Gill and his Republican apologists. Let him make fun of progressive and liberal ideas, endorse all kinds of wrongheaded and corrupt policies, get people to believe his BS, and then scratch your head and wonder for the life of you why Democrats in this state can't get anybody elected. Here's a clue: it's because of people like you.

I freely admit to not having looked at NashvilleisTalking, mostly because I was only vaguely aware it existed before someone here mentioned it and I clicked over to take a look - only to find this Brittney had already cut/pasted my post here onto the front page of her weblog and was commenting, I thought unfairly, about it. I also noticed a Channel 2 logo listed prominently on the first page. I wouldn't have read anything at all there, much less posted, except that I noticed my post on the front page and that Brittney was having a good laugh at my supposed ignorance.

I meant what I said about refusing to watch Channel 2 until Gill's gone. I think my views are being misrepresented here; I surely don't hate all Republicans, and in fact am friends with, patronize, and am related to a few. But Gill is not a mainstream Republican. He's called Democrats terrorists on national television; I personally heard him threaten to murder a person who removed trash from a construction site on his property, back when he was broadcasting on WWTN; he routinely says hateful, inflammatory and generally untrue things about Democrats and liberals in general; he's an apologist for the Bush Administration's morally bankrupt positions on everything from environmental protection to defense spending...in general, he's hardly the person I'd think a news organization would turn to in the interest of presenting truthful, unbiased material.

So I'm supposed to pretend I think that's just fine, when I think people like Steve Gill are actively contributing to the deterioration of society, and of our very democracy? When Channel 2 has hired him as its chief political commentator, without saying much about his radical-right past, and without hiring anyone to balance out his views? Heck, I didn't say I was going to go burn down Gill's house; I said I was going to write a letter to the owner of WKRN, which I have every right to do.

I think I've made a pretty good case for believing what I did about VolunteerVoters.com. I'll grant you I've not spent a lot of time reading either VolunteerVoters or NashvilleisTalking, because a.) I don't read Republican weblogs like VV, and don't understand quite why anyone whose politics are akin to Karl Marx is telling me I should do so; b.) my first exposure to NiT was its proprietor casting aspersions on my intentions and intelligence, and c.) I'm boycotting News 2. It doesn't surprise me, frankly, that WKRN's employees are taking me to task for doing so; however, I do think I have the right also to point out that they are hardly disinterested observers, since they're paid by News 2.

Now, I realize not everyone who reads KnoxViews is a progressive Democrat; consequently I don't expect many of y'all to agree with me, and I'm completely prepared to take my licks from those of you who don't go along with things I say here. I've been known to actively participate in conversations with those who hold opposing views, so obviously I don't agree with the characterization of myself as a reactionary who's uninterested in hearing the other sides of issues.

I'll grant you there's even some content on NashvilleisTalking I wouldn't hate, probably. But don't expect me to be hap-hap-happy its proprietor pretty well made fun of me in print without bothering to get my side of the story first (you know, she could have posted her comment here, instead of making it into a front-page post on her own weblog), and then was a real witch about it when I mentioned a few (justified, I think) reasons I posted what I did.

Now, chris, we can't let facts, tolerance, and reading comprehension get it in the way of speaking truth to power. I mean, someone has to stand up to Chimpy McHitlerburton's vast right wing conspiracy! For the children.

---
SayUncle
Can't we all just get a long gun?

Yeah, I know, Biz. The sad truth is that I am too, sometimes. ;) I will say this for Les and Unc: their positions are pretty consistent, and sometimes I do actually learn something from one of 'em.

Whoops! There I go patronizing Les again...must've been something I ate...;)

Just so you know, Kleinheider includes Tennessee Guerilla Women, and other leftists, in his aggregator. He also regularly links to posts from my blog which are very frequently critical of Bush, Rumsfeld, etc.

Also, I don't think anybody has pointed out that Britteny Gilbert, Kleinheider's blog sister does include Knoxviews in its aggregator.

P.S. Anybody who spends two minutes reading Kleinheider's blog knows that the notion that he is some sort of Bush-worshipping, Republican hack is idiotic. 

I think absolutely that KV should be a link on VV's
page, and vice versa, but I ain't about to tell either
proprietor how to run their sites.

OK, owing to popular demand, I will start the healing now. The link has been added.

(Actually it was there for a while before, but got removed for a variety of reasons explained elsewhere. Clark Stooksbury said he added it originally, but I thought I had. It isn't my policy to delete links added by someone else, unless they are obviously spam or inappropriate according to the rules, so apologies to Clark.)

I note that my invitation for a reader or A.C. himself to add the link went unanswered. Do I have to do everything around here? :)