The people have spoken and the results are in. No, not in the presidential election. This morning, we hit 30,000,000 views. It is fitting to hit this milestone on election day. We have strived to offer something unique among blogs as a place for civil but passionate discussion of legal and policy issues (and a few wacky stories thrown in). We continue to rank in the top legal blogs in the world and we are continuing to see a growing international readership. We often use these milestones to look at the current profile of the blog and its supporters around the world.
As always, I want to offer special thanks for our weekend contributors: Mike Appleton, Larry Rafferty, Darren Smith, Kimberly Dienes, and Cara Gallagher. I particularly want to thank Darren who has continued to help manage the blog and help out folks who encounter posting problems.
So here is our current profile:
In the last full month, our ten biggest international sources for readers (after the United States) have been:
Canada
United Kingdom
Australia
Germany
France
India
The Netherlands
Mexico
New Zealand
Italy
Welcome to all of our new readers from those countries. I have always found our foreign commentators particularly valuable in giving us an insight from beyond our borders — and domestic media coverage.
The top ten posted in terms of readership in the last 30 days:
1. The Murder of Professor Dan Markel: Confession of Contract Killer Raises Questions Over Role of Wendi Adelson
2. New Disclosures in Murder Of FSU Professor Dan Markel Raise New Questions About Adelson Family More stats
3. Comey Sends Letter To Congress Citing New Evidence (and An Investigation) In The Clinton Email Scandal [UPDATED]
4. Smithsonian Insists That Clarence Thomas Simply Did Not Make The Cut Of Great African Americans At The Opening Of The African American Museum . . . While Anita Hill Did
5. Libertarian Presidential Nominee Gary Johnson Names Top Pick For The Supreme Court . . .
6. Twenty-Five Years Later, Tawana Brawley Tracked Down In Virginia And Hit With Roughly $500,000 Bill
7. Conservative Filmmaker James O’Keefe Suspended By Twitter
8. CNN: It Is Illegal For Voters To Possess Wikileaks Material
9. Reid Alleges That Comey May Have Violated Federal Law In Disclosure To Congress
10. “They Wanted To Get Away With It”: Newly Released Emails Show Rising Alarm Over Clinton Aides Withholding Information On Email Scandal
The most frequent commentators in the last 1000 comments were:
swarthmoremom
Autumn
edm
Squeeky Fromm, Girl Reporter
Paul Schulte
tnash80hotmailcom
Michael AarethunThank you to all of our regular commentators. We remain an extraordinarily broad and diverse body of commenters from different parts of the world and different political and social backgrounds. Thanks again.
We are currently around 22,000 followers on Twitter. It actually puts us at near the top of legal commentator twitter accounts.
Thanks again to those who try to keep our discussions passionate but civil. We obviously have relapses into personal attacks, particularly during this poisonous political season. However, for those who refuse to succumb to childish name calling and juvenile digs, our success remains largely to your efforts. We have had a lot of trolls and hacks targeting the blog, particularly from the respective two political extremes in this election. They have been unsuccessful in harassing and obstructing the discussion for the most part. What remains is worth the effort. There remains a core of people in this country that want to speak objectively about the problems in our country — both legal and political. Some have found their way to this blog and I hope more will join them. We hope that this forum can remain a pluralistic and open forum for mature people to engage in mature discussions. Such discussions have never been more important.
Thanks again everyone and congratulations on the latest milestone.
I waited a while until Nov 13th which seemed fitting but as I suspected the amount of whackos has diminished and as DBB said and The Professor serious commentary has returned.
Exit polls and after election polls were very instructive especially the one showing the down turn in voters from the very same groups now protesting and the uptick gains in voter groups who were characterized as giving M2F to the opposite side. the middle area has plenty of meat and potatoes from will the Republicans go leftist again now WE have saved their party or will the Trump influence teach them to dance with those who brought them not those who bought them. I see no sign of lessons learned from the left which is just as well. Better next time to swat a group that comes at you dumbed down and non-cognizant of anything except doing the same thing over again.
Is there room for improvement? Yes but also for massive repair and maintenance. How to deal with a true nearer to 85% employment rate coupled to a 20 trillion dollar debt load without being forced into an inflationary cycle leading to more devaluation and it’s deadly at this point effect on the elderly. Well one way is spread the wealth for those most negatively affected – The elderly who cannot go back to work even if their were jobs besides Walmart. So instead of paying failed vote buying maybe increase the COLA a bit by especially if another inflationary cycle is involved. I’m not entirely sure of the answer but the outcome of the Obama policies showed the elderly were specifically targeted.
The rest is a relationship of the usual Econ 101 factors which a tax reduction wouldn’t hurt and would help. Far more than inflationary $15 an hour minimum mistakes and must take into account the phaseout phasein of the equally disastrous Obamacare and a rebuild of the military. This time hopefully giving weight to the actual shooters and combat support people than the pencil pushers in the rear.
Thus having laid out the beginnings what are the chances the Republicans have learned their lessons or shall we keep pounding them ahd hope for a name change under Trump and some of those already in office to Constitutional Republic Party.
Ishould prove interesting but I’m not holding my breath and I am keeping my powder dry.
Its a viewpoint but many of the commenters belong in Bedlam.