The New Blue Media: How Michael Moore, Moveon.org, Jon Stewart and Company Are Transforming Progressive Politics

The penetrating?and entertaining?story of the rise of a new generation of liberal media figures, from Jon Stewart and Michael Moore to MoveOn and the blue blogosphere.

The last decade brought a sea change in the American media landscape: while mainstream news outlets generally endorsed the Bush/Cheney worldview and later the administration's line on the Iraq War and the war on terror, an astonishing number of Americans?millions and millions, in fact?began getting their news from The Daily Show and The Colbert Report instead.

With a combination of technological savvy, irreverent humor, and acerbic critique, a handful of media personalities, blogs, outlets, and politically based organizations?from The Onion to Jon Stewart to the Daily Kos?are transforming American politics and culture, and the stories of where these outlets came from and how they got so powerful are just as entertaining as watching them in action. In this crisp, engaging account, journalist and historian Theodore Hamm chronicles the humble and often surprising origins of the people, the publications, and the netroots pioneers that are now household names. He also brilliantly illuminates how this "New Blue Media" both drew upon the traditional strategies of the left and also developed new ones in order to create a wholly innovative media movement.

From Michael Moore's fight with Disney to bring Fahrenheit 9/11 to movie theaters across America to the controversy surrounding MoveOn.org's hardhitting critique of Iraq War commander General David Petraeus, the stories of the battles, triumphs, setbacks, and strategies are all here. Up-to-the-minute, whip-smart, and highly entertaining, The New Blue Media is an indispensable guide to the contemporary progressive media in America.