In recent days, several folks have asked for a clearer description of the kind of discourse that’s acceptable at the Swing State Project, and what’s off-limits. Before I get into that, let me explain my personal feelings on the matter. In my not at all humble opinion, I think SSP is one of the best political sites on the Internet, and has been for a long time. A big part of the reason is the comments section – it’s intelligent, civil, thoughtful, and almost entirely free of fights and flamewars. There are good reasons why it is that way, and there are good reasons why it ought to stay that way.
So why are the comments here so great? Well, for one, just based on the general topic of this blog, we attract a lot of very knowledgeable people. But there are plenty of sites out there with super-smart userbases but comment boards that are a total morass. What makes SSP different is focus. We stay relentlessly focused on one subject and one subject only: political horserace analysis. The discussion is always on-point, and you are bound to learn something from reading the comments to every post. What’s more, I think that precisely because it’s not a free-for-all, people are inclined to be more thoughtful in what they say. And it’s a virtuous circle – good comments foster a good site which attracts more good people to visit.
The other thing that makes SSP so excellent – and this something that is both somewhat subconscious and also the thing that people sometimes have the greatest struggles with – is that we strive to be bloodless. What do I mean by that? I think the best analyses tend to avoid a discussion of personal feelings and emotions. We’re trying to describe the political world as it exists – not as what we wish or hope or fear. When we set aside our own emotions, I think we are at are most accurate and astute. On the flipside, when things become heated and emotional, that is when the conversation is most likely to derail.
Now, I am not at all suggesting we never express a personal preference – that would be ridiculous. But it’s important not to let those personal preferences get in the way of clear-eyed analysis. If you like Candidate A more than Candidate B, it’s crucial to be able to step back and acknowledge that Candidate B has a better shot of winning the primary, if that is in fact the case. The same is true for legislation. We don’t debate legislation on the merits here – there are plenty of other sites for that. But to the extent legislation affects the horserace, we need to be able to stand aside from our own feelings and let the cold hard facts take center stage.
I want to be clear: As far as “bloodlessness” goes, I’m not trying to lay out hard-and-fast rules here. Yes, we do have some rules: stick to the horserace; no insults or ad hominems; support your arguments with facts and links. Those are pretty straightforward. The intersection of analysis and emotion is a lot trickier, and we aren’t robots. And we’re also a partisan site, which means it’s generally going to be okay to bash Republicans (though even there, lines can be crossed). It’s usually on our own side of the fence that we run into trouble – primaries or intramural legislative battles.