One of the two hardest-working, conservative, female bloggers (how’s that for a micro-niche?) packed up her pixels and migrated to a new cyber-home this week, where she’ll have a chance to build a much bigger audience.
There are two group blogs that I visit every every day: “Contentions” at Commentary Magazine’s website, and “The Corner” at National Review Online. Each site has a handful of steady conservative bloggers who, collectively, can be counted on to serve up something topical and thought-provoking on a daily basis. Each has been dominated by a prolific female blogger: Jennifer Rubin at Contentions and Kathryn Lopez (“K-Lo”) at The Corner. Their writing is informed and shaped in part by their religious backgrounds (Jewish and Catholic, respectively).
Rubin in particular amazes me with her output. I struggle to post on my blog more than once or twice a week, and every post seems to turn into a three hour project. Yes, I have a full-time job, whereas blogging is her full-time job. But Rubin can write faster than I can type — she posts substantial, well-researched essays several times a day. I’ve quoted her at length several times, including here and here.
On the Washington Post homepage today I noticed a link reading “New blog: Right Turn by Jennifer Rubin.” How about that, I thought — there’s another blogger named Jennifer Rubin, and it looks like she may be a righty. But of course it’s the same person… somehow I had missed her farewell post at Contentions on Tuesday. She now joins George Will and Charles Krauthammer as another good reason to check in on the WaPo regularly. The difference is, those guys produce one (Krauthammer) or two (Will) columns a week. Rubin has posted 20 times since her inaugural missive on Tuesday.
I’ll always have a fond spot in my heart for K-Lo as well. This blog’s first significant traffic spike came at her expense. If she noticed me at the time, I hope she’s not still upset.