It's been called Marcottegate, L'Affaire Marcotte, and the Pandagonization of John Edwards, and it has bloggers talking -- left, right, feminist, non-feminist, and everything in between. And because this story involves U.S. national politics, it got mainstream media talking, too.

Here's a brief overview of events. Senator John Edwards recently hired two bloggers as staffers for his presidential campaign: Amanda Marcotte (Pandagon) and Melissa McEwan (Shakespeare's Sister).

The public figurehead of a conservative religious group then demanded that Edwards fire his bloggers, using charges of anti-Catholicism and foul language, quoting previous posts from their blogs.

These events, and Edwards' delayed reaction in responding, got bloggers whipped into a frenzy. For a left feminist blogger's perspective, see Egalia's brief rundown at Tennessee Guerilla Women.

"The kid's starting to come around"

Politics brings out the funny bone in people, and this latest controversy gave rise to a number of writings, ranging from gentle ribbing to the blogging equivalent of poking someone with a sharp stick.

Ann Althouse invoked The Nasty with Nixon's famous Checkers speech, which one commenter called "incredibly meanspirited, even for Ann."

There's the My Fair Lady parody which, ironically, I need to warn readers contains strong language.

And you have bloggers inviting John Edwards over for cookies, lemonade and a chat to set him straight.

Then there's the satirical piece "Bloggers For Rent" by Dennis Perrin, which is a sort of imaginary job interview. It's chilling in that it cuts too close to the bone to be funny.

My own feeling from reading some left blogs is that they are out of touch with mainstream politics, and have an over-inflated sense of their own importance.

The average Jane in the street either doesn't know about blogs or, if she does, doesn't care about any distinction bloggers make between personal and professional writing.

All the average Jane knows is that someone wrote something inflammatory and insulting to Catholics and put it online, and that person is now working for the Edwards Campaign. I didn't get the sense from the left that they were able to put themselves in other people's shoes when analyzing this controversy.

So let's not lose perspective here. Blogging is still a niche, and the rules of engagement that you and I understand are lost on the average American.

The left blogosphere is in danger of disappearing up its own ass. And you can quote me on that.

Hat-tip: Bitch | Lab

Melinda Casino's personal blog is Sour Duck.

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