The Early Days Of TPM Cafe | Talking Points Memo

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While TPM today is one site at one url, it was once a constellation of sites — TPMMuckracker, TPMDC, TPMtv and TPMCafe.

This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1351368
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I remember the early, early days of the Cafe mostly for the commentary of the members and the calm sense of community. in particular, I remember Melissa, who would every night just draw a quick verbal picture of something relaxing and calming and invite us all to set a spell.

And I remember when Josh pulled the plug on it. I don’t think he was wrong to do so, because we had some members who reportedly were involved in some bad acts in the early days of Obama-Hillary. But for a while it was a very pleasant place to hang out for a while. There were smart people talking about smart things, sure, but there were also people talking about their lives and their day. It may not have been as deep in thought as it could have been, but it was a nice place to be for while.

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Some of what was in the early Cafe now happens in the Hive, but the mix is definitely different.

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Totally miss the original cafe - if anything could come back that would the piece to bring back. While the Hive is the closest thing we have to the original Cafe - its really not even a shadow of what the Cafe was and could have become.

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Yes, I remember that too, there was a wonderful sense of camaraderie. Mostly it was calm, although the many threads about Israel/Palestine issues could hardly be described that way. :grinning:

I chatted with Elizabeth Warren on a few occasions and learned a lot from her, and the guest posts by other political luminaries were always engaging and informative. It was interesting too that in the Cafe people could have their own blogs and were free to write about anything that interested or concerned them. And, I also remember when that freedom was abused and Josh pulled the plug. It was a dark day, although I also understand that he had to do it.

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Probably completely wrong about this, but for a while I was convinced that a regular poster here who wrote under the Pseudonym “Rotwang” was actually Nobel laureate Paul Krugman. The person posting certainly did a good imitation of his writing.

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Really??? Are you talking about the old TPM Cafe or the new and improved version, the Hive?

EDIT: I can’t find that name in a Hive search, which is disappointing, as Krugman’s column in the NYT is a favorite of mine, and he’s an excellent writer.

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The person was commenting for the most part, although from my recollection they wrote a few articles too. Not sure if it was in the Cafe or elsewhere on the site. But it seems like the Cafe would have been the place for that. I’m a little fuzzy on that part. When I responded to them I called them “Perfessor”.
We’re talking maybe 2008 plus or minus a few years.

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Oh. Didn’t Krugman post a couple of time in the old Cafe under his own name? I seem to recall that he did. Maybe he was sending trial balloons to gauge reception on some idea or other, although maybe not b/c in general, he seems to say what he thinks and lets the chips fall…

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Its seems to me that he did, and I think that’s one of the things that led me to the conclusion I drew. “Rotwang” pretty much wrote like Krugman. I wasn’t trying to out them; my nickname was meant to be sort of a sly wink.

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