Yesterday I did some housekeeping. One of the things I did was something I had never done before in the nearly ten year history of this blog: I banned some IP addresses for comment-spamming. So far I have banned a dozen or so individual IP addresses (mostly originating in China or Poland) and it seems to have decreased the amount of comment spam I’m receiving considerably which, in turn, reduces the load my blog places on my web server. We’ll see if that holds up over time.
I also began to prune the extensive list of blogs I keep track of. My blogroll is pretty selective but the list of blogs that I read is quite extensive.
It used to be the case that I checked every blog in that list at least once a week but in the last couple of years my reading has become much more limited. When I went back over my list I was saddened with the large number of blogs that no longer existed or hadn’t posted recently. I suppose some of the authors have moved their attention to Twitter or Facebook but I suspect that most have simply fallen away.
One of the sites I visited, still active, consists mostly of a list of blogs that post on local politics. I went through the list and was shocked at how many Chicagoland and Illinois blogs were no longer active.
If anyone has any suggestions for Chicagoland or Illinois blogs, I’d appreciate it. I only know of a fairly limited number of local bloggers (Lexington Green and Carl from Chicago of Chicago Boyz, Blackfive, Rick Moran of Right Wing Nut House, Mark Safranski of Zenpundit, One Man’s Thoughts). I’m acquainted with several of them. I also know of one Illinois blog (CapitolFax). The rest are inactive.
Does anyone know of any other Chicagoland or Illinois blogs I should be reading?
How about political or economics blogs?
I don’t much care what their ideology or political orientation is as long as they’re sane, well-written, and produce original content.
You might already know this one:
http://socialdemocracy21stcentury.blogspot.com/?m=0
I can think of two you might find interesting:
Bleeding Heart Libertarians
Crooked Timber
I didn’t give the links lest the spam catcher catch me, but google is your friend.
Rod Dreher-Social cons are the GOP base and I think exposure to them would be good. He doesnt write as much politics nowadays, but still writes about gay marriage, contraception and such.
Interfluidity- Smart guy. Doesnt write often.
Money Illusion- Sorta think you already read Sumner.
Cafe Hayek- Real libertarians.
Steve
Ben Wolf:
Thanks. He’s a bit more into book reports than the blogs I usually read but his perspective is worth following.
sam:
Those are both in my list.
Steve:
Other than Rod Dreher those are all in my list. I’ve read Dreher’s stuff from time to time. Maybe I should look again.
Nice piece on John Boyd.
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/john-boyds-art-of-war/
Capital Fax is pretty much the only Illinois-themed blog I read weekly. Its readership appears to include a lot of government/ former-government types, so the comments can be illuminating. Most of these types of blogs have difficulty posting weekly and are quickly forgotten.
I will check in on Eric Zorn and Russ Stewart occasionally. Illinois Review is where the Conservatives in perpetual (and perhaps desired) exile post (as I write this, their front page contains both birtherism and Obama compared with Hitler), but on topics of ‘internecine primary warfare’ or ‘what the heck were they thinking?’ its can be interesting.
I’d be remiss if I did not mention Ordinary Times (where I contribute) as a (largely) political blog.
@Trumwill, is that the right link? It goes to a personal fitness blog. Dave has The League of Ordinary Gentlemen on his blogroll, though perhaps he should update the name. I’m still getting used to the new format and I wish some of your co-bloggers could write more succinctly more frequently (i’m cheating between work tasks here), but its definitely a quality blog.