I started Honest Graft with the self-justification that it would be worthwhile even if almost nobody read the posts. For one thing, I often find that writing about a subject helps me figure out what I think about it. Developing a habit of posting regularly about current events more or less as they occurred would compel me to form a point of view on what was going on. I reasoned that this might help me understand politics better, might spark ideas for research, or at least might leave me an electronic paper trail of contemporary analysis that might be useful later on for recalling what important political moments felt like at the time.
In the fall of 2015, I was also an assistant professor with two book projects in progress but no publishing contracts in hand and no certainty of receiving tenure. Practicing my non-academic thinking and writing skills seemed like a prudent use of my limited spare time, in case my academic career didn't work out and I needed to find another job.
Happily, my professional luck improved soon afterwards. Matt Grossmann and I placed Asymmetric Politics with Oxford University Press that December, and the following spring Cambridge University Press mercifully rescued Red Fighting Blue from indefinite purgatory at another publisher. But I kept the blog going even after my promotion: it was rewarding to do, plus American politics had entered an unusually eventful phase that generated a constant stream of fodder for contemplation.
Blogging is much less fashionable than it used to be, and that's a shame. The social media platforms that have mostly supplanted it are an inferior replacement in many respects except the ability to trade quick interactions with friends in other places. Social media too often encourages hit-and-run hot takes or cheap shots at the expense of developing a nuanced line of thought, it rewards trite pandering to partisan or ideological claques, and it has fostered a distinctively adolescent prevailing culture of behavior that is alienating to anyone who prefers a drier, less dramatic style of expression. As its consciously retro and amateurish visual design scheme symbolizes, Honest Graft is a bit of a throwback, but it's still been a lot of fun. I would recommend blogging to anyone who's considered it—especially academics looking for a way to apply their knowledge and skills to topics of contemporary interest.
Honest Graft has introduced me to many people whom I might never have otherwise gotten the chance to meet. Thank you to everyone who's been a regular or occasional reader, shared a post with friends or followers, or passed along a response or a compliment. I appreciate it all, and you've made the blog a very unexpected success. While too many people to name have been extraordinarily supportive over the years, I want to take the occasion of this anniversary to express my gratitude to two great friends of Honest Graft.
The first is John Sides, the co-founder of the Monkey Cage and a professor at Vanderbilt University. John has been a patron of HG from its inception, reprinting some early posts at the Monkey Cage when I was still new to blogging. The Monkey Cage has stood for years as a monument to the value of public engagement, giving specialist scholars a platform to share their expertise with wider audiences to mutual benefit, and both it and John's own scholarship and analysis have set an exemplary standard for those of us who follow.
And nobody has been a more loyal and enthusiastic benefactor than my good friend Jonathan Bernstein of Bloomberg Opinion. Many readers over the past five years discovered HG from one of his links—which makes me proud, because it means that they were reading a sharp and skillful observer of current events who boasts the rare combination of intellectual mastery and outstanding intuitive political judgment. I'm very grateful for his encouragement and generosity.
Thanks again to all of you for clicking and reading, and let's see where the next five years take us...