The state of conservative media

We've come a long way. We have a long way to go.

Conservative reporters
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In the beginning, long ago, before the rise of talk radio, cable TV, and blogs, the liberal-leaning mainstream media was the only game in town. This began to change with the rise of magazines like William F. Buckley's National Review, and sped up in the 1980s with Rush Limbaugh, in the 1990s with Fox News, and in the 2000s with sites like Red State, to name just a few important outlets.

When conservative bloggers began fact-checking Dan Rather's report on George W. Bush's Texas Air National Guard service, utterly undermining what might otherwise have become the defining narrative of the 2004 presidential campaign, alternative media (which perhaps first made its bones when Matt Drudge helped force the Monica Lewinsky scandal into the mainstream) seemed to have arrived as a vital force in the American political and media landscape.

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Matt K. Lewis

Matt K. Lewis is a contributing editor at TheWeek.com and a senior contributor for The Daily Caller. He has written for outlets including GQ Politics, The Guardian, and Politico, and has been cited or quoted by outlets including New York Magazine, the Washington Post, and The New York Times. Matt co-hosts The DMZ on Bloggingheads.TV, and also hosts his own podcast. In 2011, Business Insider listed him as one of the 50 "Pundits You Need To Pay Attention To Between Now And The Election." And in 2012, the American Conservative Union honored Matt as their CPAC "Blogger of the Year." He currently lives in Alexandria, Va.