Top Comments: Steve Soto on Daily Kos, part 1

It was the last day in September, 2002, and Yahoo News was reporting that embattled New Jersey Senator Robert Toricelli would announce his decision that afternoon on whether he'd withdraw his candidacy for re-election a mere 36 days from then on November 5th. This was big news, and Steve Soto made his first appearance right after a commenter named Zak suggested Bill Bradley as a replacement :

Zak stole my thunder. Why not Bradley? It's not like he's going to run for President again, right? And he would be a cinch compared against Forrester. With Clinton out of the White House and McCain/Feingold addressing some of the unpleasantness he found in politics, he may be induced to come back for a term or two. He's still young, and can be a player once again.

Posted by Steve Soto at September 30, 2002 01:07 PM

As it turned out, we ended up with a different former Democratic senator, Frank Lautenberg—the following comment was Markos reporting that Bradley had "emphatically refused to be considered". But we also ended up with Steve Soto: a win/win situation. Steve's many 2002 comments are all linked to over the jump.

When Steve Soto wrote his first comment as the third quarter of 2002 was ending, Daily Kos was barely four months old, and the mid-term election was fast approaching. Steve continued commenting in October and through the rest of the year. Nearly five months after his first appearance in the comments, and a mere seven weeks after his first guest post, he started The Left Coaster. It was Markos who let the cat out of the bag in Steve Soto has a new blog:

dKos comment board denizen and regular guest contributor Steve Soto finally has his own blog.

Go say 'hi'.

www.theleftcoaster.com

The site is still active and has its own archival system, if you want to look up Steve's posts there. He's been on sabbatical since December, so don't look for new posts until the sabbatical ends sometime next month.

As was true with Billmon, whom I profiled last month, virtually all of Steve Soto's comments on Daily Kos were made in the days before Scoop, when Movable Type software ran the blog. This site was archived in place, but there are no search capabilities in the archive, and comments are displayed in a separate window. There isn't a way to externally link to a particular comment in the thread, only to the entire thread itself. One purpose of this diary is to make a start on linking to all the comment threads containing at least one comment from Steve.

Although Steve opened his own blog in February 2003, he still sometimes commented on Daily Kos. As the other Movable Type guest bloggers had all opened accounts under Scoop, Steve was the last to do so, and he has only made five comments since then: two in 2004, two in 2005, and his last on August 4, 2006.

Below, I've listed the linked diary titles (all written by Markos) for all posts that Steve Soto commented on, and then a link to the comment thread with the number of comments Steve made in it. For Open Threads, I haven't bothered to link to the diary, just the comment thread.

September 30:
  • Toricelli calling it quits? has two comments
  • NJ Dems have GOP boxed in has two comments

October 3:
  • What's up with Gephardt? has five comments

October 4:
  • 401(k) jolt just ahead has two comments

October 7:
  • Nation reluctant to rush to war has one comment
  • Weekend poll updates has two comments
  • Supreme Court approves Lautenberg has one comment

October 15:
  • Bush: economy is Democrats' fault has three comments
  • Support for war ebbs has two comments

October 16:
  • N.Korea has nukes. Where's the saber-rattling? has two comments

October 18:
  • Judge orders Cheney to come clean has one comment

October 22:
  • State of the Senate races has two comments
  • Lautenberg expands lead; McBride within margin of error has one comment.

October 25:
  • Wellstone's plane crashed has two comments
  • I'm going to cry... Paul Wellstone 1944-2002 has one comment

November 4:
  • Bush confident of GOP wins has three comments

November 5:
  • Had to gag vote for Davis has one comment
  • Congrats to Republicans has three comments

November 8:
  • Harold Ford wants to be Minortiy Leader has five comments
  • Ford may not challenge Pelosi has one comment

November 13:
  • Homeland agency sans independent 9-11 commission has two comments

November 18:
  • Cattle Call 2004: Ranking the contenders has five comments

November 21:
  • Edwards down, Kerry up has one comment
  • Feinstein stays out of 2004 race has two comments

November 22:
  • Taking a few days off has one comment

November 26:
  • Bush's reelect numbers low, so is Dem Party has seven comments

December 1:
  • Open Thread has one comment
  • Bridging the culture gap has one comment

December 6:
  • Bush purges economic team has four comments

December 8:
  • Open Thread has four comments

December 9:
  • Daschle names new Senate campaign team has one comment
  • Judge dismisses GAO suit against Cheney has one comment
  • Daschle gives Lott a pass has two comments

December 10:
  • Open Thread has one comment

December 11:
  • Get off Lott's back! has three comments

December 12:
  • Lott was a racist in college has one comment

December 13:
  • Open thread has one comment
  • The Trent Lott Republicans has four comments
  • Kissinger abandons 9-11 probe has two comments
  • Another apology, still refuses to resign has two comments

December 15:
  • Gore is not running for president has nine comments
  • GOP battle lines forming has four comments

December 16:
  • Open thread has two comments
  • Nickles voting record has three comments

December 19:
  • Reid could succeed Daschle has one comment

December 20:
  • Open thread has one comment

December 26:
  • Graham considering prez run has fifteen comments
  • Open Thread has two comments

December 27:
  • Open Thread has one comment
  • US can't be bothered with North Korea has seven comments

Steve's final comment of 2002 said that he was running out the door and would see us in the new year. At that point, it's just about certain he'd already been signed up as a guest blogger, because we didn't see him next until the day after Markos posted the following on January 3, 2003: Introducing the first dKos guest contributors. Markos announced that he was inviting billmon and Steve Soto to be guest bloggers for the next couple of weeks, and that they'd start posting later that day or the next. Billmon started later that day; Steve the next with Watching Bush Mishandle North Korea, a post that began:

Steve Soto here, wishing all of you a happy and healthy New Year. We can only hope that our esteemed foreign policy team can overcome the hole they have dug for themselves on North Korea before our allies begin losing faith again in our true agenda. That is, assuming they want to dig out of this hole right away.

What happened next? Well, that's for part 2, probably appearing tomorrow night. There were another seven weeks of Steve Soto comments, and 58 more Daily Kos front-page articles, before he opened The Left Coaster for business shortly before midnight on February 23, 2003. As mentioned earlier, Steve's currently on sabbatical from that site, with a planned return to active blogging of some kind in June 2008.

As always, corrections and pointers to missing information are most welcome. The contents of this diary will find its way into the dKosopedia in the near future; a Steve Soto page there has already been created. The Steve Gilliard and Billmon information is already there, and has been expanded since its original Top Comments publication, though there's still much more to be added.

~~~~~

We also have a comments retrospective with a shorter horizon on tap: top comments from the past 24 hours, most as emailed to the TopComments mailbox. Thanks to all who took the time to mail in comments. If you saw any great comments that are not mentioned here—and there were well over thirty-two thousand comments to examine—please do link to them in your own comments below. The address of that mailbox:

TopComments AT gmail DOT com
(change " AT " to "@" and " DOT " to ".")

Anyone can submit deserving comments to our address—the direct link to a comment is available from that comment's date/time—as long as they arrive by 9:30pm Eastern Time. Please always include your Daily Kos user name in the body of your message, so we can credit you properly. Both link and username are important.

lineatus submitted the following nomination just after last night's deadline, and then added a second one today:

Ray Radlein answers the question of why pooties garner mucho mojo.

A quick comment from West Coastian gives karateexplosions the fodder for a great math lesson—today's topic is fractions and units of measure. [Editor's note: the lesson doesn't end there; keep going down thread.]

From Land of Enchantment:

Since it's in reply to a hidden comment, not everyone will get to see SottoVoce's comment in noweasels's thoughtful goodbye to Hillary.  Unless they click through here, that is... [Editor's note: do click through; this was going to be one of my picks, but LoE saw it first.]

Sent by mayim:

My nomination for one of today's best comments, from Tenn Wisc Dem:

I called my daughter today and said,

"Your father had to pay poll tax, and your son will grow up thinking of a first Black president as ancient history."

How far we have come!

voila sent this nomination, but I added the first clause for context:

After seeing voila's comment, Oliver W Holmes the 3rd interprets some Hebrew for us.

From highacidity:

A hilarious yet spot-on snark for those who say people are vote for Obama only because of their race.

From your diarist sardonyx:

In noweasels's superb diary A Few Words on the End of the Clinton Campaign, there are a number of comments worth noting:

textus writes "that it would be far more difficult" if Hillary lost "to a candidate I didn't respect."

oldjohnbrown replies to textus, noting how it's too easy to say let bygones be bygones when it's your own past tactics at issue.

lineatus recounts a forward-looking view of the trajectory of Hillary's life from the perspective of 1993.

Rayne presents an interesting notion: Hillary Clinton for Supreme Court Justice.

JeffLeiber writes a serious diary "I am Not Worth Much", and gets good, serious comments, such as Inland's on groups. However, it being Jeff, levity cannot be barred, and Gator1980 starts a thread that he later sends downhill with great rapidity. Keep heading down the thread... ;-)

After highacidity starts the talk down a champagne path, others downthread discuss their own planned celebrations, until Magorn takes a slightly different tack with a highly unusual inauguration ingredient.

The Cunctator's excellent diary The Conservative's Dictionary Of Scientific Truthiness originally had a title that ended with "Language" rather than "Truthiness" before MingPicket had his say, but his downthread comment on whence his comment arose and why is even better. If this diary isn't Rescued, I'll want to know why.

No Top Comments diary would be complete without that day's top mojo—those comments which have received the highest number of recommendations from Daily Kos users like you. There was a great deal of recommending today, too, as witness the high number of recs required to get on the list. Today's top mojo is supplied by sardonyx, using his own revision of the great and wonderful cskendrick's mojo-to-Excel magic.

First, Top Mojo excluding search-identifiable tip jars, first diary comments, and Cheers and Jeers:

  1) And yet Clinton supporters will still claim that by Yoshimi — 186
  2) the way they see it by davidkc — 166
  3) Hillary lost the under 60 white vote by FishOutofWater — 162
  4) agreed by hekebolos — 152
  5) Yeah! We can retire the "primaries" tags! by casperr — 151
  6) As a lazy-ass white American... by Aqualad08 — 120
  7) This needs to be front-paged by turneresq — 117
  8) She proves her genius every day by turneresq — 116
  9) Thanks Bill Moyers by pattisigh — 115
10) Oh, the hard working Americans are the white ones by duha — 109
11) Obama's campaign refused to comment on her latest by Bob Johnson — 109
12) It's a weird feeling by turneresq — 108
13) There is absolutely no reason to hold the diarist by geomoo — 105
14) Today is going to be a BEAUTIFUL day!! by Muzikal203 — 100
15) ...and drop references to "a king".... by Dillonfence — 96
16) We surely need by pattisigh — 95
17) Hillary's Nuclear option just exploded in hand by Steven R — 95
18) Obama camp response by turneresq — 92
19) You're a brave man by existenz — 92
20) You are to be chastised! by Land of Enchantment — 91
21) Funny, I just had a back and forth by gchaucer2 — 91
22) Is this for real? by stitch813 — 90
23) This makes her unelectable. by beachmom — 88
24) BREAKING= report is he showed up on the by Theghostofkarlafayetucker — 87
25) Up until the last few months, I thought it was by Seneca Doane — 87
26) And it's kind of been over for a while by casperr — 85
27) If she continues to do this by turneresq — 85
28) Oddly enough... by Brit — 84
29) I just look at my crotch by Gator1980 — 83
30) Nice to see you back again steina by kid oakland — 83

Top Mojo with No Exclusions:

  1) Tips by Keith Olbermann — 883
  2) I support Barack Obama by noweasels — 789
  3) Tips by turneresq — 638
  4) Be kind. by steina — 630
  5) Tip jar by davidkc — 616
  6) tip jar by bakabakaian — 521
  7) Tip Jar by jkennerl — 502
  8) Wow. Thanks my fellow Kossacks. by John Cusack — 493
  9) Tips? by BoBo2020 — 445
10) Waking up angry... by JeffLieber — 408
11) do the right thing n/t by blueness — 386
12) please let this be over by D Wreck — 243
13) More and Better Democrats! by kath25 — 239
14) I know by Congressional Candidates Wife — 205
15) And yet Clinton supporters will still claim that by Yoshimi — 186
16) that fucking asshole by slinkerwink — 169
17) the way they see it by davidkc — 166
18) Hillary lost the under 60 white vote by FishOutofWater — 162
19) agreed by hekebolos — 152
20) Yeah! We can retire the "primaries" tags! by casperr — 151
21) I love Bill Moyers . Thank you pattisigh by abarefootboy — 140
22) As a lazy-ass white American... by Aqualad08 — 120
23) She proves her genius every day by turneresq — 118
24) This needs to be front-paged by turneresq — 117
25) Thanks Bill Moyers by pattisigh — 115
26) tip jar? by alvernon90 — 111
27) Oh, the hard working Americans are the white ones by duha — 109
28) Obama's campaign refused to comment on her latest by Bob Johnson — 109
29) It's a weird feeling by turneresq — 108
30) There is absolutely no reason to hold the diarist by geomoo — 105
31) Tip Jar by Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse — 105

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All quotes are the property of the original authors or the websites that held them