Yea, the pursuit of "respectability" looked like a standard political choice; many political activists see courting corporate media as the path to acceptance. Which is completely the case if your political MO is palatable to management, but completely impossible if your political demands harm anyone of consequence's profits.

I thought this was the case through the first purge and was disabused of that notion over the next few years as Lefty after Lefty was chased off site.

After that first purge I started to sense that it was more than just a political tactic. It looked like the fix was in. Come 2010, there was no doubt in my mind that dKos was a veal pen as far as ownership went.

It's too bad. That place was smoking with energy and ideas at that time.