Pools

Given the dearth of research on nonpartisan political blog networks, this article conducted an exploratory analysis of the network ties of elite, moderate blogs in relation to and in comparison with elite, partisan blogs. Sampling 18 ideologically diverse blogs (left-leaning, moderate, and right-leaning) across three public affairs issues in 2007, it was found that weak-tie connections enabled moderate blogs to bridge all ideological blog networks more comprehensibly and expansively than partisan blog networks. Unfortunately, the bridging effect of weak-tie connections provided less internal and external cohesion within the moderate blog network when compared to both partisan blog networks. Moderate blogs had low intragroup (within group) and intergroup (between group) cohesion: moderate blogs not only linked less internally but received fewer, reciprocal linkages from partisan blog networks. Findings highlight the trade-off that moderate blogs make as they sacrifice the visibility benefits of cohesive community for the informational benefits of heterogeneous, weak-tie connections. Keywords political networks, political blogs, moderate blogs, cross-cutting information The strong divide in the U.S. political blogosphere began almost immediately after the U.S. terrorist attacks of 9/11 when the public adopted the blog platform to voice their fears of compromised secu-rity on home soil (Meraz, 2008). A series of connected political events post 9/11 would cement the ideological divide in online political discourse. The ensuring wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (Tremayne, Zheng, Lee, & Jeong, 2006) created the necessary divisive issue platform fo