Link Bait Hall of Fame

The Treatment of Bush Has Been a Disgrace

What have we to learn from an opinion piece in defense of George W. Bush? That it sometimes pays to go against the tide. Forget that this piece came from the Wall Street Journal. The point is that of all the opinion pieces the Wall Street Journal publishes every day, week, and month of the year, [...]

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Nation Finally Sh*tty Enough to Make Social Progress

What would an election cycle be without The Onion’s 2-cents? Ah, fake news. It’s made Jon Stewart a household name. And one thing that’s so great about it (besides that everyone loves a good laugh at our own expense) is that anyone can do it. Sure, The Onion has mastered the art form. But that [...]

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The World’s View of Obama’s Win

When ABC News announced on its website that Barack Obama had won the 2008 Presidential Election to become the 44th US  President-Elect, that item received 4,294,967,295 comments (I had to insert the commas just to see what the number really was - 4+ billion). Not that you or I could ever expect to garner 4 [...]

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McCain’s Arizona Senate Seat Could Go Democrat in 2010

Time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping into the future. Steve Miller had it right, as evidenced by this piece of link bait here, a prediction about the future of McCain’s senate seat two years from now before the future of his presidential candidacy still has a day yet to be decided. Predicting the future. That’s the [...]

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Lies, Half Truths and Contradictions: Chronicle ”Hidden” Audio on Lies, Half Truths and Contradictions: Chronicle ”Hidden” Audio on Obama

Attack hook link bait can be effective, if risky. But one way to use the attack hook against itself is in a vindication or, in the absence thereof, a defense. This is one way that those who wish to avoid the negative underpinings of using attack hook link bait can still reap some of its [...]

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McCain Did Not Disclose Keating Business Deal To Investigators

The Huffington Post is one of the more accomplished craftspeople at the attack hook (as any top-rated political blog has to be). And here’s a perfect example. Policy debate is one thing. But attacking someone’s character (even if well-founded) is another (remember - we’re just analyzing this from a purely impartial copywriting standpoint here). So, what [...]

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My wife made me canvass for Obama; here’s what I learned

The reason this piece on one man’s experiences canvassing for Democrat Barack Obama became so instantly popular (if you ask me) is because it’s a story of an unexpected turnaround. Here we have a conservative who, for all intents and purposes, believed (and maybe still believes) that he’d be better served under McCain’s policies than [...]

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No Currency Left to Buy the Big Lies

In honor of election day in America being just 1 day away, today and tomorrow’s blog postings will be all about the Obama and McCain campaigns. This first one shows the value of celebrity. No, not the celebrity of the presidential candidates, but of the commentator on them, in this case: actor John Cusack. What does [...]

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Recession Watch: McDonald’s Cracks Down on Sauce Scofflaws

You know the economy is bad when… …when McDonald’s gets stingy with their sauces. What makes this work as link bait is not just that it portrays a shocking reality (shock value) or that it’s about McDonald’s (pop culture) but that it’s a sign of the times. Signs of the times are great. Why? Because they reach us. [...]

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Automaker Lays Off Detroit Office With Blog Post

Who would do such a thing? Tesla, as it happens, but is that why over 12,000 websites have already linked to this posting (which also boasts more than 1,000 Diggs)? To find out who would be so callous as to lay off employees with something as impersonal and demeaning as a blog post? Or is [...]

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