By RegoPark
Contributing Weblogger

I’ll postpone my Deep Throat comments a bit to mark the seven-year anniversary of one of the most monumental speeches the Washington Press Club ever heard — and chose to give a forum to. The more things change in Matt Drudge’s world and in the media world at large, the more they stay the same. If you read one thing we link to on this weblog, I strongly recommend reading the full text of “Anyone With a Modem Can Report on the World“. It’s the best foray I can think of into Drudge 101. The Q&A was reprinted in Drudge Manifesto, but I found it interesting that his statement that he knocked on Monica Lewinsky’s door was deleted in the book.

Since Matt hasn’t the time, inclination or financial need to give too many talks these days, we can only speculate how his monologue might change today if he returned to the hallowed Press Club podium.

I really wish that his book about populist journalism materialized. Or, wait, was that Drudge Manifesto? He was getting quite a few lucrative proposals around this time (which was also the era of the $30 million Sidney Blumenthal lawsuit) and I’m sure he went with the book deal that required the least time commitment and allowed the most delegation…a mistake I’ve already written about.

I wasn’t very sympathetic to Matt Drudge when he first began to make a name for himself, and as regular readers know, I call him on things as I see fit. But he can be quite lucid when he doesn’t have a chip on his shoulder and isn’t copping a ‘tude. I thought he held his own quite nicely given the civilized-but-hostile questioning he faced seven years ago. Wonder if he’s still got that mug…