TPMCafe was a center-

left Left may refer to: Music * ''Left'' (Hope of the States album), 2006 * ''Left'' (Monkey House album), 2016 * ''Left'' (Helmet album), 2023 * "Left", a song by Nickelback from the album ''Curb'', 1996 Direction * Left (direction), the relativ ...

blog A blog (a Clipping (morphology), truncation of "weblog") is an informational website consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries also known as posts. Posts are typically displayed in Reverse chronology, reverse chronologic ...

portal created by

Josh Marshall Joshua Micah Jesajan-Dorja Marshall (born February 15, 1969) is an American journalist and blogger who founded ''Talking Points Memo.'' A Modern liberalism in the United States, liberal, he presides over a network of Left-wing politics, progress ...

as a spin-off blog to his popular ''

Talking Points Memo ''Talking Points Memo'' (''TPM'') is a liberal political news and opinion blog created and run by Josh Marshall that debuted on November 12, 2000. The name is a tongue-in-cheek reference to a "talking points memo" that was often discussed duri ...

''. It debuted on May 31, 2005. TPM Cafe featured a collection of blogs about a wide range of domestic and foreign policy issues written by academics, journalists and former public officials among others. These included

Paul Begala Paul Edward Begala (born May 12, 1961) is an American political consultant and political commentator, best known as the former advisor to President Bill Clinton. Begala was a chief strategist for the 1992 Clinton-Gore campaign, which carried 33 ...

Daniel Benjamin Daniel Benjamin (born October 16, 1961) is an American diplomat and journalist and was the Coordinator for Counterterrorism at the United States Department of State from 2009 to 2012, appointed by Secretary Hillary Clinton. Benjamin was the dire ...

, Steve Clemons, Jonathan Cohn,

Brad DeLong James Bradford "Brad" DeLong (born June 24, 1960) is an American economic historian who has been a professor of economics at the University of California, Berkeley, since 1993. Early life and education DeLong was born in Boston, Massachusett ...

Amitai Etzioni Amitai Etzioni (; Hebrew: אמיתי עציוני; né Werner Falk; 4 January 1929 – 31 May 2023) was an Israeli-American sociologist, best known for his work on socioeconomics and communitarianism. He founded the Communitarian Network, a ...

Todd Gitlin Todd Alan Gitlin (January 6, 1943 – February 5, 2022) was an American sociologist, political activist and writer, novelist, and cultural commentator. He wrote about the mass media, politics, intellectual life, and the arts for both popular an ...

, Danny Goldberg,

Reed Hundt Reed Eric Hundt (born March 3, 1948) is the chairman, CEO and co-founder of the Coalition for Green Capital. Biography Hundt attended high school in Washington D.C. at St. Albans School, graduating in 1965. He went to Yale College, where h ...

, John Ikenberry, Larry C. Johnson,

Michael Lind Michael Lind (born April 23, 1962) is an American writer and academic. He has explained and defended the tradition of American democratic nationalism in a number of books, beginning with ''The Next American Nation: The New Nationalism and the Fou ...

, Kevin Phillips, Mark Schmitt,

Anne-Marie Slaughter Anne-Marie Slaughter (born September 27, 1958) is an American international lawyer, foreign policy analyst, political scientist, and public commentator. From 2002 to 2009, she was the dean of Princeton University's School of Public and Intern ...

, Ruy Teixeira,

Elizabeth Warren Elizabeth Ann Warren (née Herring; born June 22, 1949) is an American politician and former law professor who is the Seniority in the United States Senate, senior United States senator from the state of Massachusetts, serving since 2013. A mem ...

, among others. The blog also had a Table for One blog where a notable person guest-writes for a week. Vice-presidential candidate

John Edwards Johnny Reid Edwards (born June 10, 1953) is an American lawyer and former politician who represented North Carolina in the United States Senate from 1999 to 2005. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the vice presidential nominee under ...

was the first such guest; others have included Paul Hackett,

Anthony Romero Anthony D. Romero (born July 9, 1965) is an American lawyer who serves as the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union. He assumed the position in 2001 as the first Latino and openly gay man to do so. Early life and education R ...

Bernie Sanders Bernard Sanders (born September8, 1941) is an American politician and activist who is the Seniority in the United States Senate, senior United States Senate, United States senator from the state of Vermont. He is the longest-serving independ ...

Tom Vilsack Thomas James Vilsack (; born December 13, 1950) is an American politician. He served as the 30th and 32nd United States secretary of agriculture from 2009 to 2017, during the Obama administration, and again from 2021 to 2025 during the Biden admi ...

Wesley Clark Wesley Kanne Clark (born Wesley J. Kanne, 23 December 1944) is a retired United States Army officer. He graduated as valedictorian of the class of 1966 at United States Military Academy, West Point and was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to the U ...

Sherrod Brown Sherrod Campbell Brown ( ; born November 9, 1952) is an American politician who served from 2007 to 2025 as a United States senator from Ohio. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the U.S. representative for from 1993 to 2007 and the 47t ...

, and

Russ Feingold Russell Dana Feingold ( ; born March 2, 1953) is an American politician and lawyer who served as a United States Senate, United States Senator from Wisconsin from 1993 to 2011. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, h ...

. There is also a TPM Bookclub blog, where authors discuss their works and answers questions from readers. Featured authors have included

Peter Beinart Peter Alexander Beinart (; born February 28, 1971) is an American liberal columnist, journalist, and political commentator. A former editor of ''The New Republic'', he has also written for ''Time'', ''The Atlantic'', and ''The New York Review of ...

, Thomas Frank, Anthony Shadid,

Larry Diamond Larry Jay Diamond (born October 2, 1951) is an American political sociologist and scholar in the field of democracy studies. Diamond is a senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Stanford University's main center ...

George Packer George Packer (born August 13, 1960) is an American journalist, novelist, and playwright. He is best known for his writings about U.S. foreign policy for ''The New Yorker'' and ''The Atlantic'' and for his book '' The Assassins' Gate: America in ...

Robert Dreyfuss Robert "Bob" Dreyfuss is an American investigative journalist and contributing editor for ''The Nation'' magazine. His work has appeared in ''Rolling Stone'', '' The Diplomat'', '' Mother Jones'', ''The American Prospect'', TomPaine.com, and oth ...

, Chris Mooney,

Gene Sperling Eugene Benton Sperling (born December 24, 1958) is an American lawyer who was director of the National Economic Council and assistant to the president for economic policy under Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. He is the only person to ...

, and Kevin Phillips.

Matthew Yglesias Matthew Yglesias (; born May 18, 1981) is an American blogger and journalist who writes about economics and politics. Yglesias has written columns and articles for publications such as ''The American Prospect'', ''The Atlantic'', and ''Slate''. I ...

was until September 2006 a flagship blogger and associate editor for the site. In TPMCafe readers could not only comment on the main posts but also initiate discussions and write their own blogs. The comment section for each post included a ranking feature.

References

External links

''TPM Cafe''''Talking Points Memo''
American political blogs {{internet-publish-stub