Balloon Juice is an online community created by John Cole in January, 2002.

Why the name Balloon Juice? Straight from dictionary.com: “Balloon juice is a slang phrase that primarily means ‘hot air’. It inspired the name of an influential political blog.”

Hey, that’s us!

The name started as a joke because the blog would be the random musings of one particular idiot: me, John Cole. In fact, our tag line started out as “Consistently wrong since 2002.” Now it’s “Come for the politics, stay for the snark.”

While initially a one man show, the blog expanded and now has a dozen people who write for the blog covering a wide array of topics. We have a number of experts in a range of fields, with everything from health insurance to nuclear security on the front page, but every one of our authors brings something unique that helps make Balloon Juice what it has become. As do our commenters! One person likes to describe it as like being at a party with really smart and interesting people. Every day.

The talk focuses on politics, pets and animal rescue, gardening, pop culture and more, but what it really does is serve as a meeting point for interesting, like-minded people to talk, argue, share, and cope. We pride ourselves on being a real community — we get to know each other, help one other and serve as a (mostly) friendly refuge in an often ugly world. Like all families, we sometimes fight.

Many members of our community have been lurkers (aka readers) and commenters for a very long time, but every day someone new shows up and we love that. The comments are open, so hop on in and join us.

Welcome! We really hope to see you in the comments section.

John G. Cole