Boston bloggers in Denver
By adamg - 8/25/08 - 10:27 am
Blue Mass. Group is, of course, in Denver en masse and blogging up a storm.
Boston City Councilor Mike Ross is blogging the convention, too. Newton Alderman Steve Linsky is also blogging, as is Seth Gitell.
Eduardo de Oliveira is blogging for the UMass-Boston-based New England Ethnic News. John Daley is there, although staying away from politics.
Others?
Comments
It would seem
Unless they're canvassing the convention in the same way that NBC covered most of the Beijing Olympics (from afar by video), I'm guessing you meant "Boston bloggers in Denver". :)
Yes, he replies, sheepishly
Although Dan Kennedy is blogging the convention from Danvers. :-).
Interesting
His description of the event makes it sound like a modern NFL football game. The real fun is at all the tailgating going on outside of the place. You likely don't have good tickets and have paid to be in the nose-bleed seats. The NFL has spent a ton of money on making the game TV-friendly and with HDTV these days, you're probably better off watching it from a bar at the stadium than freezing 500 feet up and 40 rows back...or just staying home and watching the game from there where you can still do all of the grilling and partying you would have done in the parking lot. AND you don't have to spend a few hundred on tickets to have done so.
Yes, our modern political conventions are no better than a game of football. The "political entertainment" machine rolls on. Damn you, CNN, MSNBC, Faux News, etc, etc...
When thats going to really
When thats going to really come into play is when a switch is made from the convention hall to the stadium. Im not sure how that will work, but I have to assume they will allow the convention people into the stadium, after all those are the "movers and shakers" of the party. The question is how will that play out, considering the rest of the people are being told to show up HOURS in advance to get in.
Id rather just be watching on my friends projection screen in his basement, at least there will be liquor (thats another DNC no no, no liquor in the stadium , you cant bring it in, and you cant buy it anywhere.)
Sheehan
I hope some of the locals get to interview Sheehan in her fight against Pelosi for the House race. Her interviews are always very plain-speak and sometimes entertaining (between the sob story references to her son).
I know there's little chance of it happening, but I'd love to see her beat Pelosi and force a reorganization of the House leadership. This Congress has been one of the worst ever in terms of checks-and-balance against the President and accountability (which is the stumping speeches that got them the majority to take power back from Republicans in the first place).
I really wish some of the stronger media outlets would really take Democrats to task for their mishandling of the legislature in a manner in which most of us Democrats would do ourselves if we were in position to make these attacks. That's why I hope the new "need" to reach out to bloggers and other "community media" that most politicians are now feeling the pressure on will yield more hard-hitting reporting on the issues that everyone knows we all care about but "political entertainment" softballs at today's politicians (if it addresses the issues at all).
I dont like Shaheen much, as
I dont like Shaheen much, as I think at this point she is just shooting at anything that moves. I feel that she has lost her son, but cant seem to cope with the loss. She also cant seem to cope with the idea that her son may have wanted to fight, how else would he have ended up in Iraq?
That being said I wouldnt mind seeing Pelosi get ejected from congress. Her leadership has been aweful, I dont think she has been effective at all. Reid has also been a disaster. Spineless when it comes to confronting the Republicans comes to mind.
Deep, intense psychotherapy required...
Casey Sheehan did what he thought was right, and his mother overwhelmingly disagreed with that. Sheehan is dealing with her grief and guilt through protest and politics - it may help with her catharsis, but losing a child - especially a child who went into the Armed Forces - doesn't mean you lose your sanity. Deep, intense bereavement therapy helps in those instances, and God knows Cindy could use it more than running around with Hugo Chavez.
See my comment re: Pelosi below, and I'll add that Reid also must be replaced. What we don't have now are leaders; we have angry and bitter ex-spouses who argue at the expense of their children.
Deep, intense bereavement
Thats why I never know if I should feel bad for her for losing her son, or mad for the fact that she has been acting as if he was a victim who didnt choose his own path (I think its almost direspectful of him that she is running around like this, after all he did join the armed forces for a reason. I can understand her anger but its almost like she is now in conflict with her own dead son over why he joined the military.)
Thats why at the end of the day I can only brush her off as irrelevant. The lady down the street who talks to herself, people forgot long ago why she does.
Classic MassThink Response That
Oh, you shouldn't raise a ruckus, get angry, organize, rock the boat, make waves ... and Heaven Forfend that a mere woman question the judgement and competence and decisionmaking skills of her elected representatives ... just stay in your place and GET THERAPY.
Do you realize how "automated" your response is? How regional it is too? Having been raised in a culture much closer to that of Sheehan, I've seen this blowback (aimed at me and at others) for DARING to speak up and challenge the knowledge and judgement of people who should have less an attitude of "but I'm in charge here" authority and more an attitude of service toward those who employ them.
Let's get a time machine - I hear that there are some Minutemen who don't know their place, are angry, unreasonably upset about taxes and are incredibly disrespectful of the King and of Royal authority. They must need deep, intense therapy!
Regional? Maybe. Why is it
Regional? Maybe.
Why is it that we must respect the cultures of every far flung tribe around the world but when something is "native" to New England or Boston it gets labeled as being a bad thing. Nevermind the New England culture was involved in the American Revolution, had a role in womans suffrage, and was at many times an ending place for the underground railroad.
Her gender only affects this because she is out there "speaking" on behalf of a dead son as his mother. Otherwise her gender doesnt matter much. My problem is at the end of the day her son enlisted in the military, he made a decision, he knew what he was signing up for. I dont agree with this war, and I advise people against it but still have friends and family who went off enlisted anyway. Ive lost people I have cared about, and while I feel compelled to say "I told you so" and use their name when I protest the war I dont do it because they didnt agree with me. I think its an insult to use someones name as a reason to end the war when they themselves agreed with the war and signed on to fight.
Anger can be appropriate
Yet the term "angry" is somehow a "levelling mechanism" hurled as an insult at anyone who expects competent fact-finding and questions incompetence from elected officials in these parts.
This culture you mention - the one from history - no longer exists in New England that I can see. This resistance to change and the resistance to questioning authority (beyond flouting speed limits and red lights in order to feel like a grown up - read some comment threads at the Globe and Herald) and resistance to the demands of democracy wasn't the case in the colonial uprising times.
Why are we expected to worship the elected and never question their judgment when their judgement is willfully misinformed? This "people who demand accountability are angry people and angry people are dangerous" attitude is NOT the New England culture of the Revolution. It is a culture of machine politics, organized crime and absloutist patriarchal religions. Unfortunately, some of the same Yankees are to blame for it, as they so marginalized some groups in society that they formed their own ancilary quasi-government structures absent any democratic anticedents.
Last time I checked
Last time I checked Massachusetts was the only state not to Vote for Nixon in the 70's, it is also the state that has two sitting Senators that went against the status quo and ran for president against an incumbant president (one time was actually against someone in his own party) and yet we kept them in office even after they lost.
First state in the union with real marriage rights for gay people. Granted the courts told us to do it, but I dont see a credible threat to the precedent.
The area has been a hot bead of anti war activity.
Maybe your right, maybe we dont like to make waves. Is that a bad thing?? When gay marriage hit the fan instead of creating a huge fight over it (there was bitterness and a bit of a fight, but that was not that big) we took it in stride and not even a few years later its a common occurance. Things happen, people get upset, you fix the problem and move on, lets go chop chop.
Cindy Sheehan isnt doing anyone any good by being nutso bananas out in California running against Pelosi. She could have exacted much more change if she had just taken a better route about it. Instead she became a media whore and seems to crave the attention afforded to her by the cameras.
Leave the option out there...
Let me add a word here that I didn't in my previous post.
I'm not a psychiatrist, thus I cannot judge Cindy Sheehan's feelings. The option to seek treatment privately and outside the public realm is hers to decide. What's she's doing right now is likely neccessary and sufficient for her own needs, and if it brings about dividends without forking over $200+/hr to a psychotherapist, more power to her.
Furthermore, I totally agree with speaking out on things that are wrong. The Minutemen didn't have Dr. Phil or Jerry Springer to try to dissaude them from going after the British - the Minutemen first protested by dumping tea, then fought against the British against a lot of things besides taxes and overreaching rule in order to secure their future.
(Note to self...never tick off Swirrly Girl :) )
Time to clean the House...
Kaz, I couldn't agree with you more.
You get better checks and balances when the Congress in in sync and not sniping at each other like two bitter ex-spouses. The problem with both parties is that they both have a superiority complex; where the government should be at least bipartisan and civil to carry out the functions and desires of the people that vote for them, it has proven to be a place to settle old vendettas and to blot out human goodness and fairness in favor of total naked power.
Nancy Pelosi thinks that her job is to be Queen Bee of Congress High, not Speaker of the House. Even the most ardent of Democrat supporters figure the more she digs in and acts like dictatrix, the more the GOP will make her their poster child.
I can estimate that once the elections are over, the more adult elements of Congress (at least the ones who weren't voted out) will band together and mercifully end Pelosi's reign. They will find a Speaker with no delusions of grandeur and the ability to bring all House members together. Pelosi has not done that; she's managed to be the lightning rod for Ye Old Bad Beltway politics.
As for Cindy Sheehan: a good anti-war novelty, but I don't think she has a chance, unless Pelosi's district has had their fill of her.