Thursday, November 04, 2004

John Hammer: "If you look at Guilford County races on the level of Democratic and Republican kingmakers, Democratic Guilford County Commissioner Skip Alston wins that one hands down over Republican Sheriff BJ Barnes. "Barnes has been referred to as Boss Hogg by some, and considering one of the businesses he owns, perhaps Alston should be called Boss Hotdog." (Posts Monday. The Rhino online: "Last week's news at the speed of light.") (But that is a nice shot of Howard Gaither on last week's front page.) 11:23:12 AM    comment []

BloggerCon is the day after tomorrow. I'd better get to California. 8:55:36 AM    comment []

J.M. Coetzee on Philip Roth's alternative history, the NYRB: "A volatile and fickle voting public captivated by surface rather than substance —Tocqueville foresaw the danger long ago—might in 1940 as easily have gone for the aviator hero with the simple message as for the incumbent with the proven record. In this sense, the fantasy of a Lindbergh presidency is only a concretization, a realization for poetic ends, of a certain potential in American political life." As they say, read the whole thing. 8:35:30 AM    comment []

Has Mark Pilgrim retired from blogging? 8:13:54 AM    comment []

Mathew Gross: "Here begins, too, Hillary's run in 2008. It will be a disaster...Remember, we lost because voters turned out on morality. Nominating a person that 50% of America thinks is quite literally the devil-- whether a fair characterization or not-- won't help us in 2008." 8:11:56 AM    comment []

In a depressing NYT op-ed, "The Day the Enlightenment Went Out," Garry Wills concludes with this semi-hopeful thought: "The moral zealots will, I predict, give some cause for dismay even to nonfundamentalist Republicans. Jihads are scary things. It is not too early to start yearning back toward the Enlightenment." He's exactly right. The Republicans in the middle, on Wall Street and Main Street, need to be pulled away from their alliance with the Religious Right. Else they will reap the whirlwind too. NYT: "Exulting in their electoral victories, President Bush's conservative supporters immediately turned to staking out mandates for an ambitious agenda of long-cherished goals, including privatizing Social Security, banning same-sex marriage, remaking the Supreme Court and overturning the court's decisions in support of abortion rights. 'Now comes the revolution,' Richard Viguerie, the dean of conservative direct mail, told about a dozen fellow movement stalwarts gathered around a television here, tallying up their Senate seats in the earliest hours of the morning. 'If you don't implement a conservative agenda now, when do you?'" Friedman: "But what troubled me yesterday was my feeling that this election was tipped because of an outpouring of support for George Bush by people who don't just favor different policies than I do - they favor a whole different kind of America. We don't just disagree on what America should be doing; we disagree on what America is. Is it a country that does not intrude into people's sexual preferences and the marriage unions they want to make? Is it a country that allows a woman to have control over her body? Is it a country where the line between church and state bequeathed to us by our Founding Fathers should be inviolate? Is it a country where religion doesn't trump science?" 8:10:34 AM    comment []

Bloggin' Jeff Thigpen won his race for Guilford County Register of Deeds. Did the blog help? Here's what this campaign manager, Jeff Kerrigan, says: "From a Campaign Manager’s perspective, I found some very real benefits to using the blog. 1. Foremost, blogging is essentially free. Paying a webmaster to update a static website every time your candidate wants to say something is not. Even if you have a volunteer webmaster, there is a delay in getting the message out that the blog overcame. 2. Thanks to you and others, our campaign was highlighted as being technologically progressive for blogging. In a race where advances in technology are central, this was helpful. 3. Part of Jeff’s appeal and message in the campaign is that he is accessible, friendly and responsive. I think the very nature of the blog accentuated this. I’m not sure how measurable these are. We also can’t be clear about how many people saw or read the blog, but it turned out to be part of a winning combination." Now we need Jeff to keep blogging while in office. 7:58:04 AM    comment []

Hoggard: "My Jinni has breast cancer." Kick its ass, Jinni. 7:55:10 AM    comment []