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Thursday, January 06, 2005 |
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Josh Marshall posts the White House strategy memo on Social Security. Says Josh: "Clearly, this isn't about 'saving' Social Security. It is a battle to end Social Security and replace with something that [Rove deputy, Peter] Wehner clearly understands is very different, indeed the antithesis of Social Security. This entire debate is about ideology -- between people who believe in the benefits Social Security has brought America in the last three-quarters of a century and those who think it was a bad idea from the start." 4:37:06 PM  comment []
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ACC Hoops: "If you aren't reading College Basketball, you aren't following college basketball." 4:21:36 PM comment []
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David Wharton unleashes a blog watchdog on a powerful local development group. Wharton: "TREBIC (the Triad Area Real Estate and Building Industry Coalition)...gets to influence local legistlation in Greensboro...the group boasted that it had weakened the RUCO ordinance, the sidewalk ordinance, and local environmental legislation. It claimed it was working hard to place TREBIC supporters in important positions on appointed boards. It also boasted that it had feted members of the City Council and other elected officials at a pig-pickin' shindig in order to curry their favor." His plan is to "leak a little light and air into the smoke-filled rooms of ordinance-writing." Power, meet the people. 4:20:35 PM comment []
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Dan Kennedy: "The Greensboro experiment sounds like an interesting idea that a few people will love, but that the overwhelming majority will find makes their paper too much work to bother with." Jay Rosen: "I have to say I think you are wrong. You're misreading the situation, and being unduly dismissive." A conversation between two people I'd hate to argue with over in the comments at Press Think. 4:04:46 PM comment []
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WSJ: The Coddling Crisis: Why Americans Think Adulthood Begins at 26 (unposted). Adult kids living at home, in search of direction in their lives. Every parents' nightmare. I was fortunate to be raised by loving, generous parents. But they also provided me with doses of reality, through their own examples and high standards, and via explicit statements of purpose. My dad used to tell us that his goal as a father was to raise kids who would turn into independent adults. My parents put me through college. At one point I announced that I would be on the five-year plan. That's fine, said my dad, I'm paying for four. I graduated on time. When I did finish college, my parents welcomed me home...and told me that rent began on September 1. So I got on with my life and moved to New York to become a writer. They didn't pay my bills...but when I landed my first job, my dad sent me a check for some work clothes. And so forth. So when you see an article in the WSJ dated 2018 about my kids living at home, just know it's not my parents' fault. 11:42:48 AM comment []
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John Hammer on changes along press row at the GSO City Council: "But lately, there has been a new breed hanging out on press row -- 'bloggers.' David Hoggard, who ran in the at-large race for City Coucil in 2003 and has become a committed blogger, was at the meeting this week, blogging away between two print reporters." John includes a URL to Hogg's Blog in the as-yet-unposted item. The Rhino has a very blog-like sensibility -- personal and opinionated in voice, extensive feedback forums -- and it would be a great blog hub on the local network. The Hammer brothers seem very pragmatic about their business -- they are small-business owners, not corporate managers -- and may not see a benefit to blogging in the short term. Willy once told me that the web is still a cost center for them. Their current web presence has its strengths -- full content and free archives -- and one huge weakness, namely that it doesn't publish on the web until several days after the print edition hits the streets. Again, this would seem to be a pragmatic decision based on serving the advertisers who shell out for print ads. But in the long term, web advertising is going to be grow, and The Rhino is going to want its share. They could help develop a local web ad market, in the same way I expect the N&R, with its existing sales staff and print product, to do. In the meantime, they're telling their readers about this interesting local phenomenon, which is what a good local paper should be doing. UPDATE: Just a reminder that Sam Hieb has been blogging various public meetings for some time now -- he just sits in the gallery, not at press row, which is how a lot of meetings are going to be covered from now on... 11:11:08 AM comment []
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Yvonne Johnson has a post up at her blog signed "Barbara." Who is Barbara? No info on the site. I clicked "discuss," but didn't see a way to discuss anything. 8:59:52 AM comment []
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I haven't written much about the tsunami, because it's one of those stories where I don't think I add much value -- I have no first-hand info, no special insight, just the same links to images and blogs and relief orgs as everyone else, and the same dull ache in my soul. I will say that having our Secretary of State on the scene, and the active role of the US military, and the outpouring of money from private and public sources, make me proud to be an American. This is who we are, or at least who we can be. 8:41:14 AM comment []
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Tom Friedman: "We don't want the kind of civil war that we have in Iraq now...The civil war we want is a democratically elected Iraqi government against the Baathist and Islamist militants." 8:33:30 AM comment []
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All kinds of interesting stuff bound up in a brief comment conversation: the weight of what we post at our blogs on the rest of our lives; the value of good work versus political correctness; and the grace of a man who decides he didn't like what he was saying, but still holds to his principles as he makes amends. 8:28:50 AM comment []
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Brian Baute says the Lex Memo has value for organized religion: "(H)is recommendations are appropriate for churches facing the same cultural, social, and technological changes that newspapers are facing." Faith-oriented blogs are already catching on here in the Triad. I've thought for a while that blogging will help churches and other organizations -- and organizations are catching on: I'm visiting one of the area's largest and most powerful institutions (non-religious) next week to talk about using blogs for internal and perhaps external communications. 8:23:21 AM comment []
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Last update: 3/26/2005; 7:58:39 AM .
