I am honored to be on the same web page as these folks. I am really looking forward to attending and participating in the PlaNetwork Interactive conference. It’s just what the doctor ordered after the N-TEN conference.
I hope to be blogging via Treo…
June was already going to be crazy, but it’s gotten off to an unpleasant start. Saturday we got a call that the DRM’s grandfather was in the hospital and not doing too well. We got in the car to visit him in Hickory, NC.
Before we got far out of town, we got another call. Grandfather had passed away. It hapenned very quickly. We were the first family members to get to grandmother (the rest of the DRM’s family lives in Richmond, VA). We relieved the neighbors and church friends who were sitting with her, and spent a very sad, strange night with her.
Now we are in the family’s appalachian homeland of Bristol. What state is that in? Well it depends. The Virginia-Tennessee state line runs right through the center of town. We are on the VA side, which is probably not an accident. Next door is Maryland Fried Chicken. WTF? Is that a dis on Kentucky or what?
Sorry it’s been a little quiet on the blog this week. I have two new obsessions. One is WordPress, an open source blogging tool. I’m trying to move OrangePolitics.org over there, but it’s a difficult process.
As if it wasn’t bad enough that I’m neglecting my loved ones and responsibilities while I stay up late blogging, I just got a new Treo 600. This thing truly does it all: phone, IM, web, camera, plays MP3s, washes dishes… OK, the domestic technology isn’t quite there yet. But I’m composing and posting this entire entry from the palm of my hand!
Not bad. I think I’ll call my new friend Trixie. Say hi!
Abstinence-only education is simply a denial of reality. Teenagers do it, and lying to them won’t stop it. In fact, just like the obviously fictional claims in D.A.R.E, these programs actually teach kids not to listen to adults who want to manipulate them to promote hypocritical victorian social values.
According to my boss,
A majority of North Carolina school districts teach abstinence-only sex education. Sixty-one percent of North Carolina high school students are sexually active, and in 2001, the state’s teen pregnancy rate was higher than the national rate — 69.3 pregnancies per thousand girls, compared with 55 per thousand nationally.
Not good for work if you work with Republicans.
I don’t just know what to make of
this. The worst part is she reminds me of a couple of my D.C. coworkers. Eww.
[on her job:] I could not care less about gov or politics, but working for a Senator looks good on my resume.
[on her latest screw:] I like him very much and he likes me. But can it go anywhere, i.e. marriage? I don’t know. He’s Jewish, I’m not.
How tragic. Anyway, of course there had to be a scandal. As if she cares.
Some crucial context provided by Wonkette who seems a little too star struck by all this. Oh, D.C…
Ed Cone has the scoop on the NC GOP’s latest gay-bashing maneuver, and on their general stupidity. And John Aravosis has already put this action together so I don’t have to. Directly from his blog:
Earlier in the blog, I wrote about how the NC Republican Party has told gay Republicans that they are not welcome in the party, and went so far as to tell them that they are “not normal” people.
I think it’s high time we all gave the NC Republican party a holler to let them know that bigotry isn’t normal behavior either.
Main office contact info:
email@ncgop.orgMain Phone: 919.828.6423 (M-F, 9am-5:30pm)
Main Fax: 919.899.3815Specific Staff Email Addresses:
NC GOP Party Chair Ferrell Blount – he’s the BIG bad guy who said gays aren’t normal
fblount@greenvillenc.comVice Chairman Linda Daves
LCDaves@aol.comNational Committeeman Jim Cain
jcain@kilpatrickstockton.comNational Committeewoman Linda Shaw
IMLShaw@aol.comActing Chief of Staff, Bill Peaslee
peaslee@ncgop.orgCommunications Director, Kevin Howell
howell@ncgop.orgDeputy Political Director, Dennis V. Berwyn
berwyn@ncgop.org
Then again, why do the Republicans the favor of giving them a clue? Better to write letters to the editors of local papers and especially the Raleigh N & O (here’s a good one), highlighting how out of touch they are with the reality of North Carolinians’ lives.
I have a dilemma. I have been awaiting the Moveable Type upgrade so that I could implement comment registration on OrangePolitics.org. With the version I have (MT 2.64), there is no way to prohibit anonymous commenting. Requiring an e-mail address just allows people to get creative and make something up.
The other problem is that because I have so many comments (apparently), my MovableType scripts are so slow as to barely work anymore. People end up posting multiple copies of their comments all the time because the script failed and gave an error message. Then I have to go clean it up. Rebuilding one page now takes 5 minutes, which is ridiculous.
So I am considering – gasp – changing platforms! Does anyone have suggestions for other blog apps that allow multiple authors, category archives, and comment registration? I like Blogger a lot, but it doesn’t do categories. I have looked at WordPress but it doesn’t do comment registration. What else is out there?
I’ve been invited to speak at this conference on online organizing in San Franciso! You know I had to think about it for all of about 30 seconds before I said “hell, yeah!” You may be surprised to know that I have never been to the SF/Bay area. I can hardly believe it myself.
Anyway, I still have some time to start studying. Your suggestions are welcome.
Bonus info: Herb Caen called SF Baghdad by the Bay looong before either Gulf War.
I’m a little excited and little freaked to find that anyone browsing the state website can search the N.C. voter registration files.
Want to know all about me? Go ahead.