Escapee from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts with stuff on his mind about politics, music, and more.
Archive for 8th February 2008
A quick follow-up to the post from yesterday, it’s worth highlighting:
Scot Colford is the Applications Manager at the Boston Public Library. His position is essentially similar to mine - DRM is annoying, but it gets more materials to more people. He left a comment to direct people to The Boston Public Library’s digital blog, and it’s worth reading for the other side of the coin.
Written at 9:45 on Thursday night because WordPress is AWESOME and allows you to set posts to be published in the future. How exciting!
* So Romney’s out and McCain’s the de facto Republican candidate. Great job, people. Really. Because, after all, the Republicans apparently learned so much from the Democrats going with “electable” candidates recently.
* With that said, Romney’s speech was good, and if his actions in office and on the campaign trail came anywhere near the words in the speech today, he probably would have won the nomination. Meanwhile, McCain made the speech he had to make, frankly. Not great, but hardly a disaster. I’m pretty sure McCain knows that the reality is that the conservatives aren’t going to sit out of the election, so there’s no need for him to pander too much, and he made a few promises that, if he keeps them, will make me pleasantly surprised. But I’m not holding my breath.
* Joe Klein on Obama for Time: “Inspiration v. Substance.” Says a lot of what I’m being derided for here, but the money shot is this bit: “That is not just maddeningly vague but also disingenuous: the campaign is entirely about Obama and his ability to inspire. Rather than focusing on any specific issue or cause — other than an amorphous desire for change — the message is becoming dangerously self-referential. The Obama campaign all too often is about how wonderful the Obama campaign is.”
* The times I ever find anything of worth at Talking Points Memo is rare, but this view of the Obama campaign from the left is also interesting:
The Obama campaign’s instruction to their volunteers to steer clear of policy questions. How can we truly bring about real political change if the movement the Obama people are building is devoid of ideological content, content merely to mouth gauzy generalities about “coming together” and “yes we can”? Such a movement becomes a cult or personality rather than engine for social justice and political transformation. And personality cults can be a huge turnoff to those who are not already drinking the Kool-Aid.
That any campaign would actively tell their people to avoid policy questions is simply disgusting to me, and I’m not sorry to say it.
* Oh, and one of the icons of the inspiration grassroots Obama movement, Obama Girl? She didn’t vote in the primary. Way to go!
* I’m not big on the assumption that these things had to do with political favors, but I certainly don’t want to deal with this crap again. The whole piece is interesting reading for the continued battle between the need for fuel and the desire for environmental positivity, but the second page is what’s most relevant to the moment.
* New England Republican highlights the records of our Congresscritters. Yikes. Also from him, some context on gas company taxes and profits.