Note to Readers: We're moving!

By GottaLaff

Here we go again, but this time it should "take" (if you recall, last time we crashed for 3 days). We'll be shifting over to WordPress overnight tonight, at the same URL (http://www.thepoliticalcarnival.net/), so no "address change" to worry about.

We have outgrown Blogger, which has blocked archive access to 15,000 of our posts (their limit is 5,000), and don't start me on tags.

Tags are important, because they are used to search for published posts. Without the ability to add tags (say, "Scott Brown" or "oil spill"), we can't group or search for posts the way we should to reference them when we need them. Yes, we can use Google, but Googling is often more time consuming, and I've found I sometimes can't dig up what I need that way.

The page set-up will be very similar to what we have now. You won't get lost or confused.

Some of the new options you'll find on the new and improved TPC are:

A separate page for Blunt webisodes with its own URL; a Contact Us page; an About page; an option to receive a TPC newsletter; an archives page, for as many as could be accesssed; pretty new colors.

The Comments will be switched from Disqus to WordPress. We'll see how that goes, but we've used that before, and it seems fine. No idea about registering or user names, etc., but we'll find out soon enough.

So there you have it.

If anything goes wrong this time, I will only be able to tweet updates on Twitter in the morning. I'll be on the road, in and out on Saturday and Sunday.

Paddy will be here to post, but the posting will most likely be lighter than usual until Monday. I'll post when I can.

We ask for your patience if/when there are any hiccups, but it should all go smoothly.

Welcome, in advance, to our new home.

Note to Readers: Paddyless in Indiana

By GottaLaff

Today may, or may not, be a light posting today. Just a heads up.

Paddy tried to get a good deal on a decent computer today, but still couldn't afford one, even after your generous donations. She's hitting the Sunday sales tomorrow, so for today at least, I'm on my own.

Ordinarily, that's fine with me, but I'm still under the weather (flu is over, long story, this could last a while).

So... being that my energy level is that of the half-cylinder's worth in Palin's brain on a bad day, I'm playing it by ear.

Thank you for understanding.

Very Serious Fundraiser

BONUS! New Blunt video!

Look! A new convenient way to donate!

We set up a monthly subscription button for PayPal for those who would be willing to pay $5 a month to help support us. Many people are tapped out by the Haiti disaster, so if this is something that you feel you could do, please check out the button here, or where it will be permanently in the right side bar. As I understand it from PayPal after the first month you can cancel quite easily.

And now for the Very Serious Pitch:

Paddy's computer is gone, hopeless, eaten alive by bad bugs. She must buy a new one with money she doesn't have. If she doesn't, The Political Carnival will be The Politica---- I'll be missing my other half.

Paddy also has no heat.

So, we are having a major fundraiser.

Any money not going towards a new computer and heat for Paddy will go toward a bigger server for TPC's new home so that we can fit our growing needs.

For example-- and this is to those of you who don't understand why inaccessible tags are not an option any more (as well as inaccessible archives)-- without tags, we can't sort or find our posts.

For example, Blunt. I couldn't enter a "Blunt" tag, so there was no way to direct people to all Blunt posts under one heading. I hope that clarifies why we find that so important. It's vital to group posts, it's vital for searches, it's not a luxury.

And so, for that and a million other reasons, we must move the site to larger digs.

There is a Paypal button at the top of the right sidebar that is open 24/7.

Times are tough, we know that, but for those who are able, donations will be enormously appreciated, not to mention vital to keep TPC going strong.

Thank you in advance for your generosity.

BONUS INCENTIVE! Micheal Stinson, who co-wrote Going Rouge: The Sarah Palin Rogue Coloring and Activity Book with his amazing wife Julie Sigwart, has generously donated autographed copies to our donors! Whoever pushes us over the edge of our goal will get a copy! I have two copies now, but he's graciously offered more.

Fun Foto! My former student and dear friend Alex Nester on American Idol! (Here's how awesome she sounds, a recording she did with the Four Tops) She's a contendahhh!

Subscribing to The Political Carnival

LexusOakland suggested, and we thought it was a great idea, that we set up a monthly subscription button for PayPal for those who would be willing to pay $5 a month to help support us. As LO said, many people are tapped out by the Haiti disaster, so if this is something that you feel you could do, please check out the button here or where it will be permanently in the right side bar. As I understand it from PayPal after the first month you can cancel quite easily, not that you'd ever want to stop hearing from us though. /wink

Note- The button to make sure you get RSS feeds of our posts is down the right side of the page just under the Facebook Fans widget.

Update

Gotta is still sick, but at least she can croak a bit at the moment. My computer is being good right now, but I've had to scan a couple times just to make sure that nothing evil was lingering, so that is where the gaps in posting have come. You guys are troopers for being so patient with us!! And send some chicken soup vibes Gotta's way.

Update

I'm still in a pickle. Both IE & FF are loading super slow or not loading at all. I've run every diagnostic and virus/bot/malware program I can find and nada. All the applications on my computer are loading up just fine, but anything having to do with a website just sits there working. Any ideas? If I can get to the website I'm going to try and download Google Chrome since Gotta seems to use it without any problems. Oh and Gotta is even sicker today than yesterday, so we're having a special kind of day.

Note

I'm still having some issues with the computer that I'm going to take a few minutes and see if I can fix. Be back in a bit.

5,000,000

By GottaLaff

Thanks to you, The Political Carnival has reached 5,000,000 readers! That's 35,000,000 in dog years.

Five. Million.

5,000,000!!!

And don't even get me started on the over 7,000,000 page views. Whew! I'm exhausted from typing all those zeros!

We are as grateful as we can be. The Political Carnival's success depends on your readership, and we can't thank you enough.

You're clearly the smartest, best looking, sweetest readers in the world, and we lerve you! Exclamation point!

And just because I really liked this one:

A SPECIAL THANKS TO MY TWEEPLE. You guys are a a blast!! Thank you!

Dear ultra patient, very confused Readers:

By GottaLaff

Dear You,

Due to the popularity (thank you), size, and complicated nature of The Political Carnival, we've had to temporarily move back to Blogger from our new site.

We didn't want to disrupt our posting, or your readership, while we go back to square one and build a new site on a bigger server, so here we are.

We are more than aware of how frustrating it has been for you to click on TPC and get error messages (among other annoying things), and we thank you profusely for bearing with us.

We've been tearing our hair out. We are now bald. Yes. It's true.

Noetical, our webmaster, has been a saint. She's worked 18 hour days/nights on our behalf, only to discover that our site is a big pain in the ass to move, and needed a bigger, badder place to be. She is the most patient, sweetest, hardest working person EVER.

So. Here we are for a few more weeks. We will keep you posted. And again, we are very sorry for any inconvenience we've put you through.

We wouldn't have moved at all if we didn't have to, but we've outgrown this place, and can't even access thousands of our own posts, which we need to reference constantly. Hence, the move.

When we have our next fundraiser, we will be using much of it for rebuilding the new digs, and the rest for more heaters for Paddy, who has no heat in her house. Which is in Indiana. Which is freezing.

Thank you endlessly for your patience.

Love, Us

Here's your big fat reward for hanging in there with us (click on image to enlarge):

Photo by stevekimura

Shameless TPC promotion and a big fat thank you

By GottaLaff

Thank you, Allen!

Allen McDuffee and I became pals on Twitter recently. He's a very accomplished, very sweet guy who tells jokes better than I do. Way better.

Anyway, he has a blog, and on that blog he very generously introduces other blogs to his readers. Today, The Political Carnival is lucky enough to be one of them.

Allen e-mailed and asked me if he could send me some questions so he could use the answers in his post. He did, I did, and the results can be found here.

Before the trolls accuse me, again, of seeking "fame" (certainly not fortune, or we wouldn't need fundraisers), Allen approached me, not the other way around. I'd be pretty stupid to decline. I'm not sure why it's wrong to promote one's own site, or want due credit for breaking stories that go global, but just in case, I thought I'd better explain preemptively. Again, it's a wonderful feeling to accomplish something after years of diligence. Paddy and I work hard and are grateful when we are acknowledged. So:

Thank you Allen, for your kindness. It means the world to TPC. It's not easy for a "boutique" blog like ours to reach as many readers as the gargantuan sites, so your help is very much appreciated.

And thank you, TPC readers, for keeping us going. It all comes down to you, who we adore madly.

Speaking of reaching readers, I'll be on the Angie Coiro Show (on San Francisco's progressive station Green 960) tonight at 6:15 pm Pacific to talk about last night's post about anti-choicers raising money for Dr. Tiller's assassin.

For those who have asked, my regular spot is every Friday (6:45-7:00 pm Pacific), but Angie asked me to pop in tonight because of that story Paddy found.

3,000,000

By GottaLaff

Thank you all so, so much for being part of the TPC family.
3,000,000 hits as of today!
We couldn't have done it without you... literally.

Love, Paddy and Laffy

...with special thanks to Cliff, without whom we wouldn't be posting here

Now if only that number applied to the number of newly employed Americans...

Cliff Schecter, author of "The Real McCain" on Blog Talk Radio Tonight at 9p EST

Cliff's going to be on with my friend Denise from AOL's Political Machine. I'll be there to add, ahem, color.

Tonight at 9p EST. Link here to listen.

Paddy On "Unusable Signal" On Blog Talk Radio

No clue what we're talking about yet, but if you're interested, I'll be there hanging with my friend Denise from AOL's Political Machine.

Tuesday September 9th at 9p EST. Link here to listen.

Paddy On "Unusable Signal" On Blog Talk Radio Tomorrow

No clue what we're talking about yet, but if you're interested, I'll be there hanging with my friend Denise from AOL's Political Machine.

Tomorrow Tuesday September 9th at 9p EST. Link here to listen.

Commenter Challenge: Describe The Political Carnival in 3 sentences

By GottaLaff

I know, I know, we're opening ourselves up to such abuse and snark, but then again, when don't we?

Here's the challenge: We need to write up a 3-line blurb about TPC (for advertisers, others), and have a few ideas of our own, but we're too close to it, since we work here. So we're asking for your input.

How do you see our bloggy? What's it about? What's the content about? What do we put out there? Can you describe it to us? Can you keep it G rated? Forget that last one.

If all goes well, we'll still respect you in the morning.