Note to Readers: Changes

By GottaLaff

BUMPING THIS UP FOR THOSE WHO MISSED IT:

It's time to update you on what's been going on with TPC's Big Move. We were unable to follow through. As it turns out, our site requires more than we can afford (meaning, paying a lot of money for a server that can handle what we do here).

We may move in the future, we may not. We may play with our color scheme, we may not.

But we have changed our Comments.

We're switching to Disqus, which has some great benefits. Hopefully one will be the ability to moderate better, so that we keep spam and trolls under control more easily.

That's all for now.

Love,

Laffy and Paddy

PhotOh! Rachel Maddow's snapshot from CPAC gets ugly comments

By GottaLaff

Rachel Maddow popped into CPAC and snapped this photo of some of her swag:



Nice of the CPAC gang to hand those Palin pics out, because she just can't seem to get enough exposure these days.

Under a post of Rachel's photo over at MediaBistro, some of the comments were typically, right wingily stupid:

yakuza_saint
so what type of swag do they give out at left-wing butch lesbo events?

4 people liked this comment.

PicklingTheBeast 1 hour ago

Yeah...Rachel is envious of Caribou Barbie. She'd have to lose about a hundred IQ points to compete with Sister Sarah.

Moderate 1 hour ago

Maddow the stalker.

unicornsforeveryone 2 hours ago

Creepy...
Ray alone in a hotel room with a glossy pic of Sarah Palin...

pants on the ground, pants on the ground

How mature.

Trolls and other objectionable Commenters, the sequel

By GottaLaff

Sometime we at TPC get nasty, vicious comments on our posts, and you'll see that we've deleted most of them. We often get asked why we're allowed to have our opinions, but "stifle free speech, the First Amendment" of others.

First, about the First: Read the Constitution. That's about preventing the government from stomping on your rights, not about your fellow citizens (who host blogs) from insisting that you treat each others (and us) with respect. It's about style, not substance. If you're a regular reader, that's pretty obvious.

Second: This is an opinion site. That's what we do. We snark, we opine, we snipe, we joke, we analyze, we are a little idiosyncratic, and we're allowed. Oh, and we're Progressive. If you disagree with us, fine. If you don't like our p.o.v. feel free to go elsewhere. In fact, start your own blog, and say whatever you'd like, that's your prerogative.

You are welcome to visit and schmooze as long as you engage in basic common courtesy.

In a previous post I laid out some guidelines:

As of January 1, 2009, I decided to make every attempt to delete troll comments if they are:

• Uncivil
• Pointlessly rambling
  
• Serve no other purpose other than to attempt to provoke a fight
• Redundant (ie: posting the same comment in several threads)
• Argumentative, simply spewing lies, without providing substance/facts
• Excessive in length (that goes for sympathetic Comments, too)
• Random, uncalled-for, irrelevant snottiness without regard to the content of that particular post
  

If I left anything out, please feel free to add to the list.

There are exceptions to all of these, of course. If a comment is longer than usual, but it's from a Commenter who adheres to protocol 99.9% of the time, we tend to be lenient. If a Comment is relatively innocuous, but simply annoying, that's no biggie either.

Freedom of speech is one thing. Spewing gratuitous hostilities in an otherwise congenial setting is another. That's superfluous and destructive.

Setting standards for an environment that nurtures friendly, respectful, and spirited conversation is paramount. Anything that crosses the line will hereby be deleted.

I'm adding one more: No spam. It gets deleted, so don't even go there.

So, what have we learned? Baiting and insults are no-nos. Not a difficult concept. My YouTube site has garnered the most vile comments I've ever seen, especially when I post videos of President Obama. The consensus is that YouTube is a stomping ground for the "barely literate, bio-hazardous scum" (a quote from a fellow YouTuber). I've had to stop allowing comments on some posts.

That segues me into a relevant article that a Twitter pal of mine, Plutoniumpage, linked me to. Here are random excerpts from an interview with Stephen Fry. Please go read the whole piece:

• "Of all the stinking, sliding, scuttling, weird, entomological creatures that inhabit the floor of the internet those comments on blogs are the most unbearable, almost beyond imagining..."

• "Their resentment, their desire to be heard at the most vituperative level, at the most unpleasant and malevolent, genuinely ill-willed malevolent, level is terrifying..."

• "There is something faintly disgusting in someone who merely wants to have sycophantic voices cooing in his ear and licking his inner thigh... but on the other hand it is a bit much that somehow people almost feel they have a right to be heard in their insulting of me. If I don't want to hear people being unpleasant about me I should have the right to turn it off."

• "...[S]ocial networking sites are making people more isolated as they turn to their computer screens rather than meeting people in real life."

• "The idea that the open exchange of information can have a positive global impact. If people are more informed then they become more engaged and if they are more engaged then they can become more empathetic."

And-- to quote a very civil, very wise, very brilliant man-- that's the way it is. But here at TPC at least, we try to keep it pleasant.

Trolls and other objectionable Commenters

By GottaLaff

It's time to re-post this Post-O'-Guidelines, since we seem to be having a new wave of trolls this summer. And good for us! Why good? Here's why:

Original post:

We know here at TPC that we are becoming more successful than ever before. How do we know that? Because we've seen an increasing number of trolls on our site.

This pathetic little band of drive-by and/or returning Commenters must feel awfully threatened, because they obviously feel the need to intrude on a harmonious family such as ours who have no interest in any of the illogical, ill-informed, baiting insults they fling around like ape feces (unless, of course, it's a genuine attempt at real conversation with at least a minimum of substance).

With that, here is a post I've been saving up. I found it at The Motley Moose. Here are some excerpts:

For many people, flaming and hostility are the only reasons to get online.

These are folks who suffer from a chronic case of assholicism.

Trolls.

troll
One who purposely and deliberately (that purpose usually being self-amusement) starts an argument in a manner which attacks others on a forum without in any way listening to the arguments proposed by his or her peers. He will spark of such an argument via the use of ad hominem attacks (i.e. 'you're nothing but a fanboy' is a popular phrase) with no substance or relevance to back them up as well as straw man arguments, which he uses to simply avoid addressing the essence of the issue.

It's much easier to criticise and inflame than it is to be creative and stimulating.

This is as true for the blogosphere as it is for the real world.

Not all trolls are loud, obnoxious and obvious though.

One of my favorites subset of trolls is one that does not fit this specific criteria.

The "polite" troll. You know exactly what I'm talking about.

These are usually the ones railing against opression and all about their right to spew whatever nonsense they are peddling that day.

They usually offer up blisteringly polite, well written 'snake under the rose' posts that are perfectly within the bounds of decency, but create unrest and dissatisfaction with cutting accuracy.

Disruptive people, who keep themselves just at the edge of acceptable behavior.

They can drive away the sane people just as much as the loud and obnoxious obvious trolls.

These are the posters all too often cry innocence and hide behind the very worthy excuse of open discussion, but are frequently just trying to stir up trouble.

Those are usually the ones accusing trusted and long time users of promoting censorship and trollish behavior.

Blogs have to walk a fine line though.

- Heavy handed mods find themselves with a dead community, because people do not want to be dictated to.

- Mods that exercise too little input also find themselves with a cobweb, because trolls come in and run people off. [...]

Kottke says a bit like so :

Much of the tone of discourse online is governed by the level of moderation and to what extent people are encouraged to "own" their words. When forums, message boards, and blog comment threads with more than a handful of participants are unmoderated, bad behavior follows. The appearance of one troll encourages others. Undeleted hateful or ad hominem comments are an indication that that sort of thing is allowable behavior and encourages more of the same. Those commenters who are normally respectable participants are emboldened by the uptick in bad behavior and misbehave themselves. More likely, they're discouraged from helping with the community moderation process of keeping their peers in line with social pressure. Or they stop visiting the site altogether. [...]

Gresham's Law

Gresham's law says that any circulating currency consisting of both "good" and "bad" money (both forms required to be accepted at equal value under legal tender law) quickly becomes dominated by the "bad" money. This is because people spending money will hand over the "bad" coins rather than the "good" ones, keeping the "good" ones for themselves.

Gresham's Law of trolls:

Trolls are willing to use a forum with a lot of thoughtful people in it, but thoughtful people aren't willing to use a forum with a lot of trolls in it.

Which means that once trolling takes hold, it tends to become the dominant culture.

Except for one thing: That's not going to happen here at TPC. As of January 1, 2009, I decided to make every attempt to delete/monitor troll comments if they are:

• Uncivil
• Pointlessly rambling
  
• Serve no other purpose other than to attempt to provoke a fight
• Redundant (ie: posting the same comment in several threads)
• Argumentative, simply spewing lies, without providing substance/facts
• Excessive in length (that goes for sympathetic Comments, too)
• Random, uncalled-for, irrelevant snottiness without regard to the content of that particular post
  

If I left anything out, please feel free to add to the list.

There are exceptions to all of these, of course. If a comment is longer than usual, but it's from a Commenter who adheres to protocol 99.9% of the time, we tend to be lenient. If a Comment is relatively innocuous, but simply annoying, that's no biggie either.

Freedom of speech is one thing. Spewing gratuitous hostilities in an otherwise congenial setting is another. That's superfluous and destructive.

Setting standards for an environment that nurtures friendly, respectful, and spirited conversation is paramount. Anything that crosses the line will hereby be deleted.

I'm done now.

Notice to readers

By GottaLaff

Uh-uh-uh....

Whether we agree with what you post in Comments or not, spam is spam. Repetitive and/or duplicate comments will now be deleted. We heard you the first time. You know who you are.

Now, if you have something you'd like us to address, go ahead and e-mail us. We'll look into it and decide whether to post or not. We're always open to suggestion, and, speaking for myself, I've gotten many e-mails that point me to excellent sites and/or articles.

To our regulars, disregard this warning. We are not addressing you, and thanks for keeping the discussions lively, thought-provoking, and on point.

By the way, this does not apply to friendly off-topic convos... but I'm pretty sure you all understood that.

Love,

Laffy

Frangela loves us

By GottaLaff

I posted about a terrific comedy duo, Frangela (Frances Callier and Angela V. Shelton, both of The Second City), who I thought recently lost their radio show out here in SoCal on KTLK. I'm happy to say I was (partially) wrong.

Well, guess who messaged me on MySpace and left a comment here at TPC:

hey all! Actually we still have our show on KTLK, it's called "The Week According to Frangela." We are on Saturdays from 2 - 4pm pacific - except this saturday we are not on because of some sporting event :( We used to be on Sundays also, but they replaced our show with an infomercial -so now we're only on once a week, unless of course somebody throws a ball some place! We really want our own Mon-Fri show so please check out frangela.com and help frangela out! You rock, and this blog rocks!!!!!

I messaged them back, promising to promote them whenever I could. Hence, this post. Go Frangela! Keep up the good work!

White supremacists watched in lead up to Obama administration

By GottaLaff

I wasn't going to post this (it's such a downer, and it's time to be upbeat about the Big Upcoming Obamaramapalooza), but I'll tell you why I did after this:

Hate crimes experts and law enforcement officials are closely watching white supremacists across the country as Barack Obama prepares next week to be sworn in as the first black president of the United States.

So far, there is no known organized effort to express opposition to Obama's rise to the presidency other than a call by the National Knights of the Ku Klux Klan for its members to wear black armbands as well as fly the U.S. flag upside down on Inauguration Day and Obama's first full day in office.

As Tuesday approaches, when Obama stands outside the Capitol to take the oath of office, experts expect anger about the new president to spike. But they don't expect it to go away.

"The level of vitriol, I expect, will go up a bit more around inauguration time," said Brian Levin, director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University-San Bernardino.

There "is concern" about white supremacist groups during the inauguration, said Joe Persichini, the assistant FBI director who is helping to oversee security during the inauguration. [...]

And interest in racist ideology was so high right after the election that computer servers for two White supremacist Web sites crashed, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups.

But the violence and interest soon subsided. Leaders within the white supremacist movement are now seeking to capitalize on Obama's presidency by using his election to help grow their organizations. [...]

Levin noted that it is common knowledge the U.S. Secret Service is taking great measures to protect Obama (who began receiving coverage in May 2007, the earliest point ever for a candidate in a presidential campaign), and emphasized it is a great challenge.

"President-elect Obama is so used to a public presence, and being among people poses some real difficulties for his protection," Levin said.

I realize I've posted similar pieces before, but it's important to stay aware of this horrid trend. I've personally become more aware of it in the last six days, since I posted the video of P.E. Obama visiting Ben's Chili Bowl on my YouTube page.

There have been, to date, 155,000 views and over 850 comments. I have never been kept so busy monitoring comments. At first, it was all positive, joyous, celebratory, even giddy feedback. But as the days have gone on, I've had to delete and block commenter after commenter who were so utterly and sickeningly racist that I was actually taken aback.

One spammer spent two days posting 25 comments at a time, varying his screen name by one letter/number so that blocking was impossible (I'd have to block each one separately). He finally stopped, because I made it a priority to stop that kind of hate speech in its tracks, even interrupting my writing here at TPC while I popped over to block and delete. I tried contacting YouTube, but their frustrating system makes that impossible.

I'm still monitoring diligently today. It's disheartening, and scary as hell, to read the very ignorant, extremely stupid, infantile, racist, hate-filled rants of these cretins. It makes it real and way too in my face.

All we can do is keep trying to communicate (which, by the way, I attempted to do once or twice, which you can see if you go wade through the comments), support P.E. Obama's efforts to reach out, and wish with everything we've got that he stays safe and protected.

How sad that such a feel-good 3 minutes and 37 seconds could evoke such noxious, hostile bigotry.

Reid Lobbied Against Appointing Jackson

By GottaLaff

Ever wonder why we choose to post what we post? Once in awhile in Comments, we get a mild complaint or two. Well, here it is: We post what's out there, what's available to us, and, obviously, what we hope is interesting to readers.

Paddy and I also, for the most part, put up what strikes an emotional chord in us, for whatever reason.

We also try to amuse once in awhile, and ignore the "real" news, just for a change of pace.

One other thing I'd like to make very clear: We don't necessarily agree with the content of an article. If we don't add commentary, it doesn't mean we agree (or disagree) with it. We simply though it was informative or interesting. My opinions have often been mistaken for those of the author of an article.

With that, I'm posting something that I find a little boring, because there's very little out there today:

Just days before Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was charged with trying to sell President-elect Obama's U.S. Senate seat to the highest bidder, the Chicago Sun Times reports Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) called to "make it clear who he didn't want in the post: Jesse Jackson, Jr., Danny Davis or Emil Jones."

"Rather, Reid called Blagojevich to argue he appoint either state Veterans Affairs chief Tammy Duckworth or Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan."

I'll be so relieved when Blago and the remnants of his polluted wake disappear.

Commenter compares Obama, Bush... Thinks Obama is a hypocrite

By GottaLaff

UPDATE:
Anon now goes by Not a Troll. Kudos for the i.d., Not.

The following Comment is from one of our Anonymi. You can review the original thread here.

Apparently, you didn't see it in the news that Bush has been cleared on some of the Gitmo cases, with more expected to be cleared. I'm not saying that Bush has been an angel, but I think that far more has been laid on him than was accurate.

And I don't see Obama as being transparent. There is too much about him and his time in the cesspool of Chicago that we don't know about. The mere fact that when something comes out about someone he knows in Chicago, such as Ayers, Wright, and Blagojevich, and Obama pleads total ignorance about their wrong behavior, it does make it seem that he's either hiding some stuff, or that he's simply too ignorant to be trusted with leading our country.

There are numerous other things that show that Obama is a chameleon, such as driving a gashog of a car until he ran for office, and then switching to a hybrid. Now he acts as someone who cares so deeply about the environment? Hypocritical.

He ate junk food and smoked cigarettes until getting into the public eye so much, and now he's Mr. Healthy-Workout-Machine?

Once again, I don't have time for further back-and-forths with one of our Anons. Please feel free to continue the conversation.

Please note: My last comment to Anon gave him/her kudos for civility. So far, he/she has followed the new guidelines. We may disagree strongly, but there was welcome absence of the usual troll games.

Trolls and other objectionable Commenters

By GottaLaff

We know here at TPC that we are becoming more successful than ever before. How do we know that? Because we've seen an increasing number of trolls on our site.

This pathetic little band of 4 a.m. drive-by Commenters must feel awfully threatened, because they obviously feel the need to intrude on a harmonious family such as ours who have no interest in any of the illogical, ill-informed, baiting insults they fling around like ape feces (unless, of course, it's a genuine attempt at real conversation with at least a minimum of substance).

With that, here is a post I've been saving up. I found it at The Motley Moose. Here are some excerpts:

For many people, flaming and hostility are the only reasons to get online.

These are folks who suffer from a chronic case of assholicism.

Trolls.

troll
One who purposely and deliberately (that purpose usually being self-amusement) starts an argument in a manner which attacks others on a forum without in any way listening to the arguments proposed by his or her peers. He will spark of such an argument via the use of ad hominem attacks (i.e. 'you're nothing but a fanboy' is a popular phrase) with no substance or relevance to back them up as well as straw man arguments, which he uses to simply avoid addressing the essence of the issue.

It's much easier to criticise and inflame than it is to be creative and stimulating.

This is as true for the blogosphere as it is for the real world.

Not all trolls are loud, obnoxious and obvious though.

One of my favorites subset of trolls is one that does not fit this specific criteria.

The "polite" troll. You know exactly what I'm talking about.

These are usually the ones railing against opression and all about their right to spew whatever nonsense they are peddling that day.

They usually offer up blisteringly polite, well written 'snake under the rose' posts that are perfectly within the bounds of decency, but create unrest and dissatisfaction with cutting accuracy.

Disruptive people, who keep themselves just at the edge of acceptable behavior.

They can drive away the sane people just as much as the loud and obnoxious obvious trolls.

These are the posters all too often cry innocence and hide behind the very worthy excuse of open discussion, but are frequently just trying to stir up trouble.

Those are usually the ones accusing trusted and long time users of promoting censorship and trollish behavior.

Blogs have to walk a fine line though.

- Heavy handed mods find themselves with a dead community, because people do not want to be dictated to.

- Mods that exercise too little input also find themselves with a cobweb, because trolls come in and run people off. [...]

Kottke says a bit like so :

Much of the tone of discourse online is governed by the level of moderation and to what extent people are encouraged to "own" their words. When forums, message boards, and blog comment threads with more than a handful of participants are unmoderated, bad behavior follows. The appearance of one troll encourages others. Undeleted hateful or ad hominem comments are an indication that that sort of thing is allowable behavior and encourages more of the same. Those commenters who are normally respectable participants are emboldened by the uptick in bad behavior and misbehave themselves. More likely, they're discouraged from helping with the community moderation process of keeping their peers in line with social pressure. Or they stop visiting the site altogether. [...]

Gresham's Law

Gresham's law says that any circulating currency consisting of both "good" and "bad" money (both forms required to be accepted at equal value under legal tender law) quickly becomes dominated by the "bad" money. This is because people spending money will hand over the "bad" coins rather than the "good" ones, keeping the "good" ones for themselves.

Gresham's Law of trolls:

Trolls are willing to use a forum with a lot of thoughtful people in it, but thoughtful people aren't willing to use a forum with a lot of trolls in it.

Which means that once trolling takes hold, it tends to become the dominant culture.

Except for one thing: That's not going to happen here at TPC. As of January 1, 2009, I decided to make every attempt to delete troll comments if they are:

• Uncivil
• Pointlessly rambling
  
• Serve no other purpose other than to attempt to provoke a fight
• Redundant (ie: posting the same comment in several threads)
• Argumentative, simply spewing lies, without providing substance/facts
• Excessive in length (that goes for sympathetic Comments, too)
• Random, uncalled-for, irrelevant snottiness without regard to the content of that particular post
  

If I left anything out, please feel free to add to the list.

There are exceptions to all of these, of course. If a comment is longer than usual, but it's from a Commenter who adheres to protocol 99.9% of the time, we tend to be lenient. If a Comment is relatively innocuous, but simply annoying, that's no biggie either.

Freedom of speech is one thing. Spewing gratuitous hostilities in an otherwise congenial setting is another. That's superfluous and destructive.

Setting standards for an environment that nurtures friendly, respectful, and spirited conversation is paramount. Anything that crosses the line will hereby be deleted.

I'm done now.

Anonymous Commenter: "Christians are losing religious freedoms"

By GottaLaff

Here's a comment from one of the many Rev. Rick threads. It's from a convo I was having with Anon (whoever that may be, since they won't even offer a pseudonym):

If you're paying so much attention, then how did you miss the fact that Christians are losing religious freedoms?

If gay marriage is legalized, ministers who don't choose to perform them in accordance with their beliefs will be penalized.

Christians (and others) who do not believe that abortion is morally right are going to be forced to perform them.

Certain rights, forced on others, necessitate the loss of their rights.

It's not just a matter of gays obtaining the right to marry. It ends up forcing other people to do things they don't believe in.

Oh, and I guess maybe I'd have to agree on that tyranny of the majority, if the majority voted in Obama.

That last bit was in response to a link I provided about the tyranny of the majority in relation to Proposition 8, the crux of one of the many arguments against it.

I don't have enough time to spend responding to each point Commenters make on each thread. I'd never have time to post, let alone live my life away from blogging (yes, I actually do that from time to time).

Instead, maybe some of you might want to take up the conversation from here. I suggest you follow the link back to the few comments Anon and I shared with each other, unless you feel the one I just posted here was enough for you.

Oh, look, here's an update:

No, my arguments are not faulty. There's even a lesbian professor and gay activist who agrees that religious people must lost their freedom in order for gays to get certain freedoms.

But go ahead and ignore the rights of Christians in favour of other groups. We're quite used to it.

Yes, I ignore Christian rights, Jewish rights, African American rights, gay rights, and the rights of Goldendoodles everywhere. I limit my attention solely to Laffy rights. I'm a big ol' meany bigot who refuses to acknowledge anyone's rights but my own. Anon wins. I hang my head in defeat.

I ask forgiveness of the god in whom I do not believe.

Change we can comment about

By GottaLaff

Froomkin:

Sometimes, the change is enough to make your head spin. This is one of those moments.

Here's the status quo: A president who has overt contempt for public opinion, who shields himself from opposing views and whose idea of White House Web site interactivity is a video of his dog.

And here's the change: The Obama transition team is actually soliciting public comments on its Web site, reading them and responding to them.

Whenever someone expresses doubts that Obama will bring change to this country, tell them it's not limited to cabinet members, Clintonesque or otherwise. We, the people, are as responsible as anyone for making a difference, as is evidenced by our choice for president.

If we are consistently loud and clear, we can make things happen. We already have. Now Obama has opened a door, providing us with a wonderful opportunity to vocalize.

While that, in itself, is a very welcome contrast/change, we have the responsibility to follow through, make our opinions known, and keep the communication lines open.

How great is Obama? This great...

By GottaLaff

Via Commenter Allison:

A good friend of mine from Spain lives in Berlin and attended Obama's rally there months ago. Now he mails me this:

I am joining the US Wahlkapmf party here in Berlin Mitte tonight. It is going to be tremendous. I might not come to work tomorrow if the party is nice and fun. I never thought that I might be waving an American flag. I think the celebration and joy will be bigger than in the soccer European championship (what a comparison, don't take me wrong). I saw yesterday the 30min ad he did for the television some days ago. This guy is really great.

Amazing that 'the rest of the world' will be celebrating with us too!

There's not much about this election that isn't amazing.

Maybe we progressives do have a pre-9/11 mindset. That was when, you know, the rest of the world was with us.

Please help our Commenter decide

By GottaLaff

I am not being in the least bit snarky here. I'd like to help not only this Commenter, but anyone else out there who is having trouble deciding:

I'm still having a hard time making up my mind who to vote for. I'm not too happy about Obama because in Pennsylvania the economy isn't doing too good and higher taxes won't help. On the other hand, McCain seems a bit cratchety and clueless. I'm now going to vote for who I dislike the least. So, if anyone could name me the three biggest negatives about Obama and the the 3 biggest negatives about McCain that would be very helpful.

Show your fellow Commenter what inclusiveness and communication really mean.

Comments by non-TPC Commenters on Obama's Big Half Hour

By GottaLaff

Here are some initial reactions to the Obamapalooza:

• It was really good. Amazingly good. It didn't mention McCain once, yet reminded the country of the challenges we face, that Obama can rise above politics and unite the nation. Instead of hitting people with pie charts and rhetoric. He reminded us what was important.

  Quietly he brought up every smear that the RNC has thrown his way. He has the news cycle tomorrow. I wonder what McCain will do to try and knock him out of it.

  The Ad was balanced and somehow fresh, even though I've heard it all before. The production was flawless.

• I thought I have never wanted any man more than I do right now.

  It was the most erotic half hour of my life.

• Much better than I expected. Very, very good. The stories were amazing. Since I've heard all his plans, they weren't that 'exciting' to me, but if people didn't know his plans, they now now. Done very well.
• Obama is giving a reason for Americans to vote for him and his policy proposals. John McCain is not giving you a reason to vote for him. Rather than explain is his policy proposals, he focuses on Obama and why you should not vote for him.
• I thought they were restrained and focused on Obama's message, completely ignoring McCain and his campaign. The half hour was set clearly - Obama's take on issue after issue. I was truly moved by the lady with arthritic fingers.
  But yes I did cringe a bit at how uber-polished it all was!! But then they have never been sloppy this campaign so its par for the course for them! Watch out for "presumptuous" charges from the other side :)

• Do you think the McCain people had a sinking feeling while watching that half hour unfold?

  You betcha!

• This ain't John Kerry.
• Effective and deliberate. The McCain campaign is trying to paint him as a radilcal, and this makes their task that much harder.
• Unusual combination of cheezy and awesome. They don't often go together. Kind of over the top, but appealing to lower-info voters. Perfect for them. Loved the cut to live; flawless.

Shallow Thoughts: Commenters edition

By GottaLaff

It's still way too early for my brain to function properly, but today's Shallow Thought was easy to formulate:

We have the best, most intelligent, dedicated-to-all-the-right-things Commenters in the world.

That was today's Shallow Thought. Thank you for wading in.

A post by our Commenter in Chief from Connecticut

By Commenter Chris via GottaLaff

Chris e-mailed me the other day regarding the subject below, and I invited her to send me a full post on it. It's happens to be about, but not limited to, Connecticut and the effort to introduce ballot initiatives, bypassing the state Constitution:

First, a little background: Connecticut amends its Constitution through conventions . They meet and propose whatever changes, which are then put before the electorate for approval. Any proposals approved by the voters become part of the Constitution.

So, November 4, 2008 being the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November in the even-numbered year next succeeding the expiration of a period of twenty years from the date of convening of the last convention, electors in Connecticut will vote on the ballot question:

"Shall there be a Constitutional Convention to amend or revise the Constitution of the state" as required by Article 13 of the CT Constitution. [Sec. 2] If a majority votes yes, then a convention must be held no later than one year after the date of the vote [Sec. 3]. If a majority votes no, a Constitutional Convention may be held in one of the intervening years [but not earlier than 10 years from the date of the last convention] at the request of a two-thirds majority in each house of the Legislature [Sec. 1]

That's how we do it and it's complicated for a reason.

This year, proponents of holding a convention want to put forth the proposal of changing Article 13 . They want to implement an "Initiative Referenda", which basically means doing away with the conventions and bringing proposed amendments directly to the voters, the way it's done in other states, such as California. I don't like it.

For the record, I live in California, and I don't like it either.

Our Constitution has been around longer than the US Constitution and it's supposed to be difficult to change it.

It's supposed to be a deliberative process, rather than one that is subject to popular whims and fears, which is what direct initiative will bring us.

The proponents say that they will push for an agenda to amend the Constitution to provide for limiting property taxes (how well did that work out for ya, CA?). They also want hard changes to the Constitution for immigration reform, a three-strikes law, ethics reform, eminent domain reform, term limits, a recall provision, and "More!!! Much More!" .

All of those things (except eminent domain – which does need reform) can be accomplished by the Legislature. We don't have to change the Constitution for them, except maybe the recall provision, which I'm not convinced is a good idea anyway.

And then there's gay marriage. The CT Supreme Court decision earlier this month made direct initiative imperative if the voters want gay marriage banned. Richard Blumenthal, CT Attorney General, said that the court was the final arbiter and the decision would be respected.

Jodi Rell acknowledged that banning gay marriage was a fight she could not win. The decision was based on the equal protection under the law clause of the Constitution, so any amendment would have to address that. Do we really want to screw with equal protection? Do we really want one segment of the population deciding what rights another segment is allowed to have??

A major point of the Constitution is to protect the individual from the tyranny of the majority!

There are others ideas out there which could find their way onto the ballot from initiatives - things we haven't thought of yet. And every popular whim that can gather enough signatures on petitions will make it to a ballot in November. We could be taking a lot of the decision-making power out of the hands of the people we've elected to make decisions about the way the state is run.

After writing all this, it is clear to me that my opposition to the ballot question isn't about amending the Constitution; it is against direct initiatives.

It is an argument best given when the question is about amending the Constitution to allow for Initiative Referenda. But still, I'm voting NO on the ballot question, just to be safe.

I completely agree with Chris. We have had election after election in which we vote on initiatives that are worded badly, are too convoluted for many to understand (I believe Rachel Maddow made that point last night), and most importantly, should never have made their way on to the ballot.

Chris's heartfelt and intelligent e-mail to me was too important to gloss over, and I'm thrilled to have been able to share it with you.

MSNBC commentary on Biden speech: "McCain wants to divorce Bush"

By GottaLaff

On Biden's speech:

Tweety: He married Bush and McCain today. McCain wants a divorce. It's not what McCain wants to hear. It's what makes the Democrats win.

Keith: He's [McCain's] my friend, and then hits him over the head with the leg of a table. He'll remind you of every single moment of McCain = Bush presidency.

Tweety: They finally took on McCain on Georgia, using the word "bluster" twice. Obama finally asked where McCain's vision was on Iraq and Russia, instead of just bluster. There's the fire I was waiting for. His Spencer Tracy moment. A statement of strength, anger, indignation, dignity. He took the fight to the bluster of the opponent.

Keith: Also, in describing Biden as meeting "quietly" in Georgia... vs. McCain's bluster. Biden tried to ameliorate a problem instead of scoring points off it.

Tweety: Bush didn't bring us that humility in foreign policy, as he promised. The use of Karl Rove, the new acceptance of Swiftboating, accepting politics of division, a Rove guy running McCain's campaign... Biden took it all on. People are tired of the assassination policy, especially the Rs. Biden said we're the good guys, we don't have the numerous kitchen tables that McCain has.

Our Commenters make funny videos with great ideas for elitist Republican conventions

By GottaLaff



Thank you, Joeyess! Love it!!

**UPDATE- Great idea by Joeyess but it's not advisable-

McCain has himself described having an adverse reaction to the sound of jangling keys, which reminds him of his Vietnam jailers.

We don't need to be seen as mocking his PTSD, but it is a good springboard to start a discussion on his PTSD.

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.