philly

"You've Got Blog"

Is how one commenter described the craziness.

This has gotta be a first. Or should I say, "Frist!"

Philly Dem Establishment v. Blogs

This Philadelphia Public Record article has been making the rounds for the past day [BooMan, MyDD, Young Philly Politics] and it's quite an interesting read. As I see it, the Democratic City Committee [chaired by Mr. Bossman Rep. Bob Brady] are taking a two pronged approach to the Progressive movement here in Philadelphia.

Party Chairman Congressman Bob Brady announced the formation of the new Finance Committee earlier this week. It will be a PAC chaired by Councilman Michael Nutter, with its treasurer, former Democratic City Committee Chairman Martin Weinberg.

First they're taking aim at the DCC Party Treasurer John Dougherty, also the leader of the Electricians Union Local 98, and taking a slight to his union members getting involved in local politics. A decision was made from the Local 98 national office to make a push to get more of their members involved in the political process. They encouraged their membership to run for uncontested committeeperson seats. Apparently, here in Philly, many took it upon themselves to run in contested races. Dougherty is getting the blame for this and Brady is mad as fucking hell about it. This relates to the efforts of groups like Neighborhood Networks, Philly for Change, Liberty City Dems and the Committee of Seventy [non-partisan] in encouraging people run for public office and get more involved in their communities which I wrote about here last month.

The DCC is pushing Dougherty out of the office since he refused to resign after a heated midday meeting with Brady at the Walnut St executive committee office a few weeks ago. This PAC, chaired by City Councilman Michael Nutter who is running for Mayor in 2007, will seemingly take on the responsibilities a Treasurer's office should be doing. And they're getting a former [I'm assuming] über party man in former DCC Chairman Weinberg to handle the money in this new PAC.

[Party Secretary and Ward Leader Carol] Campbell believes the Finance Committee's operation will help move the party into the future. "We need to understand the Internet and to teach our people how to use it. We need to battle the bloggers on their own turf. This takes additional resources."

Secondly, they're taking the battle to the bloggers. This is genuinely laughable and scary at the same time. Yes, they could be talking about neo-conservative, right-wing blogs, but based on the way the established/entrenched Dems have reacted to the Progressive movement to get young people involved in the governmental process, I see it as an attack on people like me, the people at YPP, BooMan, MyDD, Marc Stier, Philly IMC and others who want change for the better.

I recall reading Tim Tagaris's post from March 4, 2005 on MyDD on how unresponsive the Dem leadership at the state level were to a PA Dems blog. And now, here in Philly they want to take the fight to us? Ha. Who is the voice they're going to get to do this shit. Who is going to read the posts by a Brady lackey saying things like "xxx blogger is wrong! Brady is right! Vote Brady! Don't go to xxx's site, they're bad!" And where are these resources coming from? Shouldn't the DCC be more concerned about keeping our libraries open? They'd rather have a staff blogger argue with us when we want more money poured into our libraries? How about fixing some potholes? And that trash on the streets? Is some staff blogger going to tell us we're wrong in wanting this? Is s/he going to tell us that our desire to take back our party is wrong and that we should be a top down party instead of a party of the people? Fuck that shit.

And Nutter's organizational involvement in this race makes the 2007 Mayor's race that much more of a shitfest.

But who knows, Ms. Campbell may have misspoken. But based on the very recent actions as well as the not so recent actions of the DCC here, I don't think so.

John Perzel

I don't know the guy, but his record tends to speak for itself and the record holder is John Perzel. And he is the Worst. Person. Ever.

My vote would've gone to the team behind Bob Casey: Casey himself, Sen. Harry Reid, Sen. Chuck Schumer and to a lesser extent, Gov. Ed "The Hoagiemeister" Rendell who initially told Schumer that Casey probably shouldn't be the guy, but now, he's all gung ho [I think because he didn't want a Dem challenger in the Gov. race]. But I guess I missed the vote on this one. But all PA voters can vote for Chuck Pennacchio in the May 16th Democratic Primary!

Podcasts

I don't listen to podcasts much because I don't want to have headphones on at work all the time, I don't have a portable music player and I don't have a car to listen to stuff while driving from place to place. But I do listen here and there.

Three friends of mine put out podcasts on the regular. Miss Plum and Seuss are the duo behind The Unharshed Mellow which has lots of cool indie music, beer reviews and all things Philly, inculding the latest shit [sometimes literally] in their backyard.

Brian Russell of Audio Activism also podcastas and has been at it for quite awhile now. When he stayed over at my house for Live8 over the summer, he showed me how he does it all right in the field. I can't remember if he got around to upgrading a home studio or not.

The two podcasts have different feels, but I like them both. The Unharshed Mellow is a home studio setup. Audio Activism is an in-the-field operation. Technology is coooool.

Featured Blog Nomination

Philly Future is tallying up nominations for the bi-weekly featured blog right now through the end of the week. Voting on the finalists happens over the weeked.

Blogs that are excluded are those which have already been featured [which includes this blog]. You can find those blogs on the front page of Philly Future on the blogroll or to the left in the 'Philly Future' blogroll section.

Norgs

There they are, Will Bunch, Karl Martino, Susie Madrak and Wendy Warren, the founders and organizers of the Norgs unconference

It all started with this post on Will's blog Attytood about a theoretical concept. People from PNI management, the Inky, the Daily News, the Philly blog community and well beyond. The discussion started off online and gained steam and finally a date was decided upon and there we were at 9a this morning in the Annenberg School. Dan Rubin has a nice wrap up of the day here. I'm gonna be posting more photos tonight and tomorrow.

RedAmerica Gone

That was quick. As of 1.17p, Domenech resigned. via Atrios

Plagiarism is perhaps the most serious offense that a writer can commit or be accused of. Washingtonpost.com will do everything in its power to verify that its news and opinion content is sourced completely and accurately at all times.

We appreciate the speed and thoroughness with which our readers and media outlets surfaced these allegations. Despite the turn this has taken, we believe this event, among other things, testifies to the positive and powerful role that the Internet can play in the the practice of journalism.

Is his book already on the way to the presses? "How a Liberal Rag Hired Me and Fired Me" by Ben Domenech

WaPo Hires a Bitoged Plagarist?

So, the Washington Post may be guilty of hiring a bigoted plagarist to their staff. Their new blogger, Ben Domenech, who writes 'Red America' has been getting the under the microscope treatment this week. First off, there is no liberal blogger to 'balance' out the conservative 'Red America' - there is no 'Blue America' to be found I guess? It's not like the WaPo is a liberal rag and that a liberal blogger wasn't necessary as a counterweight.

I got an email from Media Matters today where they call for Domenech to be fired for his offensive remarks in regards to the late Mrs. Coretta Scott King, the Judiciary Branch, Andrew Sullivan needing a woman and killing black babies to reduce crime. Lovely eh? But there's more.

And now I read this post on MyDD by Scott Shields about Domenech plagarizing off of a book by P.J. O'Rourke for an op-ed piece without attribution.

Lovely.

Milestones

At some point this week or last week, the total number of comments outnumbered the number of posts. That's cool.

At some point today the site meter clicked by 200,000. That's cool.

This thing has been on line since May 29, 2004, seventeen days after we moved to Philly and a few days after I got my first job. 2300+ posts, 2400+ comments and 200K hits later, today.

Paul Lang Interview by Above Average Jane

Above Average Jane has a great interview with Paul Lang. Paul's running in PA-06 for State Senate in Buck's County. I wrote a little about him here last week.

Paul's got some great thoughtful answers to all of Jane's well thought out questions. It's always nice to see two knowledgeable people have a Q&A like this, you learn a lot more about the interviewee that way.

Have a read.