Recently in Politics Category

Sometimes you can remember what you did a year ago from a certain day when it's significant enough.  A year ago today I was in Springfield, Illinois witnessing the announcement of Barack Obama's run for U.S. President.  I believe it was just as cold in Springfield that day as it is in Michigan right now.  It was more than just chilly, I really couldn't feel my feet once the whole thing was over, which does make walking a little bit difficult.

There were tons of people there, but unlike most of my experiences with large crowds, this one was pleasant.  The people were friendly, happy, those of us stuck in the back of the crowd didn't even care we couldn't see the stage.  I think we all knew that we were witnessing something good, probably even historic.

So you might wonder why it took me a year to get the pictures up on Flickr?  There's no good reason, but they're there now.  So enjoy!  And definitely don't put off voting!

Technorati Tags: barack obama, iraq war, petition

I've been following the blog some at techPresident which is a conversation about what the '08 presidential candidates are doing on the web. I found this particular post on online transparency as it relates to two scheduled house party events that both Edwards and Obama are incorporating into their campaign (both next week).

As the situation stands, Obama has 8 parties scheduled within 25 miles of my house in Franconia, Edwards has 1; Obama has 19 scheduled within 25 miles of Concord, Edwards has 2; Obama has 5 within 25 miles of Portsmouth, Edwards has none; Obama 11 in Keene, Edwards 3; Manchester 27 for Obama, 5 for Edwards; Nashua 5 for Edwards, 36 for Obama. You see where this is going.

That kind of inside baseball is generally under tight wraps, especially if you're the Edwards campaign. The staff and the field people know how many parties are planned, but they also know enough not to go blabbing it to anyone. Now they don't have to.

This is how intelligence has always been gathered - good information is readily available, sometimes just staring you in the face. And these days, there's a lot more of it.

A couple of things really jumped out at me when I read this. The first is this is going to be a presidential campaign like none we've ever seen. Every campaign has made some sort of effort to to draw in the internet crowd with their websites (some way more successful than others). The second thing that jumped out at me is the last line. There is a lot more information out there, some of it is not too hard to find either. Our society is better for this too...especially when you're talking about politics. Transparency is a beautiful thing.

This is neat! If the election could be determined by MySpace friends, Barack Obama would be kicking ass!

techPresident

Just a plea to people who add candidates as MySpace friends...please vote too!

I love it! I went to check out if they changed around BarackObama.com since I was there last (yesterday), and they have! The website has all sorts of neat social features. Blogs, event planning, even links to YouTube, Facebook, and Flickr!!! I can't wait to add my pictures from today's event to my Flickr page now :) More importantly I can't wait to see everybody else's because I couldn't see the stage at all...

It was awesome to be there, despite not being able to see much. The energy from the crowd was absolutely amazing. We got there at 9:00 am and the place was already packed...an hour before the speech was to start! I just couldn't believe how amazing everybody was though.

My feet were sufficiently frozen by the end of the event and we found a tiny Mexican cafe near our parking garage where we went to wait for Alex's parents (and warm up with some coffee, food was excellently cheap and good too!) There was limited seating and of course a lot of people coming in and out of the parking garage, I noticed a lot of other people had the same idea. What I loved was one particular table where one man had been seated he had invited another couple to come sit too. By the time we left there was yet another couple there that hadn't been there before. I don't think any of these people knew each other prior to this so it really made me happy to see that we do have a community spirit left...people in the community who weren't there were genuinely happy too (at the restaurant and the museum). I think everybody was just a little bit happier today!

After our lunch Alex and I went strolling back by the old state capital where they were now tearing down the stage. I took some pictures of some Lincoln landmarks and then we walked down to the library and museum. I went into the library this time (we didn't get a chance to go in before) and then we visited the museum again. The exhibits didn't change at all but it was good to see them again. I felt like I saw everything differently than I did over a year ago when I went. I also knew a little bit more about Lincoln since I had read Team of Rivals (a long but awesome book if you like Lincoln and history) this past summer. It was a perfect way to end our visit in Springfield today.

Now we're at Alex's parents for the night and I should be conentrating on my DRM research and getting a list of articles to assign to my copyright classmates on Monday...

I currently don't talk politics much on my blog, but I just wanted to offer a fair warning that this may change. It's not that I never talked about politics on my blog, I tend to do it more during Presidential elections and Alex and I have been anticipating the 2008 election since 2004.

So what brings this up? Barack Obama formed his Presidential Exploratory Committee this past week. I was ready to slap an Obama in '08 bumper sticker on my car back in 2004 after the horrible outcome of our last Presidential election. Alex and I are pretty serious about wanting Barack to run, and if he does run we're serious about helping the campaign in any way we know how. That's huge for us because we don't tend to be the involved political types, we just have a lot of opinions about politics. The following video is Barack Obama's message about forming his committee.

So, on February 10, 2007, Barack Obama will announce whether he will be running for President in Springfield, IL...and Alex and I are going to be there! I'm pretty excited about it too. I also hope to visit the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum again, I love that place! Plus what better backdrop...in my opinion, Abraham Lincoln was this country's greatest President. See more about who Barack Obama is with this video:

I'll probably tone down my political posts from 4 years ago...which I remember, I believe I posted at least one thing a day about politics of some sort. Normally though it was electronic voting machines that got me worked up, I suspect that this topic might come up a few times in the next election too.

I will just throw all this out there now though. I'm liberal but not necessarily a Democrat, I do support the Green Party but I will be likely to vote Democrat in major elections. I would love to live to see a 3 or 4 party governement in this country...I think the 2 parties that we have don't necessarily represent the beliefs of most people, but for most people it's all they're going to vote for. I don't think young people don't vote because they're not interested...young people don't vote because most politicians don't have their best interests in mind as they represent their constituencies. I also believe that most politicians are out of touch with technology...however this is a recurring theme, I can't say this is the first time in history that politicians don't understand technology. After reading up on the history of copyright law in our country though, I realize that now, more than ever, the importance of our public voice when it comes to technology...this soap box is for my copyright paper though, or another blog post ;)

I'm really excited about Barack and I really do hope he runs. I haven't read his new book yet, Alex is still reading it but we did buy a copy shortly after it came out. I hope to get it read soon but I have a ton of other things to read for my classes...I know it's good though!

My husband sent me the coolest link today. If you're a fan of fantasy sports and politics you'll like Fantasy Congress.

Fantasy Congress offers you the power to "play politics." As in other fantasy sports, you - the Citizen - draft a team of real-life legislators from the U.S. Congress and score points for your team's successes. Join a league and compete against other Citizens, or form a league of your own! Play against your friends, family, bloggers, fellow politicos, or even a sitting U.S. Senator (one could be playing incognito, you never know!). On weekends, move Members of Congress into your active line-up or off your team to strategize for the upcoming week of legislation!

If you're interested in starting joining (it's free) and you want to join a league, try joining the one I created. I'm the only member so far but I had to claim the name...search for "Radical Militant Librarians", I'll be happy to have you join :)

Since I'm on the whole politics thing anyway I'll share the list of political links I've been keeping for some time now. Some are nonpartisan, some are not. I wanted to post about politics a long time ago because I realized that there are a lot of great community sites for politics on the internet these days. If this is something you're interested in you should try some of these sites out:

Nonpartisan

There's a variety of nonpartisan information sites for politics. My two favorites are GovTrack.us and citizenJoe. GovTrack is a great if you like to keep track of your representatives, senators, or a specific bill (or both at the same time). You can get email updates when something happens to a bill or if your tracked politicians vote or speak on any issues.

CitizenJoe is more of a no-nonsense issues site. My only complain about CitizenJoe is that you can't track exact bills, it's more of a general conversation on the policies and debates. It is very neutral, however.

Some other nonpartisan info sites of note are:

Public Agenda Online - "A nonpartisan opinion research and civic engagement organization helping Americans explore and understand critical issues since 1975"

FactCheck.org - This was a popular stop for me during the 2004 election. FactCheck is well known for fact checking candidate ads and commercials.

e.thePeople - "E The People is a public forum for democratic and deliberative discussion. The conversations on E The People explore the political issues we see in the news, rejecting the traditional spin and conventional wisdom that tends to fill the airwaves."

essembly.com - "essembly is a fiercely non-partisan social network that allows politically interested individuals to connect with one another, engage in constructive discussion, and organize to take action."

GovSpot.com - From the people who make LibrarySpot and all of those other Spot sites, comes GovSpot. A great collection of government related sites.

Project Vote Smart - "Thousands of candidates and elected officials. Who works for you? Who is seeking your vote? Project Vote Smart, a citizen's organization, has developed a Voter's Self-Defense System to provide you with the necessary tools to self-govern effectively."

Elections: How to Be an Informed Voter - This site is compiled by the University Library at Sonoma State University. There is a great collection of voting sites that cover a wide range of candidates and topics.

Election Information

Other than the local sites that are devoted to various election information there are two great sites for helping the voter get to where they need to go on election day. My favorite is Publius, which integrates candidate information in their interactive ballot. VOTE411.org is another good site for looking up your election information.

Political Parties

Of course, as much as I love nonpartisan sites, I know that everybody has their own opinions. I subscribe to RSS feeds and email lists for both the Democratic Party and the Green Party. Green being my primary party, but on major elections I usually vote Democratic.

Issues

I also subscribe to a variety of issue sites and organizations. Being that I'm very liberal, most of these are going to have a very liberal bias...but a few of non-partisan.

American Civil Liberties Union - If I had money I would give them a lot of it.

IPac - This organization is pretty new but I love it. It is a political organization devoted to monitoring issues regarding technology and information policy. My favorite initiative by this group is their project that sends iPods loaded with tons of public domain content to senators. I've even used this site as a resource for finding public domain content, they list everything they ship on the iPods right on their site.

Campaign For Reader Privacy - Mostly an anti-Patriot Act site.

TV Watch - I'm not sure how I stumbled across this site but if you're in favor of parental involvement and not governmental or FCC control regarding television and media then this is a good site to visit. I'm not a parent but this site has good downloadable materials for parents that I thought was interesting.

MoveOn.org - "The MoveOn family of organizations brings real Americans back into the political process. With over 3.3 million members across America – from carpenters to stay-at-home moms to business leaders – we work together to realize the progressive vision of our country’s founders. MoveOn is a service – a way for busy but concerned citizens to find their political voice in a system dominated by big money and big media."

Moving Ideas Network - A great site for locating current petitions and liberal issues that you can contact your politicians about. I've used this site many times when I want to send a message to my representative and senators.

Care2 - This site is packed full of information on issues and ways to connect to people with the same interests. I've often found some great petitions and information on different issues through this site.

Union of Concerned Scientists - My husband hooked me up on this site since his thing are the scientific issues. UCS is a great site if you're really interested in environmental issues, I have followed several issues with this site, even though I wouldn't consider myself a scientist.

DefCon - If separation of church and state is your thing then DefCon is a good site. I often find that they seem to yell about the issues a lot, but I really don't like the religious right so I do pay attention to a few of their issues.

Tags: politics, issues, policies, politicians

I just wanted to get out some of the DOPA news and other DOPA things I've been collecting.

First of all, YALSA did publish a great set of tools to use when talking to people about DOPA and contacting your representatives regarding the issues. It can be found on their teentechweek wiki. Here's a list of the great stuff they have there for you:

• Teens & Social Networking in School & Public Libraries Toolkit
• DOPA Information Packet
• Legislative Advocacy Guide
• My Space for Parents (from Imaginon)
• Smart Blogging (from Hennepin County Library)

Then some disturbing posts I read later last week regarding the proponent's of DOPA next target...Flickr. I initially found this news as a post on the Libraries and Librarians Flickr Group, but it's popped up in a couple of other places since then. Those people against Flickr are asking libraries to ban the site from their computers (some have already, sadly) because "there is an entire subculture within [the] network that poses grave danger to [their] children." These concerned library patrons have apparently found loads of porn on Flickr, including child porn. I would actually like to know where, because I've been a paying member of Flickr for some time now and I have never even accidentally stumbled across anything that I would consider pornographic! As a matter of fact, many of the librarians who have read this particular letter floating around the internet have tried to search for these "disturbing images" and all have come up empty handed. I'm sorry, but if librarians can't even find the images, I'm thinking they don't exist. Flickr has a strict policy against this type of stuff and they take it very seriously...if I had kids, them using Flickr would not be a concern of mine. For another post on the subject, try the ALA Techsource Blog, Michael Stephens has a good post on the DOPA/Flickr/Social Networking software thing. And don't forget to contact your senator regarding the issue...it's really really really important that we stand up against DOPA, protect free speech in the library, and let these people know that these sites are not evil or scary and they need to teach their kids social responsibility online!

Oh yeah, and I'm happy to see that MIT's Technology Review took aim at DOPA with a great article...currently it appears on the top of their homepage...we need more people like this to get the word out!

Tags: dopa, library, libraries, librarians, social networking, social networking software, flickr, tools

YALSA, or the Young Adult Library Services Association, will be a good place to keep up with DOPA news in the next few weeks. According to a recent post in their blog, they will be publishing some good information, including; sample letters that you can send to your newspaper editors, a Legislative Advocacy Guide for when you contact your senator regarding the issue, and a Social Networking Site Toolkit to use to "help educate your coworkers and library users about the pros and cons of social networking sites."

Tags: yalsa, dopa, library, libraries, social networking

I haven't been all political since well before the disastrous election of '04, however, this DOPA thing just burns me up. Anyway, there's a petition going on over at saveyourspace.org I was number 800 something to sign it.

TechCrunch is even on the bandwagon with an extremely well written post today. There's also some other posts listed on the TechCrunch one worth checking out.

Teachers are against this, librarians are against this, what I don't understand is why the government feels that they have to do our jobs for us by deciding what is right for our students/patrons/children. I don't have children, but to be honest with you, my views wouldn't be much different if I did. I'd also be damn sure to know what they're doing on the internet and I guarantee you I won't want the federal government telling me how to raise them. This bill is flat out wrong!

And yikes, I just read my representatives speech on the floor of the House and I'm shocked he even voted for this thing after what he said! This is an actual quote:

This is, essentially, a shin plaster on a cancer. This is a piece of legislation which is going to be notorious for its ineffectiveness and, of course, for its political benefits to some of the Members hereabout.

Yet I'm still curious as to why he voted for this...he mentioned the opposition by librarians and teachers, he mentioned the bill's ineffectiveness to stave online predators, the fact that it was a placebo and the real problem won't be solved, yet he still voted for the bill!? I don't get it?! Is this truly how our government works? You get up, disagree with a piece of legislature, and then vote to have it passed? I'm simply disappointed.

Tags: dopa, dopa petition, petition, library, libraries, politics