Fitz!

fitz

You should be a lesbian, Jane. Why play the part and not get the perks? :)

egregious!

Weird, here we are at the beginning of June on the eve of an election and still don’t know the story of:

a) how all the goofy intelligence came to be spouted, and

b) what the participants role was… you would think Jr could just tell us. He strikes the post of “huh?”

Does anyone know why throughout the last week half the time I try to get to this website it shows up as a webhosting company saying their is no such domain?

sharkbabe 3 — good point.

Neko Case on Letterman! Ater THIS commercial. God, I’m in love.

I thought it was great, and I didn’t schmooze with the press. I just met people of all ages and the vast majority were bright, enthusiastic, and reasonably savvy about politics.

Jane’s comment while sitting in one of the panels that “I’m the girl,” was classic understatement.

I wrote some more at DK about the generational aspects.

OT- Carlin-n-Coulter on Leno in about 1 minute

Didn’t Markos say that everyone had a crush on Jane?

That “top down” comment from Kid Oakland isn’t fair. When you’ve got really great panelists on panels, it is a good idea to hear what those people have to say.

I did not physically go to YKos … but I did watch a lot of it on the AA stream starting Thursday night .. thru Sunday. I signed up of course for the Plame panel, but could not stop watching whatever panel or speaker was next. Got nothing done for days. I loved it all!

Thanks to you Jane, Christy & Pach and others for all you give to this blog.

My experience at Ykos:

Spoke with Wes Clark for less than 5 minutes – because I’m a long-time avid supporter and volunteer – and Eric Massa – for the same reason, only not so avid. That’s the end of the politicians.

wrt “journalists” – Of course I had my nightmare limo ride with Matt Bai and friends – but only because it was a horrible accident.

EVERYBODY else I met and hung out with was a blogger – hundreds of them – almost every single one of them a smart, engaged, articulate, fun, dedicated patriot.

And that’s why I had a great time at Yearlykos.

Ann Coulter is wearing the same black cocktail dress.

At least it’s not the breakfast hour this time.

fitz!

and thanks to all the YK’ers who kept us stay at homes connected….

and all those who made YK happen.

Wish I could have been with you all – and look forward to next year.

[If the first YK was in Las Vegas, would an east coast YK choose Atlantic City?]

My yKos experience was good — tuned in near the start of the Plame panel, got distracted by a business call, saw the tail end . . .

Saw bits and pieces here and there –

Highlight of the Event — Brian Schweitzer quote:

Issues Divide — Values Unite

which has led to the answer to my rhetorical question:

What Do Democrats Stand For?

Government that is — Honest — Fair — and Real.

(notice the sentence structure — the adjectives are tied to the subject; not an objective noun.)

And that’s what I’ve learned since yKos . . .

Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

I think, largely because my identity is largely split between being a DKos old-timer (three-digit UID and blogmate of the retirees) and being a FDLer (not to mention that Jane invited me to participate in the Plame panel), I had the ideal experience.

The first day, I found some people to feel comfortable with, largely FDL people or people who came through my blog (and I think the way you guys did the FDL caucus had a lot to do with that). I got to hang out with the Plame panel, which was absolutely amazing … but I realized, too, that I was missing out on meeting the old time DKosers. When the panel ended, I got to meet more of them, and I felt like a lot of us oldtimers really were drawn to each other. Yeah, there was media there. Yeah, I had Wankette turn my intelligent question for Warner into a big softball (she’s jealous, you know). But for me, it was a mix of FDL and Plame and DKos, and that was about perfect.

Kos reflects on his “notoriety”:

It’s All About Me

So the bad side-effect of the YearlyKos convention is dealing with the media hordes who can’t understand that this movement truly is leaderless. It doesn’t fit any of their pre-existing biases and frames, so I have to be the “leader” of this “cult”. Or something like that.

Sigh…

…

In a way, the fact that I have become the lightning rod is good. It keeps our enemies focused on me as a personality rather than the movement, which will continue to grow with or without me. In a lot of ways I’m providing cover. And even if they could bring me down, it wouldn’t matter. That’s the beauty of what we’re building here. I’m ultimately irrelevant.

You are the real power, the real force. And by me taking the incoming, our enemies miss the real story and power. And for that, I’ll happily take one for the team.

George Carlin appears to be sleeping through Ann’s performance.

Jane – we had similar events – didn’t get to meet nearly as many familiar bloggers as I would have liked. My press-schmooze quotient was 5 min w/ Murray Waas (cool), 5 min w/ Sterling Newberry, and a drink w/ Curry and friend. No MoDo, no Cocks.
I came for the conferences and the bloggers and that’s what I got. I suppose I could have sought out the scummers, but maybe the Plame panel and the other stupendous yKos events got in the way. Damn!

Jay Leno is a cowardly sack of shit.

And what else is new?

I didn’t meet as many people as I would have liked but then I wasn’t there.

Sharkbabe- I luv you, but I’m gonna take you up on #3, even if meant as snark (which no doubt it was)– but why play into the idea that strong attractive women are necessarily of a particular sexual orientation, one way or the other? Hope you see what I mean.

dr nobody @ 22
What did Carlin do? I’m on the left coast…

Yeah the Carlin vs. Coulter was a non event. And it’s not a surprise Leno stacked freepers in the audience, ever since he supported Ahr-nold, he’s been trending more right wing. His jokes are lame anyway.

Letterman rocked though. Had Colbert on.

Lobstergirl @ 14 – Hate – It’s The New Black

and Blue e – ya beat me by two minutes –

If in the planning for YKos, it was hoped the event would give bloggers a sense of real vs virtual community, it was a smashing, tremendous, unqualified success . . .

I did not attend YKos and yet many of us back here in the threads were surprised to feel very much a part of the community and the goings on. Further, it has definitely affected my thinking, outlook, and resolve. Don’t know how to explain it better than that. Am trying to think of any other event that so fully and seamlessly included non attendees

and Jane, No one should look that good at 7:30 in the morning in Vegas

Markos says he’s not going to appear so much on TV for awhile. I wish he would reconsider. We need progressives who are good delivering our message to combat the numerous conservatives.

emptywheel 19 — It sounds like the MyDD caucus was really different. Which was great, too. In ours Christy had everyone write a little bit about themselves on paper, we passed them around and then everybody introduced everybody else. Then we talked about the Roots project a lot. It’s was about as granola-eating-egalitarian-hippie as you could get. The biggest round of applause went to TBogg. I had to leave to prep for the Plame panel before Joe & Larry showed up but all the photos people took with them make it look like everyone was having a lot of fun. Except for momentary appearances by Wankette and the Hair, I think we were completely media-free. Oh we did have NYBri. I guess he was our token politician. Which was very cool.

Who is Satan’s Temptation? It’s not Pumpkinhead’s teenage son, is it?

My YearlyKos experience was spent in San Jose. I just bought a condo and could justify spending the cash to go. So I watched a good deal of it on Air America and CSPAN. I read all the lame MSM analysis. I know they didn’t get it. I did. I am so happy to be a part of the rise of an unapologetic and aware proggressive movement. I’ve spent my entire adult life under the thumb of the goon squad. I didn’t have to be there to take something away from Las Vegas. It made me happy just to see it.

Hugh – good times! it was great meeting you at YKos….

(I was absent as well)

I liked the way speakers and panelists kept pointing out that Byron York was in the audience, and directing remarks toward him. He did not look comfortable.

Well, of course, I wasn’t there. But as to this Kid Oakland…my thoughts are that he simply relays HIS own impressions. 100 people here could write “no it wasn’t, no it wasn’t”…and nobody is wrong, and nobody is right. I managed to watch alot of it via C-Span. My impressions:
1. very white. Of course, no-one at FDL or kos folks are racists. But…that did stand out for me.

2. Age: here…I’m VERY limited in that I’m going only off of occasional crowd shots. Still….age seemed to break between 20 somethings OR the over 55 crowd. Not much inbetween.

3. An annoyance: WAY too many times the camera would pan the audience and there sat sooo very many folks with the ole open laptop. Fairly or not, it just left a viewers impression that the audience is heavily nerdy. And besides, many regular folks think it’s just plain rude to busy one’s self with computer stuff when someone is at the podium speaking. it’s a matter of manners.

4. worst program: something called….meta-koss??? Good lord. Now, I don’t go to the Kos site…it’s just too much mish-mash for me. I still have no idea what the point of that entire seminar was. And…bless their hearts, and they didn’t mean it this way, but when folks from the audience got up for questions, and proudly proclaimed, “I am X, USER ID 12345!!!!”….well…I don’t think they realized how “androidish” they sounded. Oh well.

5. Most underrated speaker: some guy…lakoff…laskoff?…something like that. When he was introduced I remember rolling my eyes and exclaiming “oh jeez, another Berkley Loon”. But then, as I listened to him, and he spoke of framing issues…I was, and still remain, very impressed with the guy.

Those are my outsider observations.
Ghostman

I think we firepups had a certain advantage because of the kind of community we have here, which you have helped to foster. We were all thrilled to meet you and Christy and Pach, but we were just as excited to meet each other, and we were much more likely than the average Kossack to be able to find a group of “our people” to hang out and have fun with at any point. Not do disparage DailyKos; it’s hugely important, but it’s also huge, which means any one person is less likely to make a lasting impression.

Certainly kid oakland is right that the panels could not possibly have the same structure as a blog discussion, and the conversation you had at lunch at YKos was entirely dependent on who you happened to sit with, rather than picking the most insightful thread out of hundreds. I would say that, except for the panels that ran overtime, more time was devoted to questions than at most conventions I’ve been to. But nonetheless, there was an inevitable predetermined, rather than spontaneous, hierarchy to the panels.

However, the caucuses and other events were less so (the myDD caucus seems to have been an exception — the other story I heard about it described it as one big argument.) And to some extent the more horizontal aspects can’t be programmed, at least not any more than the Drinking Liberally happy hour. If you want more of that, you have to consciously decide not to go to anything during some of the sessions and hope others do likewise. The sessions were great, so that’s a hard decision, but some of the best times I had were when I skipped the last sessions on Saturday afternoon.

(Oh, and I certainly didn’t get any sense of a “focus on the media.” That I don’t understand at all.)

Lobstergirl 30 — you’ll have to get that out of Digby. I’ll never say ;)

oh well i brought my friend linda with me to the convention, everyone thought i was a lesbian anyway.

you’re not a lesbian? (sounds like the end of a character arc on law and order).

well, i ran into more bloggers than i could shake a typepad at, and very few journos. i did see modo twice in the halls, holding court with admiring men, so i was shy about approaching her and telling her who coined the phrase “blogtopia!”

but maybe kid oakland’s big problem came the on saturday night before harry reid’s speech. i was in line to buy a drink with my good friend from years ago amy, a very cute blonde girl, and we struck up a conversation with a journalist who turned out to be garance franke ruta of tapped.

since i had given her a huge amount of grief over the pseudonymity question earlier this year, i bought both her and my friend amy a drink.

when i first introduced myself to her (”oh, you’re garance franke ruta! i’m skippy the bush kangaroo!”), the person behind us quipped, “skippy! i’m kid oakland!”

i turned and shook his hand, i’m a big admirer of his blog k/o, and his work on kos.

but i turned back and devoted my time to amy, a hot blonde, and garance, a hot brunette.

i really didn’t mean to snub kid oakland in favor of the press, but i did, and i’m sorry.

i take full responsibility for coloring kid oakland’s experience.

but, as i’ve been telling everybody else on blogs all over, i’m still incredibly high from the event. i’m not really what you would call a people person, but i was so excited to meet and talk with and exchange ideas with all the bloggers i had grown to know and love these past 4 years.

my only complaint (aside from not enough outlets for power cords) was that there was too much happening all at once…i missed so many great panels and caucuses (cauci?) and parties! we should do it every quarter.

i wish i had the money and energy to have gone on to the take back america conference in dc right after. i’ll just have to wait for next year.

(ps, if we don’t call our senators and demand they vote ‘yes’ for net neutrality, there may not be a ykos07!

punaise,

Absence makes the heart grow fonder and I would just like to say how fond I am of everyone. Really!

I find it distressing that Greg Gutfeld has 118 votes in the (unofficial) HuffPost Awards, and our host only has 6.

I have been unable to connect to FDL for 10 days, a problem that turned out to be the server at school. Meanwhile, I was visiting my mom and dad who both had serious surgery within days of each other. However, when I finally was able to get back yesterday, I read everything I could about YKos and very much appreciated the reports, the comments, and the pictures! It was great to connect some names and faces, but mostly, it’s great to be able to read the threads again. Thank you, everyone.

Huffington Post Awards 2006 #39 — that’s what happens when you make people register to vote on a wingnut site. Greg Gutfeld wins. I wouldn’t do it myself. And 6 votes puts me in 2nd place.

I don’t think I’m going to bank my self-esteem on this one.

Well, this should be big news. A mere 24 hours after Bush’s visit ….

‘Iraq Amnesty Plan May Cover Attacks on the U.S. Military’

“Asked about clemency for those who attacked U.S. troops, he said: “That’s an area where we can see a green line. There’s some sort of preliminary understanding between us and the MNF-I,” the U.S.-led Multi-National Force-Iraq, “that there is a patriotic feeling among the Iraqi youth and the belief that those attacks are legitimate acts of resistance and defending their homeland. These people will be pardoned definitely, I believe.” “

http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..02432.html

I would like to say that while YKos was not nearly as fun as it could have been if punaise had been there, the Laughing Liberally folks did not do a bad job in his place.

I’m curious to hear Siun’s take on Matt Bai’s participation. By all the accounts I’ve read here he comported himself quite poorly, and “just doesn’t get it”. Yet he wrote a fairly open-mined piece leading up to the event*, and Siun implored us to give him a fair shake.

(*no link, sorry. my quickie take on it at the time was not very favorable, but it held up better upon re-reading.)

Hugh – I left you a Cox riposte in EPUpia

My experience was that I stuck my hand out and introduced myself to anyone who had that orange lanyard on. The big exception was Jane Hamsher who stuck her hand out at the FDL caucus and introduced herself to me. And some people turned out to be (to use Maryscott O’Connor’s phrase) “famous online”. Most everyone I talked to marveled at how cool it was to be at such a large gathering of like-minded SMART people. I felt somewhat “starstruck”, but I can’t think of anyone “famous” acting any differently than anyone else. I asked Markos to take his photo – he handed my camera to someone else to snap us together – how cool was that! I did not get one bit of snottiness or stuck-uppery from any blogger. And Joe Wilson and Larry Johnson very graciously mingled with the masses, and were interested in other parts of the convention beyond their own gig.

Meeting a fellow FDLer was instant connection – others have likened it to a family reunion, and that’s true. Best people in the world, FDLers!

punaise 44

I’m still trying to get a line on why Matt Bai was on a panel in the first place.

Valley Girl, re your comment at #24….(and written with a chuckle) I am a lesbian, and I assume that all strong attractive women either are or could be attracted to women, and Lo, it has often come to pass….grin. While some of my closest friends are women who are currently in a relationship with a man, and I don’t think that is an invalid choice, anything can happen. I didn’t read Sharkebabe # 3 as snark, just a good humoured admission that sex between women rocks.

Really, really interesting stuff in Jane’s post – participants reacting to the event according to the usual human things, mainly a) projecting perceptions of media/celebrity culture onto our burgeoning movement, and b) whatever the connectedness/loneliness of one’s immediate human surroundings at any given time and overall.

The energy of conventions is always strange and all its own, let alone the likes of this. I myself am a strange mix of equal parts loner/hail fellow well met at such things – anyway I knew I’d enjoy the event more from home – i.e. the fdl boards – this time around. And damned if I didn’t.

Ghostman, that was George Lakoff. He wrote a truly fantastic book called “Don’t Think of an Elephant”. Highly recommended.

He’s a member of the Rockridge Institute, which is trying to show progressives how to use language to portray our message to the masses.

http://www.rockridgeinstitute.org/

Boy nobody is outing themselves in the photos. Oh well eventually…

Warning: From the last topic. (Got a phone call and EPU’d myself in the submit comment section.):

The fight between Lamont and Lieberman is shaping up to be THE fight for control of the Democratic party. This presents some exciting opportunities for us.

I propose that if the party regulars continue to support an Independent Lieberman and Lamont wins, it will be difficult for anyone to deny that the netroots are the new power in the party and they need to be reckoned with. The race becomes a winner take all opportunity.

Rather than spending our time trying to discourage the party regulars from supporting Lieberman, I would rather we spend our time ensuring a Lamont win.

So I have two questions:

Can Lamont win if Lieberman goes Independent with the support of the party regulars?

What can we do to make sure that he wins?

I think Jay Leno must have sent 2 buses to Orange County to pack the audience with wingnut coulterparazzi. That “interview” was a visit to bizarro world with yet another doofus fawning over her.

I am amazed that George Carlin didn’t have an accidental beverage spew over her well-used little black dress…

It’s Pat Buchanan, isn’t it!! I have a little crush on Pat. He’s so sweet. My friends think I’m batshit crazy, but what do they know??

Arianna seems to have a thing for celebrity. She was going all gushy about the Webby Awards where Tom Friedman won a lifetime achievement award. Maybe it was really deep irony or overtop parody but it sounded legit, which made it even funnier.

I keep remembering bits. At one point Sterling Newberry stopped me in the hall and said he was really impressed with the FDL readers there — he said they were everywhere, really enthusiastic and cordial, and they were “the glueholding this thing together.” I said I wholeheartedly agreed.

Lobstergirl 54 — I’m busted.

Bob Smith #6:

I’ve had the same problem for the past week and it’s because of a bad DNS entry. My ISP (Charter) has been providing me 2 DNS servers via DHCP, but one of those 2 servers has the wrong IP address. I’ve reported it, but they’ve ignored my report. The correct address seems to be 38.98.18.100, but you can’t just use the address because it’s a name based virtual host. Either you need to point to a DNS server that is correct, or lacking that, setup a “hosts” file with the above address for the time being.

op99 46

“Meeting a fellow FDLer was instant connection -others have likened it to a family reunion, and that’s true. Best people in the world, FDLers!”

I would certainly agree with that.

“And Joe Wilson and Larry Johnson very graciously mingled with the masses, and were interested in other parts of the convention beyond their own gig.”

I didn’t get to meet Larry Johnson, but I thought Joe Wilson was just incredibly approachable and warm and friendly. He acted like he was one of us.

Wondered @ 48

…a good humoured admission that sex between women rocks.

May I be the first ever, in the history of the world straight male to agree wholeheartedly?!

Wonderer 48 — I did chase Lindsey Beyerstein out of the conference room and introduced myself because I wanted to meet her. Does that count?

Everything counts Jane, everything!

…I watched from home, and what I saw was great!
Thanks.

I don’t know the guy from Adam, but what the heck:

cooin’ Bai awe, my lord, cooin’ Bai awe
cooin’ Bai awe, my lord, cooin’ Bai awe

someone’s hacking, lord, kumbaya….

punaise,

Thanks I saw that and raise you.
ne marie coq
aine marrie cocasse

VG 24 – I swear upon fitz, not the slightest “idea” or ideology in my #3 – merely as a proud and ever-mischievious dyke, couldn’t help taking a fun smack at the irrestible whiffleball of Jane’s funny last sentence…

Neurophius, I was sorry that I didn’t get to know you better, we must have been at different panels. And everhopeful, how did I miss you completely, were you at the FDL caucus.

The first Firedog I met was Zennurse at the Northeast caucus, I squealed when I found out it was her!

I agree op99… Even when Maureen Dowd sat next to me at 8 am Thursday and startled me. I came to Yearlykos to meet bloggers, to learn and be a sponge sucking up being being around progressives pretty much 24/7. Getting my fix (Hey I live in a Red State)

The stats show there were 1100 attendees with around 150 media persons, so that is 1 media person per 7.33 attendee. But did they call the Star bloggers media?

To me it was such a wonderful event, meeting people who I have made comments and blog alongside for years. Having indepth discussions about topics in common. Of course finding myself in the Sunday Chicago Tribune is pretty exciting too.

Actually, I was did not expect the media there and was surprised to see them there.

oops, this doesn’t do the circumflex:
ane marie coq.

haine marie coccinelle cooks in hell

(no that’s over the top, my bad)

haine = hate
coccinelle = ladybug…collateral verbal damage)

Arianna seems to have a thing for celebrity.

I would just assume that from the git-go….

There are a lot of things I like about Arianna, but her narcissism and publicity hounding aren’t among them….what was it Maureen Dowd said about Judy Miller? That she had a tropism toward important or powerful men? (Pot, kettle….all 3 of them)

oops, that would be “irresistible” of course

I was almost able to piggyback a visit to Vegas for yK, but alas, was not to be. Would have most especially been interested in the FDL caucus and Plame panel.

I hit the Kos site multiple times daily, but only as a lurker. This is the only place I comment with any regularity, as it feels like a conversation more than being on the trading floor of the comex. I used to comment on Billmon’s site, when that was possible, but the suspension of comments there has done nothing to diminish my enjoyment of that site. Truly a wordsmith of the highest order. And of course, what would a day be without visits to Digby, Tomdispatch and Professor Cole’s place. (BTW, Billmon had a nice piece on the neocons’ academic hit job on Cole’s being considered for a tenured chair at Yale.)

Would have loved to ask Ambassador Wilson what he thought of April Glaspie.

Arianna is a good speaker on TV. She’s charming and funny while sticking the shiv into the conservatives. We shouldn’t underestimate the importance of people who can do that, since so many people get their news from the boob tube.

This is one reason why Jane should appear on TV as much as possible. I’m not kidding.

sharkbabe 66 — I would’ve been totally disappointed if nobody did so.

Hey Jane- I just left you some outing info at the Service Desk.

Jane, thanks, first off, for noticing that diary. I hear you.

I got out of a car in Las Vegas after nine hours of desert driving and walked directly into the MyDD Caucus. Maybe the Bright lights, Big City effect of “MoDo and Co. meets the blogs” was magnified by the reality that my most recent social interactions involved a truck stop in Bakersfield and a Jack in the Box in Barstow. Dunno.

Regardless, my overall point in writing the piece was not to take away from any one else’s personal experience of the event…on that level people made Yearlykos the event they chose to make it…so much as to understand the ways in which Yearklykos was structured and, I would guess, conceived:

press meets blogs
candidates meet bloggers
bloggers meet each other and attend panels

Clearly all three were important in the structure of the event, and shaped Ykos. That’s my point.

I apologize that in the course of introducing myself to mucho bloggers that I never got a chance to meet you. I did get the cold shoulder from skippy though!!

And I also learned that a common misperception regarding my appearance involves imagining me as a “short, long-haired, twenty-something idealist with a fierce demeanor.”

Damn, was I a total dissappointment or what?

The KidOakland comment you cite sounds like a graduate student who’s just returned from her or his first academic conference. Over a semester you read a ton, get to know some line of argument and the names associated with it, make scintillating points in the seminar, write a brilliant paper, enjoys the prof’s attention, and top it all off by getting the paper accepted at the American Historical Association meeting, or maybe a smaller one. The big day arrives and you go deliver the paper. And what do you get? You wander around a corporate hotel, the stars whose books you’ve read have their flocks with them, no one knows you name, and when they look at your nametag in the elevator, they turn back to their conference program. This is the way conferences work, and YK is probably worse than most because the blogosphere is not a converation over a beer after a session at the annual conference–unless you drink liberally.

One more thought: KidOakland repeats what appear to be the right-wing spin on YK, which I also heard last night from some Brown Shirt on the radio program “Open Source,” produced in Amherst, MA with Christopher Leiden. They devoted yesterday’s show to YK. The young woman in brown dutifully followed her talking points. Her contention was that YK’s and the left blogosphere’s success could be traced to the centralized organization and topdown, autoritarian structure of sites like DKos, FDL, TPM, etc. By contrast, Hugh Hewitt and Instapundit and others are more invidualistic, and democratic, she claimed. A bizarre argument to construe YK as Comintern VIII, especially when the right wing echo chamber deploys its talking points on radio, tv, and blogosphere with rigidity, dutifulness, and ceaseless repetition. Organization is usually their strength not ours. KidOakland appears to be repeating the top-down spin in his critque of YK.

Thanks for all your thoughtful analsyis, Jane and Redd.

Geez, I’m proud as punch to have my photos front-paged, thanks Jane. I took #1,2, and 4, and I CAN be bribed!

I was talking to Jim Dean, Howard Deans brother on Friday about DFA things (I’m chair of my county DFA chapter), Jim says… “Oh, there is Amb Wilson, Oh there is Maureen Dowd” He was as excited as a kid. I took him around and introduced him around.

Did not want to talk hokey about it but it was really just one BIG family reunion. We had met somewhere online, on some blog or comment over the years. Even the Lurker’s …..

elle aime haine eau paix cul aire est-ce th, etc.

We can always count on Sharkbabe to hit the whiffle ball!!!! xxxooo

How’s the leg op99?

Jim Dean must know all about the political process … you know, sausage and all.

Hugh, chapeau! the only appropriate response would be to quote Marcel Duchamp:

LHOOQ

Sizle… Hot punaise!

Katymine, the red is gone, the Sharpie outline from day 2 lingers on, lol.

L’enfer, c’est les autres au petit dejeuner…

LHOOQ = elle a chaud au cul = her ass is (ahem) feeling hot

It’s the rather irreverent inscription Dadaist artist Duchamp made on a copy of the Mona Lisa, by way of explaining her bemused smile.

Is the dark area going away? When you said spider bite…. rubbing alcohol or hair spray take ink off …

Yeah, it’s fading, still a bit of a lump.

Where’s Matt O.? I need to hear about his YK experiences!

Jane:

Memories of YKOS:

1) THE MEDIA ROOM; You taking over that beige armchair in the corner of Room 202 (The Media Room)–it was your seat. I wouldn’t sit there, even when you were gone because I knew that if you returned to the room you would want to sit there again!

2) THE BOXER MOMENT: I was holding the small tape recorder while my buddy DiANne was blogging and taking pics. It was when Boxer said she was going to support Lieberman over Lamont that I could feel the pupils of our collective eyeballs dilate then retract. Boxer had shot herself with the blogosphere and MSM as witness.

3) STRATOSPHERE: a) The Blues Brothers were just plain awful; b) Same with the Elvis impersonator; c) Aquamassage is an almost-ok invention, though, as I mentioned at FDL breakfast-might as well have your S.O. put a giant garbage bag on you and use the jet spray.

4) FINAL NOTE ON THE MEDIA ROOM: You could tell, without speaking, who the bloggers were versus the MSM. The bloggers had energy that emanated. The MSM sucked the oxygen out of the room.

AHHH, Vegas…

punaise,

It sounds very Ana Marie both in the anatomy and the meaning. Elle est en manque.

wiffle ball, catnip, you name it, I’m there!

Speaking of Arianna – Stephanie Miller does such a great Arianna – with her voice guy Jim doing Ahnuld as well as Tom Brokaw moderating the “debate” – comedy heaven

xo back vg!

and night all!

Lobstergirl 71 — I’m going to defend Arianna here a bit, and not because she’s my friend. We have the opposite response to celebrities – I don’t enjoy being around them, I don’t cultivate them as friends and I go out of my way to never mention them but I understand why she does. She’s managed to use her celebrity contacts to create a very successful site that has become important in the political discourse. When Fitzgerald was trying to keep Judy Miller in the clink he cited Prof. Geoffrey Stone of the ACLU writing on the Huffington Post. I don’t know that a lot of people remember that but it was rather landmark. Do people go to the HuffPo because Geoffrey Stone is there? No, they draw big traffic because John Cusack and Alec Baldwin and Harry Shearer are there. But Arianna uses that to provide a platform for important thinkers like Geoffrey Stone who in turn have the opportunity to have greater influence and a bigger audience than they otherwise would.

We do something a bit similar. Atrios says Plame is like porn and it is. We get our big traffic from it, that’s what people love to read about. We use that big traffic to do our series on racism and war profiteering and labor that otherwise probably wouldn’t get much traffic at all. I don’t care if those posts get 10 comments, we’ll keep doing them and they can (and have) begun to imact the consciousness of the blogosphere. I think that’s the responsible thing to do.

I think there’s value in what Arianna does, and it’s not just celebrity chasing. When you talk with her it just isn’t something she mentions, she’s much more preoccupied with stopping the war any way she can. I’ve never had a conversation with her about movie stars, I’ve had plenty about how to influence politicians to get us out of Iraq. She’s a very savvy marketer in being able to use her gifts to leverage political influence and I respect her tremendously.

My two cents.

well Jane,

just got back from looking at the Flikr YKos pix – Chicago Dyke is adorable, same for Atrios (those eyes), disappointed not to find any of Mr. and Mrs. TBogg

I’m stumped on the “satan’s temptation” and Digby doesn’t have a search feature – what the hell does that mean ?!?

More pics on Yearlykos
http://www.flickr.com/groups/45562770@N00/pool/

“Twenty-somethings and over 55″? Um, no. Maybe that’s how it looked on C-SPAN, but the majority of people I saw were 30’s – 40’s (I’m 38). Many of us were just as excited to shake hands with Krist Novoselic as Joe Wilson. Dude!

There was plenty of interaction, dialogue, and argument to be had, all over the place. Hell, too much at times (I’m looking at you, Berkeley guy, when you started going off about how Marvin Bush helped orchestrate 9/11, and why that didn’t get more coverage on Daily Kos…yeah, you simply CAN’T find ANY kooky left-wing 9/11 conspiracies in the blogosphere!)

That said, um, yeah…it was a little different than how things happen on the blogs…but, uh, Kid…maybe that’s cuz it was a convention, in Las Vegas, with real live human beings? And if you had maybe stood up and asked some questions, or started a conversation, you would have maybe come away with a different experience?

I shook hands and chatted with Joe Wilson, Wesley Clark, Harry Reid, and Maureen Dowd, and I really wasn’t even trying that hard. And those were just the rock stars. I found everyone else (Jane included) to be completely accessible, although I spent most of the time talking to new friends at our table or just hanging around. I thoroughly enjoyed all the panels; they were all well run and on time, but more importantly, the discussions in the halls and in the elevators were just as if not more exciting (Mudcat Saunders was dishing some serious dirt Saturday night…). In fact, thinking back now, one would have to have gone out of one’s way to NOT have an interesting conversation or experience, at least from my perspective.

What to do differently? I dunno, Kid – Xanax, perhaps? Usually works for me.

The best part of Leno was at the end. The musical guest, Neko Case, (according to Dr. Nobody @ 8) had taped a message to her guitar:

This machine kills fascists

I was watching TV with my sister on the other end of the phone and had turned off the TV in disgust, when she said that Case had thumped her hand beside the message.

I think blogtopia should make her record go platinum for that. Think of the message that would send to America if they heard on Entertainment Tonight that we made it happen as a sign of approval for speaking truth to power.

I don’t think the audience was overwhelming in approval. They hissed and booed a little when they heard the quote. The applause she got sounded to me as if it came from a vocal few. It was loud, but too short for the volume. I think they positioned themselves close to the audience mikes.

I wouldn’t say that Plame is porn. Jane, your description at the beginning of the Plame panel touched on why it’s such a great story. It’s a mythos with characters as evil and as good as any in the ancient classics.

kid oakland — I think your description of your experience was totally valid, I did not mean to take away from it. It was just completely different than mine, it felt like we were at two different events. I am sorry that we didn’t get to meet, you’re on that list. And Skippy just likes the girls, IMHO. Garance is awfully pretty.

fe — I was very happy you warned me off that thing. And yeah, those reporter freaks in the corner did suck all the oxygen out of the place. Didn’t want to talk with anyone. The bloggers over on our side of the room were all over each other.

And that was my one complaint — you pretty much had to be right IN that room to get any connectivity. I could get it intermitantly downstairs in the main room but consistently nowhere else. For a bunch of bloggers it would be nice to have something a bit more powerful next year, but that was a small gripe.

Way to get me in total trouble here at home, JANE. For the record, that wasn’t my Late Nite YK Experience, and it wasn’t Matt’s either.

Oh, sorry, I read the post title wrong.

Never mind. Thanks for posting my picture, Jane!

Bionic,

Ms. Case is paying homage to Woodie Guthrie with that one…

I wish I had to add to perspective as a YKos attendee but I cant since I didn’t go :(. As for the C-Span coverage, I caught the Plame panel and also i believe it was part of the meta-Kos panel. I REALLY enjoyed what I saw from both panels in both content and presentation.

(Random question: was Wilson joking or slighly cranky about the standing O he got when he was announced….he made a snarky comment and I couldnt tell if he was joking or annoyed?).

After reading Jane’s post above I tried to think a bit differently about what I saw when watching the Plame panel, and try to approach it from a different angle to maybe fit Kid Oakland’s narrative. I nodded with agreement with everything that the panel said, but when you come down to it…you could say that the Panel was really preaching to the choir. Ive read Wilson’s opinions, Waas’ articles, Froomkin’s column, Jane and Christy’s take here, and emptywheels over at TLH. It could lead someone to come to the conclusion that the panel and what was said was not really directed to the attendees of the panel (who likely knew much about what was being said) and was directed to the Press attending (who has been less than stellar at covering the case). I’m not saying that is how I felt, but just throwing it out there for discussion.

One thing I absolutely LOVED (Sorry Ghostman at #34) about the coverage that I saw, was the meta-kos panel….and especially the questions that were asked and answered afterwards. The questions that were asked were intelligent and were also questions that I would have liked answered…and the panelists came back with informative answers. I know the Plame panel was pressed for time, but I did wish there were more time for Q&A from the audience.

Other than that…I got nothin’ :)

Teddy, you funny!

My experience was really kind of up and down all weekend. I changed my flight so I could attend the FDL caucus only to find out I couldn’t get a seat in the room behind Byron’s big head and Ana Marie’s narrow behind. So I missed meeting everyone.

That really pissed me off so I arrived for the Plame panel at about 4:00 am. Others were already seated. Plame panel was the clear highlight of the conference for me. (Emptywheel blew me away!)

I met Wesley Clark who managed to shake my hand and ignore me at the same time. Very weird.

There was a MoDo traffic jam in the hallways leading to the keynote. Frankly she looked a little terrified and embarassed.

I immediately noticed the lack of minority participation and started trying to count the people who were black like me. If you exclude the handlers and political staff I counted six women and 4 men. (Houston we have a problem).

I met wonderful people at every panel and keynote. FDL breakfast was great but brief.

At one point Jane and Arianna took a seat in front of me, Joe Trippi was to the left and Ana Marie was on the right. My circuits overloaded.

I must mention that the most authentic person I met at the conference was Amb. Wilson. He introduced himself, he looked me in the eye, and he earned my respect.

Then I went to the airport on Sunday and someone stole my laptop! Still it was a great experience and I’m gonna do it again next year.

Well, the thing to realize is that the underlying structure of panels up there and audience down here (or vice versa, depending on where you were sitting) is a media creation. Or at least it has been refined to be media friendly.

But it is fundamentally undemocratic, in the small “d” sense of the word. When you step back, you can see that it is actually a seating arrangement based on the same power relationships underlying old media assumptions.

So what’s the model of a new media convention? Not sure, but ironically the 17th century definition of the coffeehouse comes to mind. In England at the time, they called them penny universities, because for a few pennies you could sit and debate the issues of the day with laborers, aristocrats, artists and philosophers.

Perhaps something in between is where we need to land.

As for my experience, it was much more like kid oakland’s. Being acutely attuned by training and professional experience to underlying constructs like the one I describe might have been a part of that perception.

I immediately noticed the lack of minority participation…

This is certainly a legitimate concern. However, the event was completely organized from the ground up. (I remember thinking the idea would never work when it was first proposed). So I’m not sure what can be done about it.

50, rob zuber: thanks for the link. George Lakoff. Very interesting man.

103, zamboni: no reason to be sorry. We just saw the same thing, and saw different things!
Ghostman

Hey Teddy, I am in the Sunday Chicago Tribune… AND NO I did not give anyone my hotel key….

Teddy- ah, now I know how to find you in a crowd! Matt O. thinks you are “awesome”.

cbl at 27: I’m glad you feel that way. There was a conscious effort on the part of many firepups to interact with our remote compadres, because we didn’t want to create a “YKos clique” that might diminish our community. I participated, but I can’t take credit for the idea.

Rob 108

Agree, but still concerning because we are not connecting with an important part of our base. I resolved to increase my involvement in this area to understand the reasons why and see if we can do better next year.

Perhaps something in between is where we need to land.

Don’t forget, though, that the TV and internet audience will always be larger than the audience at the actual convention. So it is important that the structure allows a television viewer to understand what is happening.

I too noticed the blinding whiteness of the whole thing. And Jane’s “I’m the girl” remark was spot on, too; other than the Plame panel.

Mocha Dem 106 — I would very much like to see a much bigger and more robust African American blogosphere, period. I think the attendance at the conference reflected the need for that. Agreed.

That was the only time I saw Arianna at the conference. Did not see Trippi or Cox at the table.

Sorry about your laptop.

Oh and the whole thing was too brief. I was always rushing from one thing to another and I missed a bunch of cool stuff. I think next year it has to be longer. Undoubtedly.

And hopefully a little less spread out? My feet were KILLING me.

OT,

There’s an interesting piece in this month’s Vanity Fair tracing the origin of the Hi-talian forgeries at the heart of “let them eat yellowcake.” And drunken trotskyite Christopher Hitchens has an essay on fellatio. I shit you not. Hey, it’s a guilty pleasure, and it’s my wife’s subscription. Plus, where else would I get to see a 50s styled pure as the driven snow Gwyneth Paltrow but an Estee Lauder ad. Rowrrr.

I know that Coriolanus reads FDL when he can, so this is for him- OT, but also on-topic. Coriolanus- do you have time to blog, what with every thing else you are doing? Would you want to add your perspective to the discussion? A serious question.

knuckledragger 117-

And don’t forget The Walcott’s article about The Clooney. Lovely.

What happened to the strikeout tag on my Hitchens modifiers. Damn you, html!

Jethco 98

I’m a kava kava man myself…

Phoebe,

Walcott rocks. As always…

arianna, being european, doesn’t realize how much she betrays her sense of class — although she has laudable ideas, she says things [last night at a dinner party we were talking about such & such … ] that show her lack of fellow feeling as far as the submerged tenth is concerned — to prove it, i’ll just say that she’d never back charlie rangel in trying to bring back universal conscription: she just doesn’t realize that if our democracy is to survive, everybody needs to share in the burden — her attitude is that the lower orders should join the military but not her kids: she’s like our representatives in washington who vote for war but don’t let their kids sign up [hillary, for instance] — she can’t get out of it by saying she’s against war: the only way to prevent war is if every family has a stake

Mochadem, sorry to hear about your laptop.

Teddy SF, if Matt O was your YK experience, then I’m going to need some details, please, cos you’re both cute as hell.

My YK experience was awesome. You know, I was in that big limo doing rails of coke with the Time Warner people. (They’re buying this site, by the way. Did I mention that, Jane? Yeah, I’m getting, like, 15%! You can still say anything you want, but first all your posts have to go the the CEO’s office for approval.) Then I schmoozed around with some Hollywood types, made out with a certain politician who shall remain nameless, and shamelessly sucked up to every big name media type I could find. Whoooo-hooooo!! I’m gonna be a big money pundit before you can say, “I used to know that guy”!

Okay, actually, I spent YKos right here in my apartment, schmoozing with the cats, drinking lots of coffee and trying to think up Late Nite posts.

I found yearlykos to be incredibly fun and energizing.

It was really easy to meet and talk with people, ranging from top bloggers, to lurkers, to Larry Johnson. The one blogger I really wanted to meet but didn’t was Jane. ;)

I felt it was actually much easier to interact with people during the breaks, at lunch, in the exhibition areas then during the panels. The exception was the FDL caucus which was structured to get people talking (nice job) and since it was on Thursday, not jam-packed.

The Mark Warner party made me sad. Not because it was lavish (been to too many dot-com-launch parties) but because it made me think of traditional reporters getting bought off by free drinks, low-grade sushi, and cover bands. That deserves all the scorn we can heap on them. Who could sell their soul for a mashed potato martini?

A couple of guys I met felt that YearlyKos was like high school: they thought there was a group of ‘cool kids’, the top bloggers and traditional media people who got all the attention and then a bunch of outsiders who weren’t in the club.

I didn’t have that experience, but I do think we can find ways to make the bigger panels and speeches by politicians more interactive.

For example, we could bubble up questions from the audience by having people send or text message questions to an internal site for quick community voting and vetting. This would help to make sure that with a thousand people in an audience, questions that are really important to the community is asked.

Could do the same sort of thing with video-sharing sites to get the community’s comments and thoughts playing right next to the panels and speeches… that’s all for next year, though.

I think it was a great event and can’t wait for YK2.

There was a discussion about the digital divide in one of the sessions I attended. That issue comes with so many different aspects. There is the infastructe issue of broadband in specific communities, economic aspect of being able to afford computers and high speed service. Then there is the language issue with the english as a second languge.

Tempe AZ has put in wireless in the downtown community and my city is working on city wide wireless until the big Telecoms shut it down.

A man from the Dole Leadership school said they have been putting blog posting in print for the non-computer folks in Kansas to reach those without. Kind of like the free weekly paper using the blogs as the content.

Arianna is a semi-regular paricipant on a weekly news round-up radio program on KCRA public radio in Santa Monica.

Left, Right & Center: Provocative, up-to-the-minute, alive and witty, KCRW’s weekly confrontation over politics, policy and popular culture proves those with impeccable credentials needn’t lack personality. Featuring four of the most insightful news analysts anywhere, this weekly “love-hate relationship of the air” reaches about 50,000 of the most influential radio listeners in Southern California.

Hosted by: Robert Scheer, Arianna Huffington, middle of the road Matt Miller & the insufferable Tony Blankley

see link to listen online and for pod casts.

Soy basura blanca.

I went for Plame, FDL Breakfast, and to gamble, and I wouldn’t have gone if it hadn’t been in Las Vegas. But I wound up attending YKos things in every time slot, and dragging my sorry ass out of bed way too early to do so. So I will go again no matter where it is.

Ghostman: 3. An annoyance: WAY too many times the camera would pan the audience and there sat sooo very many folks with the ole open laptop. Fairly or not, it just left a viewers impression that the audience is heavily nerdy. And besides, many regular folks think it’s just plain rude to busy one’s self with computer stuff when someone is at the podium speaking. it’s a matter of manners.

Well, it was a gathering of bloggers and blog commenters. It was heavily nerdy.

A lot of people were liveblogging, something they’d never had the opportunity to do before (at least not at a major event.) And as such, they were no more being rude than a reporter taking notes would be. But primarily, the sentiments you read here about those who were not present feeling like a part of the event were a direct result of those people tapping away on their laptops.

I would not sacrifice any of those things just to look less nerdy or better-mannered to people watching on TV.

Jane–the only problem I have with Arianna is the stupefying idiocy that is Greg Gutfeld appearing in the HuffPo. other than that, she’s jake in my book (whatever that means).

oh, and maybe Carol Platt Liebau, too. outside of that… :)

TRex- thanks for keeping the home fires burning!!

And drunken trotskyite Christopher Hitchens has an essay on fellatio. I shit you not.

Oooh, ‘Hitchens’ and ‘fellatio’ in one sentence. *SHUDDER!* Must…wash…brain…with bleach…now.

Uh, he’s got a column about fellatio from which perspecive?

Not that there’s anything wrong with fellatio. Just, Hitch doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy to write a column about giving head. Although some critics would ultimately say that’s all his writing has been about for the last five or six years…

TRex, living up to the snarkasaurus billing….heh heh.

Gladly at 123
i’ll just say that she’d never back charlie rangel in trying to bring back universal conscription

Well did she ever say that or are you divining what she might say? That’s like smacking your spouse up side the head because of something they said to you in YOUR dream.

Hitchens fellates gin bottles

For example, we could bubble up questions from the audience by having people send or text message questions to an internal site for quick community voting and vetting.

Interesting idea. Some people are going to be shy and intimidated about coming up to a microphone to ask a question, and would do much better if they could submit their question in writing. Even viewers could submit questions, theoretically.

she’s never had anybody on her site who advocates the draft — i’d be delighted if you proved me wrong

I’m a nerd and I’m proud.

Well, in the contributors section, they’ve got a picture of Hitchens wearing a leather jacket. Who knew?

Blogwhore somewhere else, kid. (ed.)

BTW, kid oakland, I had a great time falling in with your crowd and wandering over to the My Left Wing party. I had no idea who you were until you introduced yourself over dinner, but then and the couple of times before that I met you guys, you were probably the most inviting group of people there. Not that other people weren’t friendly, but most other people I didn’t know from somewhere online were have conversation, move on, but you guys gave off the vibe of “sure, join us!”

Jane, it can’t be helped: you look too, too smashing to be a nerd — it’s in the genes

I liked seeing all those computers in the audience. It was dizzying to think about how many people’s minds were converged on that room at that moment. It was like looking at a mirror in a mirror where it makes that endless curving tunnel of mirrors. Like an infinite number of rooms all existing parallel and simultaneously to each other.

Dude. That sounds like I’ve been smoking pot, but it made sense when I started typing, I swear.

After hearing everhopeful’s story about being in a limo with Matt Bai and a bunch of kids who expected someone else to pay their share of the limo ride, I found myself thinking,

“Oh lord, won’t you Bai me a Mercedes Benz”

Sorry, I just had to get that out of my brain so I could go to sleep.

an oldie, revisited for Lieberman:

Little Joe never once gave it away
Everybody had to pay and pay

A hustle here and a hustle there
Washington DC is the place where they said
Hey babe, take a walk on the wild side
I said hey Joe, take a walk on the wild side

Sugar plum fairy came and hit the streets
Lookin for back stabs and a place to cheat

Went to sixteen-oh-oh
You should have seen him go go go
They said, hey sugar, take a walk on the wild side
I said, hey babe, take a walk on the wild side
All right, huh

Even viewers could submit questions, theoretically.

Agreed, Rob Zuber. That’d be even better.

Gladly, it’s not fair to ascribe a position to someone by inference. It’s up to you to show where she (not other people on her blog) did say that since you are asserting that’s her opinion. I’m not saying it is or it isn’t, just that you put words in her mouth with no evidence that I can see. Also, there is not a consensus core position on the left as to the desirability of a draft.

Hey Van, maybe you should wear one of these.

I work in the event production business and rarely attend an event unless I’m being paid to be there. Attending Ykos was a last minute decision and I have absolutely no regrets for shelling out hard earned cash to attend. I boarded the plane with a fair amount of cynicism about convention gatherings mingled with some trepidation similar to attending my first high school reunion (30 years after graduation).

As others have already said, the camaraderie was truly incredible. If you were there to mingle with the stars…more power to you…but most of my interactions were with people who were there to meet each other and exchange ideas. If there is a single area of improvement it’s that all the sessions were surprisingly low-tech which I attribute to some very practical decisions by the organizing commitee.

Just a few random personal highlights:
1. Discovering that TBogg was in the house during the FDL Caucus.
2. Meeting Taylor Marsh…who is as charming as she is attractive.
3. Watching Emptywheel and Joe Wilson become acquainted during the FDL caucus.
4. Talking golf with Joe Wilson and Larry Johnson.
5. Talking with Mike Stark about how to expand his efforts to let RW radio hosts display their natural ignorance.
6. Talking with Jennifer Nix about how we can help spread the word about How Would A Patriot Act?
7. Learning fashions tips from Stirling Newberry.
8. Mommybrain’s young son, Luke, in his t-shirt that read “I Already Know More Than the President”…and everyone he met knowing he was right.
9. RevDeb handing me her cell phone and discovering I was talking with someone I went to high school with (who was not at the reunion I mentioned earlier)
10. Hanging in the hall with op99, KathryninMA, Teddy, and Redshift.
11. Smoking and chatting with BarbaraB & Siun.
12. The “Boxer Moment”…when I saw in person why I never want to be on Jane’s bad side. Not a word was spoken but none were needed.

And yes…I’m one of the people in one of the pictures. Matt is younger and both he and Teddy are better looking. Jane’s admiring Skippy’s photo shoot. That’s all I’m going to say about that.

the draft is too big an issue to treat lightly — it’s not enough to be silent: many americans watch news of the war as they sit in the comfort of their dens, not caring that other folks’ kids are at risk — nobody in congress or in the executive has kids at risk — what many progressives don’t grasp is that democracy can’t survive if we expect others to do the dirty work

gladly- this is an issue that needs seriously to be addressed. That’s all I will say for now- it’s Late Nite, and I’m tired.

3. Watching Emptywheel and Joe Wilson become acquainted during the FDL caucus.

OMG! That must have been great. I can only hope that at some point, Amb. Wilson said, “Marcy, I think you may know more about my life than I do.”

If I wrote the screenplay, that’s what he would say, anyway.

100, 104:

Actually, the guitar sticker emulates Pete Seeger, not Woodie. As I recall he put it on there back when the Weavers were performing in the 40s, before the blacklist.

I enjoyed watching the C-SPAN coverage and am contemplating finding a way to go to YKos 2007.

It’s interesting how one of Jane’s OK – rather than great – posts has elicited some of the best feedback I’ve seen yet about the conference and what it was.

My impression from watching was merely interest and mild happiness that somebody at C-SPAN managed to push coverage of a very important event which might usually be missed up to the top of the pile there. We need to find a way to thank that structure without getting the person or people who set this up in trouble with the Bushbots.

I was trying to explain YKos to my best friend over the phone last night. He’s Peter Bevis, the guy who brought the “Kalakala” back to Seattle from Kodiak in 1998, and is also one of the greatest bronze sculptors alive. I brought up the interesting thing I’d observed about YKos that there was really no focus person or people there and that the ego factor was minimalized to the point that it seemed to make the media people more than a bit uncomfortable.

gladly ~
Arianna is Greek, every Greek male is REQUIRED to perform military service. I was stationed in Greece 1977-1980. They can obtain deferments for college but they are rare. They were paid approx $3.00/month and they depended on their families to support them while they served their two years.

Any American military who was evaluated for transfer to Greece who was of Greek decent was also evaluted because at that time, the Greek nation counted three generations from the first immigrants out of country would have to meet their military service.

In addition, military services is required in Italy and many other countries in the Mediterranean.

Just finished my first blog entry on the Cheyenne DrinkingLiberally site last night. At least my mom thought it was good…(thank god for moms)

The biggest problem I am running into is trying to get the 20 to 30 year old crowd to come on out and talk politics. Thanks to all the musicians putting out albums speaking the truth, I think I see a change in young peoples’ perspectives regarding Bush. The youth is starting to realize he sucks, the older generations definitely are aware of this fact.

Anyway, I was thinking of setting up a myspace blog thing with a combination heavy metal/34 year old father of four/liberal thing to go hand in hand with the DL site. But on my own blog I could openly endorse candidates. Is there easier and better programs to use out there?

late evening post from Josh Marshall:

Okay, this may resolve the Sanders issue.

According to The Hotline, despite the fact that Bernie Sanders runs as an independent, he was endorsed by the Vermont Democratic party. That presumably settles the matter of the DSCC’s public support for him.

a follow-up to this:

…. Is the DSCC supporting Bernie Sanders in any way? I’m really not sure. If they can, I would hope they would be. There’s no Democrat running as far as I know. And presumably he’d caucus with the Dems in the Senate as he has with the Dems in the House.

Late Update: About half the emails I’ve gotten in response to this post have construed it to mean that the fact that the DSCC might be supporting Bernie Sanders somehow settles it that Schumer can also support a party-defecting Lieberman. Don’t overread.

not analogous

Wouldn’t it be cool if Wilson hired Marcy on to be part of the team for the civil suit? THAT would be a blogging Cinderella story. She could be largely responsible for sending Karl Rove to jail.

The key, though, is to take their sweet time on that trial. Karl needs to be waaaay beyond any power of pardon by the current executive branch.

Jane – TRex really did a fabulous job covering the home front and keeping us in stitches while you were at YK.

But, of course, I do wish I coulda been there.

Since you mentioned Geoffrey Stone, he hosted an excellent caucus on civil liberties and sedition at the LWV convention on Monday. I got to ask him some questions about why he has any faith that Arelen Specter will finally decide to stick up for us and the constitution. He’s pretty great as a speaker and is very unassuming as a person (from what I could tell).

As for next year’s YK – I’m saving up my pennies!

good point — that’s one reason why greeks & italians are anti-war: they have a stake

do you really think bush would have been so quick to take us into iraq had his twins been obligated to serve in combat?

Gladly, agreed, but you’ll be spinning your wheels before 2009 because it’s political suicide. They’ll hobble along under the volunteer system at least til then.

Linkmeister,
au contraire.

TRex—didn’t eavesdrop, but my impression was that he knew he was in the presence of a truly remarkable mind.

Mike G & Rob Z—there’s some interesting meeting software being developed that will do what you’re both suggesting. I can’t say I know a lot about it but I’m planning to make that research part of my contribution to YKos07.

Duh. You can’t send people to jail in a civil suit can you?

It’s late.

Random thoughts: Ambassador Wilson dressed down in baggy shorts, loose shirt and sandals.

The party pass of truly Spinal Tap-ian proportions that gained one admittance to the Warner bash.

Pach’s warm, welcoming smile as I snuck into the FDL caucus late.

Watching Krist Noveselic on the “Reforming the Electoral Process” panel, flashing back on our previous meeting backstage at the Guns’n’Roses/Metallica show at the Kingdom where I rescued him from an adoring throng and delivered him his (normal sized) backstage pass.

Next year: a camera free zone in the main ballroom.

The feeling that we were experiencing history in the making. That in future years many will lay claim to being one of the thousand that were there. And I was. Thanks Jane, Christy, Pach and FDL-ers!

TRex – debtor’s prison?

Bob Smith at 6

I have experienced some amusing new “anomolies” as well,

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..5#comments

TRex, a civil suit is just for money, not jailtime. Hope they get ever penny offa Rover.

Nitol. Avez bons reves…

RBG, thanks. Shoot me a note if you find something interesting. I’ve done online events where we did something similar using chat software with moderation tools, but the software was internal. I’ll look into it as well for yk07.

to me, prosecuting bush for war crimes is more compelling that prosecuting his flunkeys for outing plame — i’ll work hard for any promising effort to haul bush before an international court

OT,
Like most of my comments, but I’m an avid reader and I like it here…

This fella has his shit together and I likey the way he phrased the liberal/conservative talking points.

http://www.exponentialimprovem…..ples.shtml

It was written in 2004, a dark year to be sure.

On topic, kudos to you Bill and Ted for your excellent adventure in Vegas. I’m in this fight in the middle of GOP freakville (WY), but at least I have you wonderful people to help inspire, amuse, and get me worked up enough to keep active in the community.

I am a child of the Vietnam era. My father worked for the Army at Fort Hunter Liggett as a biologists at one of the main bootcamps and last stops prior to going to war. Many of my male high school classmates died in vietnam. In addition, while I was in nursing school, a selective draft for nurses was barely defeated.

Having the draft did not stop over 50K deaths in those years. I am very ambivilant. As the mother of three cannon fodder age young adults, no I will move to Canada to save them.

But I do think that instituting the draft would shut down the Iraq war sooner. Those Chickenhawks would not want to risk their poor baby repug Yellow Elephant kids to the likes of War. I do agree, they have no skin in the game.

tired — than, not that

tired – bed, not blog

I dunno who beat me to 143 but you’re quick, I was gonna do the same thing… ;)

TRex — Joe Wilson DID say that to Marcy. I thought someone blogged that at one point, but she was talking and he was smoking a cigar and he just leaned back and said something to the effect of “you know more about this than I do.” Which is no doubt true — Marcy knows more about it than anyone.

zAmboni 105 said something about “preaching to the choir.” My goal in the Plame panel was to set the new narrative going forward about the case, and it wasn’t for the benefit of the media, it was for the benefit of the country. The more people who hear it the better, and I’m thrilled it was on TV, but it’s no different than what we promulgate here every day. Then when someone vulnerable to pressure transgresses that narrative (as Wankette did so helpfully the very next day) we enforce. It’s really rather simple. It’s meant, ultimately, to affect the perceptions of people entering the voting booth. It may work THROUGH the media, but that’s a delivery tool, a means to an end. As individuals their opinions matter squat.

TRex at 154:
OMG! That must have been great. I can only hope that at some point, Amb. Wilson said, “Marcy, I think you may know more about my life than I do.”

If I wrote the screenplay, that’s what he would say, anyway.

He did say pretty much exactly that.

gladlythecrosseyedbear says:
“tired %u2014 than, not that” at 178

are you quoting Faulkner or did I miss something?

nowadays technology gives us the illusion of being able to make war without a draft — it’s easier for armchair generals to declare war

i typed that instead of than — too tired for faulkner

Speaking of emptywheel, she has a new post where she surmises that Rove may have information about someone else leaking to Novak:

http://thenexthurrah.typepad.c…..hts_o.html

I did not want to nor did I need to attend the “Yearly Kos” but I’m happy for all those that did. It had to be more of a social gathering than business for most of everyone never had met one another by all that I had read prior. Be that as it was (and is), I’m sure that there were many who had an agenda to meet certain people. With limited time, everyone could not meet everyone. That is just the way life is in the realm of reality. If one finds them-self feeling ‘left out’ or ’shunned’ — not in the group of cool kids — it is your own fault for having such salty self-esteem; Blaming others is so GOP, so either join that group or get over it already.

The other reason I didn’t attend the “Yearly Kos” event was that I am not licensed to practice my skills in that state, which I usually charge 245 dollars an hour for with a minimum of four hours, pre and post entertaining hours being uncharged, and all paid in advance.

Jane, if you are still reading, could you please check moderated comments? I have something waiting to be read. Thanks.

deviantdevil @183

Thanks for the professional sample. Pass.

deviantdevil – I’m guessing you weren’t missed.

165: Hmm. Well, the photo doesn’t lie, but I’m willing to bet that Pete followed Woodie’s tradition, because I’m sure I’ve read (back a year or so ago when the guitar was temporarily lost) that one of the identifying marks on Pete’s guitar was that inscription.

Thanks for the pic.

JH sez:

“My goal in the Plame panel was to set the new narrative going forward about the case, and it wasn’t for the benefit of the media, it was for the benefit of the country.”

You did the “benefit of the country” part very well, and Mr. Wilson aptly pointed out the gulf between his service in the State Department and the right’s distorted narative about what all this means even better, but I’m not sure many got the “new narrative.” That’s extremely hard to do, even without the pressure all of the YKos planners and participants were going through.

Okay, did I miss Teddy and Matt and others identifying WHICH photo is theirs, or what?

Deviantdevil—that sounds awfully similiar to the deal the attractive young woman offered me at the hotel bar. How are your services different?

My YK experience, simply put: Time of my life.

I wrote on 6/12:

Firedoglake readers that have come to know me through my writings provided such encouragement and faith in me that I’ll never forget and will always cherish. I am still getting my head around the mini-celebrity treatment of people wanting to buy me beers and showering me with comments like “I love your writing” and “keep doing what you’re doing.” It was absolutely surreal. It is something that I’ll have with me for the rest of my life.

That is an understatement. I had such a great time with you all this weekend. Everyone was so gracious and encouraging. I just hope I met everyone’s expectations.

I wrote up a quick post — which doesn’t do this past weekend justice — on Monday.

I don’t know any other way to say than “time of my life.”

Let’s do it again next summer, and V.G. has to come this time!

http://thegreatsociety.blogsom…..s-wrap-up/

Bionic @ 187 $ shoephone @ 188

TY. Your so very predictable comments helped me win the bet. And you are correct, I was not missed for I was were I was suppose to be, not at some event of notoriety. As much as so many of you do not want to admit it, you have a propensity to be snobbish and cliquish, as elitest as those of whom you speak.

Your satans are your gods:)

and skippy just likes the girls, imho. garance is awfully pretty.

but she still hasn’t returned my email! and i offered her a free skippy tee shirt, too!

Matt O.! I tried to phone you earlier, to say “please check in on FDL late nite” but your phone was busy, and I didn’t leave a message. Glad you got the message anyway! Now, I’ll go read your blog post. xxooo

gladlythecrosseyedbear at 125

three points:

1 – I love your handle – it makes me smile. Thank you.

2 – Your post appears to contain the assertion that only those support Rep. Rangel’s efforts to resume universal conscription are acting to prevent war.

This assumption will come as a great surprise to my activist friends here in San Francisco who are actively helping uniformed war resisters, holding demos outside of recrutiment stations…and who just happened to help shut down the city when Shrub invaded Iraq.

3 – I’ve actually listened to Arianna Huffington for years – since the beginning of Left, Right, and Center on KCRW.

Then I was living in Santa Monica with time to spare on Friday evenings due to lousy social life. Now I listen most Fridays in SF due to … oh, nevermind.

I’ve heard Arianna (whom I wouldn’t know if she fell on me – as long as she didn’t make a sound) speak repeatedly and eloquently about the death and carnage the Iraq war brings to American troops and the people of Iraq.

I lived in Santa Monica – the home of KCRW – for sixteen years. The first thirteen years I rented in the most modest and diverse neighborhood in the city (and left only when the landlord wanted to rent to family). I worked at UCLA most of that period. My residency program was VA based.

The drive from Santa Monica west to UCLA down Wilshire Blvd rubbed the veterans’ sacrifice in our affluent Westside faces. We had plenty of time to look – the stretch of Wilshire crossing under the 405 is one of the densest corridors in the US, and morning traffic crawls.

East of the 405 Wilshire – all eight teeming lanes – is dwarfed by the massive VA hospital grounds on the north and south.

West of the 405 the Santa Monica commuters on Wilshire emerge from the overpass to find the Federal Bldg on their right – and the massive Veterans’ Cemetery on their left.

Every day of the friggin’ commute, that’s the view.

And up through the time I moved away (after the start of the war) the folks I worked with and lived near had almost no personal relationship with active duty soldiers.

The Westside of LA is not exactly a hot spot for military recruiters.

So I don’t know if Arianna Huffington’s class consciousness will ever pass muster with you or anyone else.

My class consciousness may not, either.

But I am damn sure I’ve heard AH repeatedly deplore the human costs of this hideous war for US troops and Iraqis.

And talking about the direct experience of the US Armed Forces to the civilians in West LA was a gauche, too-fervent, not-cool yawner whrn AH started telling the KCRW listeners about the war’s horrific consequences.

Maybe there is more than one way to prevent and resist war.

And maybe – just maybe – calling out the war’s human costs over and over to the people who shape the lens of popular culture is a powerful tool against this evil war.

____________________________________________

“i’ll just say that she’d never back charlie rangel in trying to bring back universal conscription: she just doesn’t realize that if our democracy is to survive, everybody needs to share in the burden – her attitude is that the lower orders should join the military but not her kids: she’s like our representatives in washington who vote for war but don’t let their kids sign up [hillary, for instance] – she can’t get out of it by saying she’s against war: the only way to prevent war is if every family has a stake”

Groan. Deviantdevil, don’t take any more peyote tonight, okay, hon? $245 an hour? Pffft. I don’t get out of bed and piss at night for that kind of money.

‘Wish I was there’

oh s*** [sorry Jane :) ]

VA hospital is West of Wilshire…

Cemetery is East of Wilshire…

and map and compass was so easy in the Boy Scouts…

sigh

…whoa, some wierd posting here tonight…what I got Jane, is that you thought (for a minute anyway) that Pat Buchanan was cute…Satan’s Temptation?… granted I wuz reading fast to catch up but have to admit I’ve done some wondering about him myself…
Jethco 98: re Kava Kava…watch your liver with that stuff, tempting

…and finally sad to say I did some reviewing of the Bush chart (astro) and frankly he could have a couple of good weeks here til late June then a bad week and a big bounce of Jupiterian luck through August. In fact Saturn crossing his ascendant may be a waning aspect and he will probably get back some of his old dumb luck…others around him however will not so that may counterbalance…he may start to look good again to a few people…

This machine kills fascists

Woody Guthrie had this on his guitar many years ago. It’s nice to see someone pays attention to him

Matt O.! I just finished reading your YK post on your blog. Thanks!

I, too, highly recommend Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) http://iava.org/index.php I’ve known about it for a long time, ever since I heard Paul Rieckhoff the founder interviewed on radio.

TRex @ 198

Smiling inside and out, I am. TY:)

Reickhoff is an awesome, awesome guy. Straight shooter. He told me about their Follow the Money Project when I spoke of my war profiteering series. I just wanted to ask him about any of his experiences.

During the panel, Reickoff said how veterans’ benefits are being slashed, and I think Democrats should vocally back the IAVA, pushing for veterans’ rights. The GOP is using the “support the troops” meme with the war, but I don’t see how cutting back on their EARNED benefits is “supporting the troops.”

If Dems want to fight back this “Democrats don’t support the troops” bull, fight back with this.

I make $245 a day. But then, I’m just a lowly painter.

And being Jewish, I don’t worry about Satan much.

The musical guest on Leno tonight was K.T. Tunsall, a musician from Scotland.

From her site:

KT Tunstall is a sparkling new songwriter with Chinese blood, a Scottish heart, great legwarmers and a cool name – “well, it’s got a bit more attitude than Kate which just says farmer’s daughter to me,” she laughs. KT celebrates classic singer-songwriting in the tradition of Rikki Lee Jones, Carol King and Fleetwood Mac with an articulate, accessible, immediate brew of rootsy sass, wistful quandary and after-hours atmosphere. The latest in a line of outstanding contemporary Scottish songwriters including Texas, Fran Healy, Teenage Fanclub and The Beta Band, KT’s unique perspective offers a rare emotionally connecting intensity through it’s gripping lyrical bite and heartfelt melody.

She’s the one who had “This machine kills fascists” on her guitar. A nod to Woody Guthrie.

pea ess have you seen my husband’s work yet? Tell him, he gets giddy.

Matt O.- wow- that’s great that you got to talk with Reickoff. I couldn’t agree more about the hypocrisy of the “support the troops” and then not, in any real sense. This is something that I used to go on about a lot (not so much at FDL), and linked the IAVA site, but I kinda gave up saying it, because sadly, the issue does get lost, never coalesces to a major dialog, or least not one that rises above all of the other BushCo. sorry events.

Matt O.- BTW, here is a link to the interview with Reickoff. There are many other good (! heart wrenching) interviews with vets from Iraq at the same site- during the time that Brad did live radio from Camp Casey in Crawford. http://www.bradshow.com/Archiv…..r1_24k.mp3

What I find incredible is that you (Jane) are available (the cute guy seen thing). You must be living in a cave with wolverines.

Anyway, my YK experience. I liked the panels – my highlight was Mudcat telling the guy who said the South was Lost to kiss his shiny metal ass. That came as close to the blogsperience as any panel did. But seriously, I’d like to see more opportunity for audience participation and interaction. The FDL death row dinner questionnaire was great; I’m sorry I got there late. FWIW my meal would have been 1000 year old eggs made from scratch.

So, more audience and less panel, but the reality is that there isn’t enough time to do all we want. The one suggestion I’m really serious about is to *not* go to Vegas again. It is the most depressing place on earth. By Saturday afternoon, with three hours to kill before Harry Reid’s speech, I just had to saddle up and go home. As a second suggestion, go someplace where we can have meals together. The FDL breakfast was good – I got to talk to several new people at length. Years ago I went to a National Audubon convention at Western Washington University – beautiful place. I’m guessing that in June there may be lots of colleges with space available at reasonable prices.

The reason I went to YK was to see the celebration of the birth of a new life-force. It happened, and if Mark Warner did nothing else, he gave a great coming out party. In 20 years there will be 10,000 people saying, I Was There at the First YK.

I now have the IAVA button on my backpack in a show of support. I really wish I could help those guys, and I am doing to do what I can to push the political game in their favor.

Dems really, really need to back these guys.

Another Kid Oakland kvetch? He is a connoiseur and a chronicler of disappointment.

Thanks, Christy, for your response about the grand jury…you confirmed my understanding. I don’t think they ever voted on a True Bill, which I think would typically reflect the difference between the evidence necessary to indict and that needed to secure a conviction.

I gotta admit, though, somethin’s fishy.

And, Jane, forgive my comment, which is impossible not to sound racist, but I note that Boxer (& Feinstein) and Schumer are Jewish. Joe is Jewish. Outspoken Joe supporters in the DLC are Jewish. The Jews, being a small, perpetually oppressed group, stick together, pretty much no matter what the litmus test is. There will be snowballs in Hell before any of them will criticize Holy Joe…out loud.

Taking it a step further, there are always those threats to withhold support and money by that Israeli lobbying group if their chosen candidates and policy positions are not supported to its liking.

On a positive note, perhaps someone can dig up a Joementum donation to Libby’s defense fund. Wouldn’t that be fun?

Hey, it is great to be able to post again after months of not being able to. You guys and all your commenters rock! Cool with the guest posters, too, not to mention Vegas. Loved hearing about that and thanks to all who provided pictures. I’d never seen a pic of Murray Waas.

BTW, have you heard? Liberals are GODLESS!!!

Amazon needs a proper trexinator….

My problem is that there isn’t a left anymore in America. Ted Kennedy would be considered a middling centrist pol in most western liberal democracies. You have a right wing party and an extremely right wing party in the US. I think a switch has flipped in the larger world. America for whatever reason has failed in it’s endeavour to establish a hegemon. I’ve been noting journalists in the west commenting on the need for NATO to go in and clean up the mess in Afganistan left by America. I resent that. If America had spent a fraction of the blood and treasure lost in Iraq on Afganistan we wouldn’t have to be wasting our blood and treasure cleaning up America’s mess.
The failure to have any liberal democratic element in the US lies at your feet.

The experience was largely what people made it. I had an advantage and a disadvantage: no laptop, no cell phone. Freed from having to post on a schedule and not serving on any panels, I was able to mingle fairly extensively, and had a good time doing so (most notably with some FireDogLake commenters.)

The panels were structured, in most cases, not as conversations, but as lectures. When you have only 5 rooms and a limited number of subjects, along with tons of people, it was hard to do it any other way. There were some exceptions, but that meant going to the less popular panels/seminars.

In terms of access, there were some “important” people there, but as with Jane I saw only a few of them, and talked to less. However, for those determined enough, and with sharp enough elbows the opportunity to talk to some journalists, candidates and politicians was available.

Maggie 213,

And, Jane, forgive my comment, which is impossible not to sound racist, but I note that Boxer (& Feinstein) and Schumer are Jewish. Joe is Jewish. Outspoken Joe supporters in the DLC are Jewish. The Jews, being a small, perpetually oppressed group, stick together, pretty much no matter what the litmus test is. There will be snowballs in Hell before any of them will criticize Holy Joe%u2026out loud.

Taking it a step further, there are always those threats to withhold support and money by that Israeli lobbying group if their chosen candidates and policy positions are not supported to its liking.

Sorry, that’s ridiculous. It could be disproved a million ways, but the easiest would be to just look at the vote for the use of force in Iraq:

Feinstein, Schumer, Lieberman, Specter: Yes

Levin, Feingold, Wellstone, Boxer: No

Ian,
I was in the same boat. I don’t have a laptop (it sounded like FDLers were pooling money to get me one? Seriously, the nicest, sweetest, most gracious people are at FDL), so I didn’t post at all this weekend.

As you say, there were “important” people there. I was more excited to meet people like Jane, Atrios and Tbogg (he and his wife are the nicest people ever), than say MoDo or Wankette (I didn’t even look for them). Jay Rosen was cool. (You were sitting with me and Jane while talking to him.) Judd from TP is so much younger than I thought he would be. He and Amanda were totally cool people to talk to. They do such great work at TP. Jonathan Singer from MyDD is a super nice guy, too.

And I have to thank Pacha a lot. He was introducing me around, and not just introducing me, but building me up to guys like Joe Wilson, Ezra Klein, etc. I hold his opinion in high regard so thank you Pach. (Latino Blogger Power.)

Dover, thanks for debunking that comment. It was ridiculous.

Very interesting post, and comments too.

It has started me puzzling a bit about the relationship between fellowship and politics.

While politics is the subject of much blog discussion, it seems to me that fellowship is the key goal for most people. I think that is a positive thing. I’m just not sure exactly what I think about it.

My guess is that fellowship is always a very important part of social and/or political movements.

My bet is that the early union organizers and members were bound by fellowship. Mother Jones and all that.

Probably the NAACP in the 1950s.

Probably the rise of the evangelical right in the 1980s and 1990s.

To a lesser extent, you get that sense working on a political campaign.

A few years ago, I saw a parade with various religious denominations. Several organized groups, singing. Then the Unitarians. A bunch of happy folks all singing their own song.

Maybe liberals in the last few decades haven’t had fellowship organizations — from a big picture point of view. Unions, civil rights — not the same meeting places as once were.

Maybe blogs are the new avenue for that energy.

AS I said, a good thing. But I wonder if it is an adequate avenue for all purposes.

That is a different thread.

One last stray thought. Plame may be the porn that draws eyeballs, but the context is war and authoritarianism. That is what makes Plame important.

We all need a little fellowship to brace ourselves to face those twin monsters.

Sure, we talked politics, we stayed up late, we partied. But YearlyKos was also the most extraordinary gathering of unselfish people I’ve ever experienced, and that’s the thing I’m still trying to get my head around. Thank you, everyone.

Are you serious, Jane?

You honestly thought that your experience, as a “blog celebrity” moderating the most charged (and imo interesting, great job!) panel at the event, would reflect the experience of other anonymous attendees?

Come on. Don’t be coy. Fact is, people looked at you more than you looked at people. In a way, there was something pretty disempowering about the stratification of star bloggers and their nameless fans. The blogosphere, like any social situation, self-organizes into cliques. Please don’t pretend otherwise.

Peace.

Quick note:

Honestly I find it amazing and sadly revealing how few Kossacks and other American liberal bloggers are acquainted with the World Social Forum, an internationalist online predecessor to YearlyKos that’s a good decade ahead of the American blogosphere in political thought and organization.

The WSF has been a key contributor to the electoral victories of leftist leaders across Latin America, from Brazil to Bolivia. (Lula hosted the first WSF as mayor of Porto Alegre in Brazil.)

The WSF’s very organization embodies participatory democracy in a way that was totally absent at YearlyKos.

There’s a lot for YearlyKos to learn from what the WSF is doing, and I hope American progressives are up for it!

Peace.

If there was any “blog celebrity” feelings, I think it was more self-created than, say, the bloggers doing it themselves.

I know I was timid about approaching top bloggers, and it wasn’t because they made themselves inaccessible. It was that “Oh my that’s [insert top blogger here]!”

Now, I didn’t consider myself a celebrity but the FDL regulars certainly treated me like one (in the good way) but were able to approach me and say hi to me. And I love them for it. It certainly made me feel important. Thanks again guys!

But I have to say, the top bloggers like Aravosis, Atrios, Singer, Stoller, etc. were all easy to talk to. John was super nice at the Hard Rock as we tried to find out way to the WesPAC party. Atrios was laid back, always hanging out at the end of the Splash Bar. I hung out with Singer all weekend. I would bump into Judd Legum and strike up a friendly conversation. Mike Stark was super cool and easy to talk to. Tbogg was awesome. I talked to him for like 30-45 minutes at the Hard Rock. I am sure I am missing people but in my experience, you could talk to anybody. It was like the first week of college for me over again, where you had the courage to go up to anybody and just strike up a conversation.

However, I did act like a nervous school girl when I met Sam Seder. That guy is hilarious. I just love the voices he does on the Majority Report.

I AM SUCH A TROLL

Stephen’s my name — trollling’s my game !

Matt O:

Your point is well taken. But I’m not blaming the (as you revealingly put it) “top bloggers” for the natural social stratification that was glaringly obvious as YearlyKos. And I’m not saying that anybody was hard to approach. Hell, for all I know, Angelina Jolie is easy to approach, but that doesn’t change her celebrity status. I’m just acknowledging that reality.

Bob Smith says:

June 14th, 2006 at 9:23 pm

Does anyone know why throughout the last week half the time I try to get to this website it shows up as a webhosting company saying their is no such domain?

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Yes, I had that same experience. I don’t have a clue how it happened or why it stopped after 3 or 4 days.

OT….the pool by and the NYT are helping Rover with his public rehab….
Rover’s friends say he “technically” didn’t leak the name of a CIA operative…..What was that about the word is?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06…..5leak.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..02160.html

Morning, pups. Our local paper finally printed a Net Neutrality LTE this morning — not mine, but this better one (Steve Keller, if you’re here, well done!):

For Internet neutrality

On June 8 the House defeated an amendment to a bill that would implement Internet neutrality. By defeating this amendment, the House essentially voted to hand control of the Internet to the phone and cable companies, who intend to impose changes that will alter the Internet as we know it. The president of Public Knowledge, a public interest group, said, “Today’s Internet, which gives consumers control over what applications, services and content they want to access, will be replaced by an Internet that looks like a cable system — where network providers determine who gets on and at what price.”

If we lose in the Senate, we must be ready to pay much more for Internet access. We can be prepared for Internet censorship, too. If someone makes money using the Internet, the phone and cable companies will want a piece of the action. The rich will see their e-mails move quickly, because they paid a premium price, but ours will move more slowly. Even if we have broadband, if the site we are visiting doesn’t buy premium service, we might wait while the site downloads at dial-up speeds. Many businesses will pay, but blogs, small charities, individuals and sites that offer free services may not be able to do so.

Let’s not let the phone and cable companies tell us they are entitled to recover costs of building the Internet. The Internet is highly profitable to them. This is about competition. It is about keeping us from using VoIP (long distance over the Internet) phone services or buying Blockbuster movies that compete with the cable company movies. It is about preventing cities from offering free wireless hot spots or libraries offering free Internet access to users.

Let the cable and phone companies both compete for our business. I urge readers to call their senators today.

STEVE KELLER, Ormond Beach

I would like to know why everyone is ignoring this,I read it and he makes a very convincing point

I couldn’t sleep at all last nite

39 citizenspook says:

June 14th, 2006 at 8:39 pm

RANDALL SAMBORN INDICATES FITZGERALD’S PLAME INVESTIGATION MAY HAVE BEEN SHUT DOWN

http://citizenspook.blogspot.c…..icates-fit zgeralds.html#links

well, my link dodn’t work but it works on the previous thread, take a look and please comment

me to me, if you read on down last night’s thread, before long you’ll find some reassurance on citizenspook’s poor track record.

Meanwhile, this piece of good news from http://www.tpmmuckraker.com:

Lewis, Rangel Break Ranks on CBC Jefferson Stand

Well, maybe this won’t be such a battle after all.

…

CBC Chair Mel Watt (D-NC) had promised that the whole thing would “blow up in their face” if the Dem leadership pursued it. But it looks like some powerful members of his caucus have broken ranks.

Most prominent is Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), who himself reportedly made the motion to have Jefferson booted off the committee. And Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY) took the mission early on of trying to convince Jefferson to step down voluntarily. Those are among the two most esteemed members in the caucus.

Watt says he’s not backing down, but it’ll much harder to make his stand with those defections.

Nice to know that a few old bulls around Capitol Hill are still thinking straight. (And that I’ve finally learned to blockquote!)

Comeraderie. I was pining away in OKC with these two hienous Senators and the flat earth society boys I work with. Glad I found the internets and FDL. Everyone here has been so welcoming. The entusiastic greeting I recieved when I was outed at the FDL caucus was overwhelming. A sort of recognition that I had not experienced since my days as a playwright.

Eauh deah.

15 new examples of Coulter plagiarism
Blogger finds additional lifted passages…

http://www.rawstory.com

lotus…that is GREAT news

metome…..I want to believe it, I know something went down, BUT….I don’t know what to say……..If Fitz was shut down, he should resign that would get the juices flowing and lead to more investigation, but unless that happens, we are stuck with all the spinning that is beginning, y’know Rover NEVER leaked Plames name.

Buffet at FDL breakfast: $15

Having to replace a stolen camera: $300

Meeting so many committed, intelligent, thoughtful people: priceless.

It’s been hard to go back to work this week. Still, when my ex-Marine buddy wrote me this morning that all political parties are alike, I can reply, “Baloney!”

Oilfieldguy, I’ve been thinking that I need to put you in touch with one of my bestest friends (who recently retired from the Palm Beach Post and moved with her hub to Norman — where blue isolation is an issue for her). Unfortunately, they’ve just taken off for their summer trailer in CO, but in the fall . . .

me to me — hmm. Interesting. Sealed v. Sealed could have been CheneyCo. v. Fitz-DoJ.

In other words, another “Saturday Night Massacre”.

If CheneyCo. used state secrets argument, Fitz’ team, the judge and the grand jury might be prohibited from saying anything about status.

Right about now, Leopold, would be an excellent time to burn those sources if they had given you any information about this. Do it wide open in the public eye.

I suppose it is important that left-leaning bloggers get a chance to talk to other bloggers. But why do that at the expense of talking to consumers (and financial supporters) of blogs? I look at the premiere post on Firedog Lake and find it dreamy reflections on Yearly Kos. The day? The day the Take Back America Conference ended with a thoughtful and moving speach by Barak Obama.

In 2005 I got a chance to meet those behind many of the blogs I read regularly, to thank them for their work, and to connect with them as people. I got a chance to meet a few new ones this year, but the “stars” of the blogger left were largely noticeable by their absence. To my mind, it was far more important to have as many of you there as possible, taking the temperature of the movement, ferreting out stories (was Cindy Sheehan dis-invited? Why was there no “official” concluding march?) than to have you all basking in maintream media attention and the glowing affection of your fans. This is NOT a condemnation of a yearly blogger conference. It IS a questioning of both the location and the timing. There are 52 weeks in the year, guys. There are 12 weeks in the summer. Why not choose one which isn’t so close to the long-standing week of the campaign for America’s Future annual do?

I bought the pass on Air America and watched everything I could. It looked like a good time to me and the panels were very good. I’m with whoever up-thread that wanted to see a ykos take place somewhere east. I’m in favor of New Orleans, though that’s probably more central. I’d love to show everyone what’s left of our port.

My dish on those I met:

BarbaraB. An intelligent, vibrant woman. Lved yer ‘do!

zennurse. A remarkable woman. Our time was brief, but I’m glad I got to meet her.

TeddySanFran. Good vibes. A very enthusiastic and fun guy to hang with.

RevDeb. Wow. Encyclopedic knowledge and google like speed with info. Can assist with people searching for words in five conversations simultaneously.

BobbyG. One hep cat. That’s saying alot considering we were in Vegas.

Siun. Remarkable. Glad she’s on our side.

Taylor Marsh. A hottie

CHS. Unfair. She’s entirely too young to contain such brilliance and grace in the same vessel.

Mr. CHS. In my line of work. Simpatico.

Jane Hamsher. I don’t speak french, but I do think it. I’d hit that shit. (I’m available for booty-calls Jane. ;)

I’m sure I missed several. It was great meeting all of you!

LindyH, pretty sure you’ll find lots of other votes for NOLA here, judging by the reax when it first came up the other night . . .

Please do Lotus. Our netroots group is inert. My time is hugely limited. I am seriously considering a career change merely to have more time to fix our country. It means giving up a six figure income though. A real tough call, but somebody has to do it.

emptywheel’s midnight thoughts on Rove as she resifts the May 5 hearing:

http://thenexthurrah.typepad.c……html#more

“… I think–but am not sure–that Rove has the goods on someone else leaking to Novak (probably, but not definitely, Libby), and that Fitzgerald is hiding those goods for the moment. … “

Redshift 35

Good points–and that was part of what I was trying to say about my experience. I was able–because of the efforts of Jane and Christy and Pach and because I ran into zennurse immediately–to hook up with very warm, welcoming firepups immediately. Partly because of the Plame panel but partly because there wasn’t that “let’s get together and hug each other as soon as we hit Vegas,” I didn’t meet a lot of my oldtime DKosers (including kid oakland) until much later. It was harder to find the oldtimers partly because we’re so diffuse, and partly because there wasn’t a social event designed to accomplish that (though MSOC’s party did partly fulfill that purpose).

I think it would have been a very different conference for me if I hadn’t gotten hugged by zennurse as soon as I got there.

Kucinich on C-SPAN 1 RIGHT NOW.

Says he- this resolution is based on a lie. The war was based on a lie. If it was wrong to go into Iraq in the first place, it is wrong to stay.

Go Dennis.

OMG- he was only on for like 3 minutes! WTF?

Okie-doke, ofg! They’re in transit right now, but soon’s I hear from Mary, I’ll give her a heads-up about you. Her husband is less into political stuff, but I’m pretty sure you three will find each other welcome company.

You were a playwright in a former life, eh? Mary used to love performing in the S. Florida papers’ annual “Yellow Feather” revue razzing the local pols and such as Roxie Pulitzer. Hmmmm . . .

I would like to see janes, christy’s and emptywheels take on the investigation being closed down speculation according to that article

Off to work now. Later

New article by john Pilger up on Information Clearing House. Pretty important reading IMHO
/www.informationclearinghouse.info/article13627.htm

How ironic this is, considering that the rise of Hamas was due in no small part to the secret support it received from Israel, which, with the US and Britain, wanted Islamists to undermine secular Arabism and its “moderate” dreams of freedom. Hamas refused to play this Machiavellian game and in the face of Israeli assaults maintained a ceasefire for 18 months. The objective of the Israeli attack on the beach at Gaza was clearly to sabotage the ceasefire. This is a time-honoured tactic.

Now, state terror in the form of a medieval siege is to be applied to the most vulnerable. For the Palestinians, a war against their children is hardly new. A 2004 field study published in the British Medical Journal reported that, in the previous four years, “Two-thirds of the 621 children . . . killed [by the Israelis] at checkpoints . . . on the way to school, in their homes, died from small arms fire, directed in over half the cases to the head, neck and chest – the sniper’s wound.” A quarter of Palestinian infants under the age of five are acutely or chronically malnourished. The Israeli wall “will isolate 97 primary health clinics and 11 hospitals from the populations they serve.”

Two points:

Jane, Obviously I did not attend YKos in person. Nonetheless, between the CSPAN and the live blogging I felt like I was following it in real time.

The FDL community attended AS A COMMUNITY, and you and Christy and Pach and all the commentors who wore out their batteries sending e-postcards back from the frontlines did that for all of us.

Thnak you all.

Lotus,

I left a post over at TNH for Marcy (thereby outing myself to her as well)

I think maybe the Rove thing, all the things, may come down to one thing:

GREYMAIL

I think our boy probably does have solid cases for all kinds of nifty things, but public corruption cases ARE DIFFERENT.

Judges treat them diffrently, juries treat them diffrently.

I know, I have done them.

I think the problem is not “can he make a winnable case?”

I think the problem is “Can he meet his discovery obligations for the crimes he would otherwise charge?”

Up until he annonced the indictment of Irving, I was fairly convinced that he would not indict anybody (because like most folks, I was fixated on the outing of Plame) b/c it would be SOOOO easy fir the WH to stop him in his trcks by claiming National Security and Executive Priveledge.

When he came up with the lying to the FBI thing, I was blown away by the sheer elegance of his KISS(Keep it simpple stupid) solution.

I suspect that after reviewing Walton’s decisions and having done all the exhaustive research into discovery law needed to fend off the Well’s motions, that he has not found a set of facts that he can charge that will not trigger a discovery obligation that he cannot meet. Not meeting his discovery obligation=dismissal of case (probably with prejudice, which means you can never try again).

In chess, this would equal being in check.

I’m with Jane though, it ain’t checkmate, until Fitz says it is checkmate.

This also means that the pressure on Irving just increased by several orders of magnitude, b/c he may end up bearing the whole brunt of it. At sentencing, you get to “prove” a whole bunch of stuff you never put in the indictment and it can really ratchet up you sentencing guidleines calculation.

emptywheel, are you still here?

N E W . T H R E A D

Hi, lhp! I like your analysis — check, maybe; checkmate, probably a leap too far; in any case, Scoots more pressured than ever.

And hey, that low typo-quotient suggest you must be feeling better — yippee!

What I was going to ask EW, I’ll ask you: isn’t it about time for Monday’s transcript to emerge? What particulars might you be especially watching for in it?

This is worth saying, if it hasn’t been articulated elsewhere already:

(But first, let me say that I burn with jealousy that I wasn’t able to attend YK.)

The coolest thing about FDL, DKos and the whole netroots community is that one doesn’t have to attend such gatherings as YK to be equally plugged in, to participate in discussions, to get to know other participants, and to help contribute to taking our country back.

I love the internet age!

Sorry I didn’t get to see Skippy’s hot blonde friend, though…

PS: It was Woody Guthrie who inscribed “This machine kills fascists” on his guitar. His buddy Pete Seeger’s response was to write, on his banjo, “This machine surrounds hate and forces it to surrender.” He must have written small letters.

Jane, et al, keep up the good work!

I know there is a new thread and all, but I just have to address this statement.

“Hitch doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy to write a column about giving head.”

No way would Hitch write about giving head (or fallatio for that matter), only about GETTING some.

Asshole!

Some lingering images: London Yankee and her kilt-wearing companion. Brains everywhere. Stirling Newberry, Geek God.

Late to late night – does that make me early?

I came away from the conference with several impressions. First and foremeost is that we are in good hands and the potential this movement has shown us CAN be realized. The folks who organized the conference were amazing and the panels and workshops were informative and intelligent. I wish there had been more about economics; I think that’s going to bite us in the ass the hardest, soonest. They have so screwed things up I amost don’t want a Dem at the helm as everything explodes. The organizational skills in evidence at the conference gives me great hope that this momentum won’t slip through our fingers.

Second impression: This is a bunch of serious people. That’s a very good thing, we’ll need the gravitas. We have in place the skeleton of our machine – at FDL, DKos, The Next Hurrah – to help us strategize and coordinate message, etc. There are ideas everywhere you look, good ones. It’s not just bitching, as They accuse.

Third – I’m not sure I’ve ever felt so comfortable in a crowd of 1200 strangers, except they weren’t strangers. I felt like I knew these people and of course some of them, I did. But initially, before I met our peeps, I had the crazy idea y’all could have been not just anyone but everyone. Our sense of community was instantaneous, intimate and complete. People talked in the halls, the presenters mingled with and disappeared into the crowds, not into the green room.

In short, it’s a great start. My enthusiasm is strong, you guys help keep it bubbling.

And OT but really bugging me – did you see Mehlman on Daily Show? The sight of him snickering through the Republican talking points made me physically ill. They really do think this is all a big yuck, he knows it’s bullshit.

op99 sed: And Jane’s “I’m the girl” remark was spot on, too; other than the Plame panel.

The only other panel that was almost gender balanced was the Failure of Conservative Economics one. Two -count ‘em, two – smart women on that one.

As one unable to attend YKos, I still felt as thoigh I was there.

This past weekend I was transported %u2014 first by technology, as C-SPAN and the blogs allowed me to vicariously attend YKOS-1, and by memory, which took me back to the national emergence of the anti-war movement in 1967-68. The tools today are different, with email, blogs, and truly “public service” television replacing the teach-ins, underground newspapers, coffee houses and word of mouth we relied on to spread the truth about government’s misdeeds in the Sixties. The availability, reach and, most of all, the interactive nature of today’s communications modes place them a power of ten beyond what we had during the last Civil Rights-Illegal War era. Although the means have changed, the spirit is the same %u2014 ordinary citizens, armed with truths about the atrocities perpetrated in their name by the government, rise up to effect change, not for personal gain or position, but to return our society to its founding principles, “that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom %u2014 and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Jane Hamsher doesn’t get that other people might have different impressions or feelings than her own. Big surprise there.

Ghostman, dear, the laptop is the new notebook, not a sign of nerdy geekiness. The people you saw were taking notes or communicating with others (like here on FDL) who couldn’t be there in person, or maybe doing google searches about something a panelist mentioned. Try one, you might like it. Much more verstile than a cell phone ;)

Oilfieldguy 233 – well, the plauwright thing explains why you are so articulate. I wish I’d gotten to spend more time with you in Vegas. Do you ever come to LA on your trips? Come visit if you do.

For those of you who don’t want the netroots to get too cozy with politicians – this is politics, pure and simple. Maybe the political fight of our century. Get as close to them as you can and whisper in their ears. Keep whispering, it’s getting louder.

didn’t attend but just wanted to say that redd getting a hug from joe wilson brought tears to my eyes…

Well Bushtit, we don’t have to agree with your damn opinion either.

Ykos was very interesting and it was great to be able to follow it from home. What I enjoyed most of all wasn’t just the Air America streaming, nor the C-Span, it was the people who took the tidbits of time to post comments and write about it or upload a quick pic to share what they could, many borrowing someone else’s laptop to do all that.

Those were the real gems and what gave us here a sense of closeness of our whole netroots communities being there with you in spirit, in many ways.

Bushtit 260, Why exactly do you think JH solicited others’ impressions of their YK experience if she “didn’t get” that they might be different than her own?

As one who was there, both Jane and Kid Oakland are right. Both of them had a different experience from most participants, because they were both in the “celebrity/opinion leader” class–they are both prominent, easily recognized bloggers.

Kid Oakland is absolutely correct that the MyDD caucus was an abberation — unlike most of the breakout room panels, it was mobbed, mobbed by the press. There were about 10-20 reporters in a room that fit about 80. Most panels and discussions had zero reporters. Similarly it was disproportionately populated by political operatives, that is, the contingent of the blogosphere that work professionally on campaigns. That’s just the kind of site MyDD is. It was very different from all the other caucuses, which actually seemed like caucuses.

Furthermore, and maybe Jane didn’t realize it, but she actually was at a semi-private invitation-only shmoozing event for the elite at one point during the event.

That said, her comments about the essential egalitarian nature of Yearly Kos are absolutely true.

No one person got the full event, in the same way that no one person can understand the Internet.

I can see how people would think this was a press event considering the omnipresent cameras of all shapes, sizes and impressiveness as well as microphones and reporters notebooks. I even got to wear a John Fund/Wall Street Journal Press badge on Sunday since he didn’t show up and there it was, sitting right in front of me in the reg booth. I have no will power…

But, despite this array of electronics, most people were laughing their asses off at them. There we were, watching them watch us. I mean, folks, they came to see us, we didn’t go to see them. Same goes with all the pols. They wined and dined us in spectacular fashion and after burping and saying thank you, we went back to doing what we do best: arguing, learning, laughing, agitating.

I wish we could do this every week.

Joe Wilson is hot. Jane is hot. Dan Froomkin has a great smile. Kos looks 13. I have never looked 13. Sigh. I hate him.

calvin suggests that the kos community (and FDLers) is/are just that and not a large group of robots programmed in the same way. Jane goes about things in her own way. Arianna has her “thing.” We validate and celebrate those things which we believe have merit. There is not a single road but rather a system of roads which will lead to taking back the keys to the kingdom. All of us will do what we feel comfortable doing and, perhaps, this time around, some things which may not be.

Since Jane brought it up, calvin has a question (and answer) for her. calvin thinks it is something that we can all relate to. What is the biggest organ of sexuality?

The brain.

Right on, Calvin. That was the sexiest part of the weekend for me, the Big Brains.

I was not able to go to YearlyKos, but in the lead up to the convention, for so many reasons, I wanted to go desparately …
I thought it would be a seminal meeting of new progressive thinking. I thought that a movement would be borne there that would have the huge potential of the brainpower and the passion of the people I read on a half-dozen or more sites every day. I thought– this is the moment when it will all come together, and it will be the beginning of a big change.
Then as I read about the convention itself, I was glad I had not gone. It seemed to be– as this post says– about something else all together — about the politicians lined up for endorsements and the media coverage– even about the big name panels. I was glad I had missed it.
Perhaps we are past the beginning I had envisioned. I had thought that the politicians were coming to participate, not to ask for endorsements.
I don’t know, what would have happened with just bloggers — no press and no endorsement-seekers present– or is it really past time for that?

Part II of my post.
Well, rethinking my last post, I see that the presence of the Press and the Candidates at Yearly Kos means something positive — not something negative.
It means that the netroots are much further along in making an impression on the country, in having an effect on the outcome of elections, on influencing the media to pay attention, than we thought. On the one hand, we knew that, but on another we weren’t claiming it yet, in quite that way, if that makes sense to anyone.
And so our job is to begin to think of ourselves differently, and to own the successes that you pioneers have earned us by your very hard work and determination.
It’s a sort of where-do-we-go-from-here? moment. To grow it out in different ways, and to continue with the same enthusiasm and truth that you folks started –

It seemed to be%u2013 as this post says%u2013 about something else all together %u2014 about the politicians lined up for endorsements and the media coverage%u2013 even about the big name panels.

sandra y, didn’t seem like that on the ground there. In fact, check the on-site blogger reaction to Warner, Boxer’s faux pas, some of Harry Reid, etc., and you can see that if they didn’t have the goods, they got slammed hard online in real time. The same skepticism and critical thinking that we apply to “our” politicians every other day of the year was alive and well in Las Vegas.

Geez, remind me not to put hyphens and quotation marks in italics!

sandra y 269

“It seemed to be [dot dot dot] about the politicians lined up for endorsements and the media coverage [dot dot dot] even about the big name panels. I was glad I had missed it.”

I did not see any politicians seeking endorsements. Boxer and Reid are not running for anything other than, perhaps, re-election, and most of the crowd was not from their home states (maybe not as true in the case of Reid). Warner is very openly running for president, and he did wine and dine us, but my sense was that he was not pandering to us; he knew much of the crowd would not agree with him on all the issues, he just wanted a fair shot at being considered.

And there was nothing remotely resembling any effort to secure an endorsement of any kind from the convention as a whole. Markos, in introducing Warner, made it explicitly clear that he was not endorsing or asking us to endorse Warner, but appreciated Warner’s early commitment to attend YKos and that he thought it was good for us to have an opportunity to meet candidates.

The whole event was unlike any political convention I have ever attended in the sense that there was no voting, for a platform or resolutions or a straw presidential poll. I thought Reid and Boxer were there to reach out to the blogosphere and let us know they respect us, not for any personal electoral agenda.

As for the media, I happen to be a graduate student in journalism as well as a longtime political activist and a blog reader, and I found the chemistry of those three elements invigorating.

There is no question that blogs are a form of news media, and becoming a more important one all the time, as this conference demonstrated.

I welcomed the chance to listen to someone like Jay Rosen, a well-known professor of journalism as well as a blogger, or Dan Froomkin and Murray Waas, two outstanding political journalists. I didn’t sense that the conference was primarily about media coverage (although that was welcome), but rather about an exchange of ideas about the media and the role that blogs play as a part of the media.

I’m glad I was able to go.

I had a post today on dailykos called “yearlykos statistics” which I spent about 10 or 11 hours on (why? why?)that looked at blogging on clark, warner, vilsack and richardson at Yearlykos. I used technorati to assemble statistics and categorize them. There were many posts passing around quotes about how important bloggers were. There were only six fairly decent posts on the substance of what two of these men who may be our next president had to say. Clark and Warner got three each, nothing of note for Richardson, and if the mainstream media hadn’t quoted Vilsack talking about the importance of bloggers, he’d have been pretty much invisible.

My experience (as someone who registered for YK while on my second tour in Kuwait last year) was one of profound and estatic joy!
I reg’ed with DKos about a year or so ago and quickly became a regular lurker. After being deployed to Kuwait for the 2nd time, I tended to spend a LOT of time reading and learning about who this incredible group of people were.
Scientists, mothers, laborers, teachers, the whole scope of humanity.
I wanted to meet you.
I wanted to see that you were real.
I wanted to party with you!

Well….who knew what would happen.

As Susie and I stood at the hotel check-in desk waiting for our room at one of the many windows in the lobby, i looked over to my right and noticed one of the many orange necklaces hanging from the neck of an “ordinary fellow”. I idly asked him where the reg desk was for YK.
He immediately introduced himself.
“Hi, I’m Steven Darksyde..”
Ga..ga…ga.. I was helped along by Susie who blurted out “He’s one of your biggest fans!!!”
Well.. I had to admit I really enjoyed what he wrote , but was immediatly struck by the fact that here was just “another guy that blogs”.
So, we get on the elevator after checking in and who gets on with us?
teacherken…..
I’m sure I was the deer in the headlights….

i hit the wrong button………..
So the whole conference was like that……
orange clouds 115, MSOC (man that woman can party), devilstower, Sterling Newberry, Jerome a Paris, Matt Stoller, David Sirota, George Lakoff, Paul Rieckhoff, Sam Sedar……..

As I said so often: YK will never be like this again……..

catherineD 274
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