I just got a phone call from my father. He's a wonderful man, but as a small business owner he's been a solid GOP voter for as long as I've been alive. I remember having intensely heated arguments with him after the 2000 election -- screaming, swearing, slamming down the phone arguments. I remember sitting in the car with him shaking my head and grinding my teeth as he explained to me in 1996 that, as a 19 year old newly minted voter, it was my duty to vote Bill Clinton out of office to help keep the family business strong. I just got another heated call from my old man. He's fired up and ready to vote for Obama.

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Watching the media coverage of Obama and McCain this month has been interesting, to say the least. While the millions (and millions) of talking heads talked about how crippling a gaffe by Obama on this trip would be, they've passed on numerous gaffes by McCain. These ranged from silly mental errors that were clearly comical misstatements (the "bottled hot water to babies" type) to factual errors on substantive issues (Anbar and the surge) to things sort of in the middle (Iraq-Pakistan border, in response to a question about Afghanistan).

In fact, the overall tone of the coverage has been a little like a Little League game where an overmatched team is down by 12 and the ump is trying to cushion the loss a little. Widen the strike zone a little for their pitcher, ignore the first baseman's foot being a little off the bag, call something foul instead of fair, that sort of thing.

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Earlier I wrote a piece exposing Edwards history for promoting more labor arbitraging guest worker Visas, yet in a recent NPR debate he sounds like he might be realizing Americans are being displaced, or at least is feeling the heat.  

This is a good thing, certainly most of Edwards positions are more in line with working America (see Clinton on H-1B and yes Obama is about as bad).

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I'm in Lawrence Kansas, and I participated last night in a panel called "Blog to the Chief" with some other bloggers, including mcjoan of Daily Kos.  It was an hour and a half discussion of what impact blogging has made and will make on politics. I usually come away from these events having sat on a panel of people that are also progressive bloggers, but with 3 conservatives on the panel as well, the different attitudes toward blogging became noticeable. We focus on the building of movement, particularly through becoming more localized. The conservative focus has been on integrating with the other parts of the Republican machine to push the traditional media narrative in a partisan battle. Progressives, wanting to get the movement moving, get involved with community blogs through commenting and writing diaries. Conservatives go out and create their own blog, with an individual voice that adds their own voice. Of course the dynamic at work, of community and individuality, is not surprising given its prominance in American politics.

The other thing that became evident during the discussion, regarding the Presidential campaigns, is that none of us expect much by the '08 contenders in regards to either campaign blogs or their blogging. There is an expectation of blogger outreach, and interacting with the existing blog communities, but a campaign is just not going to be able to compete with community blogs that have been longer standing and represent a more authentic interaction. Dean's Blog For America was the first successful campaign blog, and maybe the last (a Barack Obama's social networking site is not going to replace, or even compete, with Facebook). I just don't see interesting blogging happening from within a campaign, and certainly that's the lesson from the Edwards bloggers debacle.

I say this with one caveat. If a candidate blogged, that might be interesting, but it's not practical give the verbal habit of politicians-- they don't write much at all. However, if any of the candidates take up reality-based vlogging on a daily basis, and it's real, it is going to be a sensation. But which campaign is going to devote the resources to having a video person on the road, a video person in house, and a high-level staffer responsible for daily oversight?  That's no small devotion of campaign resources. But the point is, blogging on behalf of a candidate is just not compelling. If a candidate wants to use this medium to reach people, they are going to have to figure out how to do it themselves.

The discussion at the Dole Institute for Politics was filmed by C-SPAN, though I don't know when it's planned to air. Before the event, we were given a tour of the archives where everything of Bob Dole's (he has over 50 ceramic/plastic/metal/whatever elephants) is stored. Dole is probably the accomplished non-President in recent history. Looking back over Dole's life, I was moved by his overcoming battle wounds from Italy, where my grandfather also fought during WWII. Reading about his recovery, and then his political climb (and looking at all the political memorabilia), was fascinating.

The news today in Kansas is that the State Board of Education once again changed the science standards. The raging debate is over whether there is a "controversy" regarding evolution. The new board voted 6-4, with 4 moderate Republicans joining 2 Democrats to defeat the conservatives, and remove the language that suggested evolutionary concepts such as a common origin for all life on earth and change in species creating new ones were controversial. Whew, progress!

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