Latest '08 Presidential Candidate Poll Results

Matt Towery of Insider Advantage’s Southern Political Report (who has yet to get the Share Your New Media memo and continues to employ un-embeddable video on his site. Heck, he’s yet to get any sharing media memo as there are ZERO sharing tools on the site from what I can tell) has the latest and greatest data on how the ‘08 Presidential candidates are playing down south… and elsewhere.

Matt’s poll results, and fabulous preacher-man hairdo, are here. Good news for Edwards and Thompson somewhere in there. Clinton and Giuliani strong, strong, stong in FL and SC.

Deeper analysis of I Know What Fred Did At The Debate Last Night is here. But I’m addicted to these gosh darn wacky webcasts. There’s something so ______________ about them. Fill in the blank with YOUR bons motes and priceless feedback.

NOTE: This post cross-posted at PP too.

Mommy Look! A Fred-head!

Nice Ride!

From the James Marlow For Congress blog:

(Athens) Standing before a group of Tenth District voters and members of the Georgia press corps today, James Marlow offered Jim Whitehead a free ride to a meaningful debate anywhere in the district. In the past week alone, Whitehead skipped two significant debates - the Athens Press Club debate on June 6 and the Atlanta Press Club/Georgia Public Broadcasting debate yesterday.

Who's says politics cain't be funny?!

Old Media Noticing New Media In Georgia Politics

(This post cross-posted at Peach Pundit too.)

With the 10th Congressional being one of the few political shows in town, in the country for that matter, won’t be long before Big Media notices all our Little Media efforts here in Georgia, just as the Athens Banner-Herald has. Especially if Marlow makes it to a runoff on June 19th. Then the big guys will be all over us, trust me, because we can then, and only then, say that New Media is likely impacting the political process in the Peach State. Likely.

I caution anyone to use extreme caution when believing a word out of a political advisor’s mouth right now about new media. Not only do they tend not have a clue about new media as a whole, they don’t have a clue about the impact of new media on voter behavior. So when people make statements like this from the OnlineAthens story:

Unless a (newspaper) story’s written about it, the people viewing it (an online video) probably know how they’re going to vote anyway,” (Emil) Runge said.

…trust that they’re pulling statements out of their as* book of facts.

No one, at this point in time, has a clue whether a “traditional” print story about a YouTube video will impact voter behavior or not. Just as no one has a clue whether watching a YouTube video will translate into feet to the polls. There simply is no data right now to support any kind of “new media” political reality.

Let’s hope that some of our fine Georgia (national?) pollsters will seize the momentum of this special election on June 19th to get out there and gather us up some good, hard data on whether or not “new media” influenced not only:

a.) how people voted.
b.) But also did new kinds of media get folks off their butts and actually out of the house to vote at all?

In the meantime, don’t believe any hype coming from “traditional” campaigns on any side about what the Internet vs. traditional media will or will not do for them. They simply don’t know. Anyone trying to dazzle you with statements about the impact of any kind of media on politics right now is simply flying by the seat of their (old media advice) pants.

Georgia Dems Meet New Media

The Georgia Democratic Party's annual Jefferson-Jackson dinner was a place to not only see John Edwards' hairdo up close and personal, it was also the place to find out just how Georgia politicians are using social media.

Let The Great SC Dissing Begin

Trust the NYT's Alessandra Stanley to fire an opening shot at my ye 'olde home state. As if I could possibly have expected otherwise. I've been totally intimidated, dissed too, by seemingly scores of Ivy League women, given my dubious education credentials and pronounced accent.

It's really rather pathetic, in a Bridget Jones way. Those Ivy Leaguers of all genders could be so haughty and dismissive, and just kinda mean-girl when we used to rub shoulders in network news.

Then again, I could always drink their lipflapping, snotty, privileged, toned butts way under the table... in my day of course. And dissing SC is my territory, Alessandra. Not yours. Nobody really can do it better, if I do say so myself.

Least I can still go out drinking here in Georgia with whomever, wearing whatever, whenever I damn well feel like it, wearing only a comforter and a push-up bra maybe! Lord knows what the women of Iran won't be allowed to do next. This is sickening here. Just sickening. It knots my stomach in a billion different ways for the hell it implies. No need to wonder why I have always been an unapologetic feminist.

Bombing back to the stone age to free women from religious, nonsensical oppression? Sounds plausible, initially; but if I was for that, we'd have to start here in Georgia, given our own religion-inspired nonsensical legislation.

One other thing before you run away... congratulations to Mara Shalhoup at Creative Loafing for her Best Journalist in Atlanta award last night at the APC awards gala. She really deserves that recognition for being the hardest working, lowest-paid reporter in this city. I hope the NYT comes a'callin' for her kinda talent soon.

Sigh... I fear a total Bridget Jones kinda afternoon coming-on here for real. Bloggers must have so many self-esteem issues. Sigh... Know what could really pick me up though? Anyone got ANY good gossip from last night's APC soiree? Did anything remotely resembling monkey biz transpire without me there to blog it? Come on. The SGR needs some good 'ole schadenfreude-dirt right about now.

Careful What You Ask For -- #872

While surely the best of the political editorialista we have going in Georgia, I must take exception, as does Panda's Keeper, to Bill Shipp praising Maynard Jackson's backroom wheelings and dealings to get South Carolina on the early Presidential primary map. I wonder how Maynard could seriously have felt that South Carolina had much to offer (other than George W. Bush) to the future of the American political process?

But hey, I'm only from S.C. What would I know about who really runs the show 'round there? (Hint: it's certainly not African-American Democrats, most of whom live pretty darn meagerly, and at the very bottom of virtually any national ranking -- be it economics, education, health, etc. So do most of the the white folk, for that matter. Not a power to be reckoned with, needless to say. But you don't need me to tell you that.)

Republicans love 'em a good & paranoid, white, under-educated, manipulatable (is that even a word?) voter base though! How do you think we got all up in the W mess we're in now? Not without SC to get us there in the first place.


HT: PS

Nothing "Natural" on DNR Board

Let's count the envionmentalists on Georgia's DNR board!

If you can't find any here, then try counting the builders and developers instead. You'll find that more fruitful. Heck, there are two more dentists on the board than people who seek to protect our natural resources. What's with that? Might have to have one of my cellular chats with those dudes too, just for grins... and blogging purposes of course.

And of course, being a polite Southern lady, I'll be sure to invite them to the party for Upper Chattahoochee Riverkeeper on May 10th!


CITIZEN JOURNALISM MOMENT: Help me call some of these fine folks on the DNR board and invite them to River Revival!

A list of contact info for these folk is here. Another citizen journalism bonus point to see if any of these are also lobbyists.


DNR BOARD MEMBERS AND OCCUPATIONS
Per AJC, Oct 2006

William "Bill" Archer III, Lake Burton
Retired Georgia Power executive vice president; working as a consultant for the utility company on a three-year contract through 2009.

Earl Barrs, Cochran
Owner of Knapp-Barrs & Associates Inc., a Macon timberland management and investment company; also owns other land investment companies.

Jenny Lynn Bradley, Savannah
Community volunteer and former vice president of the Garden Club of America.

Warren Budd, Newnan
New York Life insurance agent.

William A. Carruth, Dallas
President of Aiken Grading Co., a land grading operation; also owns land development companies.

Cader Cox, Camilla
CEO of Riverview Plantation Inc., a quail hunting plantation on the Flint River; also owns a vegetable and timber farm.

Walter Hudson, Douglasville
President of Exxell Developers Inc. and Land Sales Inc., real estate development companies.

Mabel C. Jenkins, Millen
Retired.

Phyllis T. Johnson, Hazlehurst
Co-owner of Thompson Hardwoods Inc., lumber and wood products manufacturer.

Bob Rutland, Covington
Chairman and part owner of Allied Holdings Inc., a Decatur car-hauling business.

Loyce W. Turner, Valdosta
Former state senator, retired veterinarian, retired banker, farmer; runs a family foundation.

James W. Tysinger, Atlanta
Former state senator, retired sales industrial engineer from Westinghouse Electric Corp.

James Walters, Gainesville
President and CEO of James A. Walters Management Co. Inc., which provides management services for consumer finance companies. Managing partner of Walters Income Properties, which owns and manages commercial and office buildings, and shopping centers.

Tom Wheeler, Atlanta
Manager and principal owner of Wheeler/Kolb Co., a Duluth company that manages and leases shopping centers and office parks in the Southeast.


NEW MEMBERS SINCE OCTOBER 2006.
The following individuals replaced Sara Clark (Community Volunteer/League of Women Voters), Ralph Callaway (Callaway Gardens) and Jamie Reynolds (Developer):

Dr. David Allen, Atlanta (Oral surgeon)
Chair emeritus and founder, Oral Surgery Associates; Chair, Georgia Chamber of Commerce

Joe Hatfield, Baldwin
Chairman, Fieldale Farms Corporation

Dr. Gene Bishop, Dawsonville (Oral surgeon)
President, Health Service Centers


VACANT POSITION FOR GOVERNOR PERDUE TO FILL.
AT-LARGE BOARD SEAT PREVIOUSLY HELD BY SALLY BETHEA.

Shame, Sonny, shame. (All of the above are Governor appointees.)

I Know What Nancy Said

"But Mr. President, I've been reading the Spacey Gracey Review!"

Marlow In The NYT

Well, dang. A story about James Marlow's run for the 10th Congressional from Georgia is picked-up in the New York Times. And the dude's been on the campaign trail for what... about 24 hours now? He's already got a media buzz edge on any others out there, R or D.

I wonder what role technology will play to give Marlow the votes he needs to win? Since he actually knows how to turn on a computer, unlike most Georgia cracker politicians, chances are it will put him totally in the driver's seat for this interesting race.

Obama or Edwards? Look To Their Vids

Obama is as flimsy as a sugary confection. Just pumped up with pretty, lite, nothing much, generic rhetoric. "The Seinfeld Campaign"-- as this dude says here. Like some kinda "lifestyle coach"... whatever the f that is.

Now Edwards on the other hand, that dude can lay it out a lot thicker, richer, and deeper. Sign that damn union card! With a rebel yell almost. Watch here. (BONUS PRODUCTION NOTE: vid-bloggers, hear how critical good audio is to this otherwise very simple clip. It's the audio, stupid. Me being the biggest stupid with audio sometimes.)

And keep a bookmark on PrezVid, my guru Jarvis' pet political project. Yes, all media bloggers need a political project we can lean on. Marlow might just be the one for me.

Now of course I gotta go see this. Hate when I remind myself of oldies I (secretly) loved. Shhhh... don't tell. (And yeah, we used to actually dress like that. Some of us.)

Quick-Mix suggestion: Run the "Rebel Yell" track under the Edwards' union hall speech for an extra power hit.

Seeds and Stems

This is a funny, but not embedable, video: Condi Saves Harlem from Kim Jong-il, via MadTV.

And James Marlow, an acquaintance from the dot bomb days, says he's quitting his position as head of Yahoo! sales here in Atlanta, to become... a politician. Says James in this email message today:

Well, the time has come for the next great adventure. After six fantastic years with Yahoo! I am leaving to run for United States Congress in the special election to represent the 10th District of Georgia.

The 10th District in Northeast Georgia is where I grew up and I hope to have a chance to bring some new energy and fresh ideas to Washington D.C. While I’ve been interested in and involved with government and politics for quite a while, this will be my first run for elective office. Now is a time when our country needs people with experience outside politics and government to step up and try to help bring some new solutions to Washington.

Website for Marlow for the 10th to be up soon. (But dude, where's your YouTube announcement???) I can't endorse his candidacy, or not, as I know James only from Internet-related matters. I have no idea what his political inclinations may or may not be... at this point. What I do know is that Marlow's got to be 100% more on the ball than the Georgia Legislature peckerwoods another James is writing about today.

And finally, whew, some good news about politics and blogging from Jeff Jarvis:

Henry Copeland of Blogads asks the panel to speculate what the technology and moment and person will be that changes politics in this campaign. Armstrong says that someone will become the Walter Cronkite of online, mashing up video with a voice. (Joe) Trippi says that money will explode; within weeks hundreds of millions of dollars will come in from people. “It totally changes the entire game, the big money, the PACs don’t matter anymore… It’s gonna be like a flood.”

DeFeo agrees that the volume of contributors will explode. He says that we are still waiting for that moment to arrive when we declare that the internet has dethroned television in campaigns. He believes that this will actually be a series of moments that add up. Ruffini says that online video is meeting a new meet; in the last campaign, you had to be a big guy to post an online video. No more.

That post in full here. And screw all those SXSW poseurs. Instead, see you at PodCamp Atlanta!!!!!! Manuel's 7pm. Let the wild rumpus begin.

Because The Political Is Social

Seems Republicans have tried their best to ruin the social inherent in the political process (beats me why), so let's just put the social and the political right back where they belong - together at last!

Angela Trigg of Trigger ID has launched a killer social media site for ALL of us politically-minded bloggers and yappers around the South. Now this is my idea of money and time well spent.

What are you waiting for?!! Jump on in and join the (beta) political reindeer games at A Donkey and An Elephant Walk Into A Bar dot com. Meet you there!

Sorry Peach Pundit, AD&E has tons more bells and whistles. Was nice while it lasted though. I take only fond memories with me. (And yeah, that's a southern gal's kiss-off.)

Atlanta Woman Refused Emergency Contraception

The Super Christians are at it again. Yet another woman was once again refused emergency contraception, this time at an Atlanta Kroger. Kroger. Kroger. Kroger. What are we gonna do with you? NOT SHOP AT YOU that's what.

They'll be a NARAL-led press conference at the Capitol tomorrow with Dionne Vann, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Georgia and Carrie Baker, local resident who was refused Plan B® emergency contraception at Kroger. Press conference:

Friday, March 9 at 1:00 pm, Capital Plaza

(Washington Street side).

They (Vann and Baker) will announce the launch of a statewide “Emergency Contraception Education Campaign” and call on Kroger and other local pharmacies to stock EC and to ensure that women do not encounter delay or harassment at the pharmacy counter.

These women, and some Georgia Representatives who support a woman's right to choose (apparently there are at least two), will be there for this press conference. NARAL is reaching out to us as media. I appreciate that. Thus I'll sure try to get there. Would be nice to see some bloggers there. Male ones as well.

John Edwards Plays The Donald

...and gives bloggers a second chance. Did the un-fired gal bloggers cry their mascara off for the media too? Get to keep their bloggerati crowns? Have to go to re-hab? Maybe they should to help further any lingering campaign issues.

My my my. The boy Edwards' and his people have a spine! And they aren't afraid to flex it. I'm loving this. Chalk one up for those "liberal feminist blogger" types. (And Sara/James: you'd have sold us down the river pretty quick-like, eh? I'll remember that.) From today's NYT:

Mr. Edwards announced on Thursday, after 36 hours of deliberation, that he would keep on his campaign staff two liberal feminist bloggers with long cybertrails of incendiary comments on sex, religion and politics. Mr. Edwards could keep the women on his staff and have to answer for the sometimes vulgar and intemperate writings posted on their personal blogs before he hired them late last month. He could dismiss them and face a revolt in the liberal blogosphere, which is playing an increasingly influential role in Democratic politics and could be especially important to his populist campaign. Some bloggers saw the controversy as manufactured by conservative groups.

Most importantly:

He (Edwards) also said he would not allow his campaign to be “hijacked” by religious conservatives who had pointed out the bloggers’ most provocative comments and demanded their dismissal.

Well... back to the cauldron for me! Gotta go stir-up lots more "incendiary" comments on sex, religion and politics. There's a lucrative future in it now.

True Confession: I'm totally sucked into Anna Nicole Autopsy Watch. Yeah, so who's the media 'ho now?!

Political Role Play For Couples

This is priceless. Hilarious! But very Adults Only. Watch only with the kids not around and the sound up. Enjoy the screwing you're already getting!

Let's Conversation!

Settled For Cluelessness

Linda Hirshman, writing for the Washington Post, implies that most women, particularly married-with-kids ones, are politically clueless. Hell, essentially culturally clueless from what I can tell from this piece.

Way out here in Mommy Land, I can tell you -- she's right. I can't think of but a very few mom-women I know who are "up on" much of anything other than Brangelina, sales, food items, costuming, PTA, vaccinate or not, putting things in cutesy flower pots, American Idol, and whether their kids prefer Beefaroni or sushi. It's pitiful and sad, but true. I can't say I've discussed "what the hell is wrong with McCain" with any other moms. Should I even try? They'll just change the subject to stroller brands, or "have to run go get my kids" all of a sudden.

On the other hand, political astuteness isn't necessarily what I'm seeking from my friendships and alliances with other moms. That's what having super-smart and savvy men-friends is for, right? Here's a taste of what's bound to get any gender going:

A 36-year-old former financial sales executive considers herself an independent, reads only the Style and Weekend sections of The Post and the Marketplace and Personal Journal sections of the Wall Street Journal, and also counts on her husband, a Republican, to tell her what's interesting in the rest of the paper.

A former human rights activist told me that she still reads the New York Times, skims the Economist, and gathers political information from PBS's "News Hour," a local broadcast from the BBC and from her church.

Neither the former teacher nor the retired television reporter read any newspapers at all.

There are some constants. Most of the women read People and Real Simple magazines. They all listen to news on the car radio, mostly National Public Radio. And almost all their full-time working husbands consume immeasurably more political information than they do ("He reads 10 times what I do," one told me), reading news magazines and political Web sites and bringing home political information from their jobs. The women gather little information from their almost exclusively female society of other stay-at-home moms.

Full article here. They oughtta at least make time to scan the SGR, eh? But as one mom told me most gleefully the other day on the playground, as I was no doubt boring her to wandering-eye distraction with my own "something I read on a blog the other day" tales of deadly-boring astuteness (basic response of other moms: "what's a blog?"), "I just learned to cut and paste last week!" I had to turn my face away lest she saw my look of undiluted disgust.

So does this mean that the only reason I absorb politics is because I'm divorced and have no man around the house to tell me how to "feel" about it all? I'm going to go hurl now, because this reminds me of how I loath going out with married couples. (T&C not included!) It's always "we this" and "we that." There simply isn't individual thinking or feeling going on for much of anything - least not publicly, the little liars.

Hillary Is Just Alright By Me

I keep throwing it out and it just keeps coming right back like a mangy pup -- my Hillary-leaning that is. I've always liked her for her ill-concealed conservatism I suppose. Takes one to know one. From The Economist today:

The saner American left is at last waking up to the fact that Hillary was never the radical firebrand of conservative caricature. She has always been pro-business (her much demonised health-care reforms rejected the Canadian single-payer model and enjoyed the support of many businesses that were worried about escalating health care costs). She has always been deeply religious, and even contemplated becoming a Methodist minister. She supported welfare reform. If the right regards her as a Trojan horse for left-wing liberalism, the left regards her as a Trojan horse for corporate Clintonism.

Hillary-hatred is a double problem for the Republicans. It blinds them to Mrs Clinton's strengths: many Republicans live in such a conservative cocoon that they think no sensible American will ever vote for the she-devil. And it brings out everything that is most noxious and misogynistic about the right. Hillary-haters may look forward to reading Jonah Goldberg's forthcoming book, “Liberal Fascism: the Totalitarian Temptation from Mussolini to Hillary Clinton”, but most people just laugh. Hillary-haters may applaud when Jerry Falwell says that a Hillary candidacy would motivate his constituency more than Satan himself. Most people take it as a sign of derangement.

Yepper... or the "Psycho Christian Right", as termed by Peachtree Screed. Full article here. (So Erik at PP, you with me on this one? Heh heh.)

Woe To Ladies Who Lunch... and Blog

Wonder if W will divert a few of those "escalated" troops down South? I could use a few good men about right now. Woke up to the news that I'm being threatened by religious extremists. And I'm not even a Sunni! Just Episcopalian. And although I deeply appreciate Rusty and Doug blogging about it, would it not have been the White Knight kinda thing to actually pick-up the phone and call to let me know I was being threatened out there all alone in the wilds of the blogosphere? Typical ... none of 'em ever call. And I know their mommas raised them to do better.

I will alert the proper authorities -- the media. Then do lunch, of course. With my lawyer.