Friday, June 09, 2006

Yearly Kos

I thought I might go; circumstances intervened.

There’s plenty of coverage. One organizer put the ratio of conference-goers to reporters at eight to one. Judd reviews the reviewers and concludes:

So far what they’ve discovered hasn’t been earth shattering: 1) many liberal bloggers don’t fit into the stereotypes the media has created, 2) liberal bloggers are respected (and feared) by politicians, and 3) liberal bloggers disagree about stuff. Check your local paper for more breaking news.

SEE ALSO: YearlyKos.org

LATER: Markos was great on Meet the Press:

There’s this perception of bloggers as being these anti-social people, typing away at keyboards in their parents’ basement. And I think what we’ve seen is that actually the people who read these blogs are a real cross section of the Democratic Party, a real cross section of America...We have people on the left, the center, the right and everything in between and up and down the party spectrum.

Video. Transcript.

Kissing cops

My parents have an apartment in Sunrise, FL. I find it hard to believe the police force there worked together to thwart the antigay marriage types. But that’s the story they’re telling:

A Florida religious group is crying constitutional foul after they say members of the Sunrise Police Department tried to stop them in their petition efforts for an anti-gay marriage amendment.

The Religious group Florida Family Policy Council says they paid to have a booth at the Promise Keepers Conference on June 3rd to collect signatures for their Florida4Marriage petition. The group is hoping to put an amendment on the November 2008 ballot, banning gay marriage in Florida.

However, a leader for the group says their efforts were cut short by Sgt. Stephen Allen and other officers from the Sunrise Police Department., who told them they would be arrested if they did not remove the petition. They also claim two of the male officers mocked volunteers by kissing each other after removing petitions from the area.

Circumcision as gay cure???

Worried grandma:

Dear Abby:

I have reason to believe that a young man in my family may be gay (he is 15).

I have been thinking a lot about it lately, and have been wondering if circumcision would cure it. What do you think?

GRANDMOTHER in Missouri

Dear Missouri Grandmother:

Homosexuality is not an illness, and therefore there is no need for a “cure.” I predict that your family will be happier if you accept your relative exactly the way he is, love him, support him, and stop trying to think of ways to cure him.

P.S. Circumcision is a sacred rite of the Jewish religion. If your theory were valid, then there would be no Jewish homosexuals. And yet, among the successful, gay, Jewish men who are “out” are Harvey Fierstein, Michael Feinstein, Barney Frank, Isaac Mizrahi and David Geffen - to name a few.

Dear Abby, you’re my hero!

Strange clocks

Tech Blog has a feature on the top ten strangest clocks. I guess I’m not big on clocks; I can’t even say I have a favorite.

But it does afford me an excuse to share this student video from my recent trip. Those town square clocks in cities across Europe are all the tourist rage. Not among my students…

Picture permits

On my recent trip abroad I noted that we had to pay for picture permits in order to take snapshots inside some of the castles and cathedrals we visited. Much as I might not like it, it’s not surprising to read that:

Under a new policy that began May 15, the Park Service is requiring a payment of $50 to $250 from groups that hire commercial photographers to snap pictures at some of the 390 monuments, parks and historic sites it oversees. The cost depends on the size of the group.

The fees are being charged at some of the busiest Park Service sites in the Washington, D.C., area and at the Grand Canyon in Arizona. Other heavily used sites include the Statue of Liberty, Alaska’s Denali National Park and Preserve, Big Bend National Park in Texas, and Yellowstone National Park.

The European permits were for amateur photographers.  won’t be surprised when that happens here.