Coming home for the holidays allows me to catch up on what has been happening in my home state of Arkansas. Sometimes you find great things and other times you find idiotic actions like this couple in Huntsville. This greeted me in the morning paper and apparently has been an ongoing saga since the election. Granted Huntsville is not a big town with slightly more than 2,000 in the town. It's most famous resident was Orville Faubus who retired there after leaving office. It is in the NW corner of the state, known for being heavily Republican. It is also in Madison County which is next door to Fayetteville, Springdale and Rogers (yes, Wally World). The Faubus Motel is no longer owned by the Faubus family and they will not comment on the matter.
What I find most interesting in the article is how people in the state and throughout the South have rebranded the Confederate flag as a symbol for Christian values and the principles of our founding fathers. That has got to be the biggest crock I've ever heard. I don't care what they say, the flag is a thinly veiled front for a racist agenda. Others quoted in the article come from around the state and the South. Loy Mauch of Bismarck in southwest Arkansas claims "the Confederate flag is a symbol of America's Christian roots, from which he believes the nation has strayed."
If American foreign policy had a gift shop, what would it sell? America the Gift Shop is an installation project that reflects the current foreign policy in the fun-house mirror of American Commerce. My palette is the vernacular of retail. Once the sugar coating of the ordinary dissolves, we are left with the hard and uncomfortable truth about where we've been as a nation. We buy souvenirs at the end of a trip, to remind ourselves of the experience. What do we have to remind us of the events of the last eight years?
I encourage you to visit it; it's worth eight years of your time.
When Keith Olbermann needs someone to guest host on Countdown he will no longer be able to call on Rachel Maddow, because she will now be busy hosting her own show.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry (from left), U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, Vice President Dick Cheney, former Secretary of State James Baker III and former Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove attend a memorial service for former U.S. Ambassador Anne Armstrong. (August 15, 2008)
For those of you who have followed my twitter or facebook updates over the last week, you're aware that I have been a little distracted because my 11 year old cat, Catfish, has been sick. After spending four nights at Brykerwood Veterinary, she's back home but diagnosed with what appears to be early stages of Chronic Renal Failure. The kidneys will go in older cats so this isn't uncommon and for the cat, it's less about pain than a general loss of functioning and the will and ability to deal with it.
The good thing is it can at least be managed (not cured) so she has a change in diet, some food supplements, and then sub-cutaneous fluid injections which can be done manually at home (hence, why there is an IV bad hanging next to my desk in the video below).
I'm leaving for what has become my annual summer road trip. Previously, I've taken trips through the Mountain West to the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, the Tetons, and everywhere in between.
This year, I'll be driving west from Boston through upstate New York, Chicago, and the Black Hills of South Dakota. I'll take a trip to the great Native American monuments out there -- and the purposefuly grandiose Mount Rushmore that sits in the middle of all of them. From there, I'm off to Glacier National Park, where I'll camp and backpack for a week or so before heading slowly back through the midwest.
I hope to have some conversations with some Democrats as I travel through Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Montana -- and hopefully will be able to write some on-the-ground reports of how Obama is doing in those states.
I have a few posts that I've written that should appear in coming days. Otherwise, KT, Matt, David, Michael, Todd & Vince will continue with their incredible coverage and writing, and I'll be back in late August, fresh for the final few months of campaign season (and the start of another grad-school year).
Hope everyone gets a chance to take a break in August -- it's the last break we'll see until we have a Democrat President-Elect.
Readers expect front-page stories to speak directly and clearly about events and issues. Eliminating the possibility of misunderstanding from our work is a critical part of our daily newsroom routine. When we communicate in a way that could be misinterpreted, we fail to meet our standards.
Our front-page story Sunday about the Netroots Nation convention included doses of irony and exaggeration. It made assertions (that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi might find herself at home politically in Beijing, for example) and characterizations ("marauding liberals" was one) meant to amuse. For many readers, we failed.
In trying for a humorous take on the Netroots phenomenon without labeling it something other than a straightforward news story, we compromised our standards.
I appreciate the note, and I think a lot of readers will, too. It takes a lot of courage for a newspaper to talk about compromising their standards -- when credibility is the cornerstone for journalism (both in print and online).
The Statesman goofed and recognized their error. Good. Though, the story has apparently been deleted -- and can now only be found in their archives (which is not the normal timeline for their online stories). Learning from our mistakes is necessary, but trying to hide from them doesn't do anyone any good.
There's still more work to be done. I'll be writing more on that later this morning.
UPDATE:
Just read about all of this at "Editor & Publisher" -- the premiere journal that covers the newspaper industry. The article retraces much of what's gone on so far with the Statesman and this story -- it's worth a read for those who may think we've gone "over the top" on this:
The noose is more than just a piece of rope, it is a symbol. To some the noose is a symbol of execution; to African-Americans the noose is a symbol of terror. Louisiana and other states have taken steps and passed legislation to outlaw the use of the noose to incite terror. This is in the wake of the incident in Jena, Louisiana which sparked a debate in America about race and symbols.
Louisiana has passed legislation that makes hanging a noose, or an image of one, on another person's property or on public property with "the intent to intimidate" illegal and punishable by up to $5,000 and up to a year in prison.
There are those that voice opinions about the affect this law has on freedom of speech and the affect of the broadening definitions of terrorism.
Netroots Risingauthor Nate Wilcox has an interesting interview with Democratic consultant Kelly Fero that I recommend reading.
Most of the interview focuses on 2002, when Fero, a long-time ally of John Sharp, witnessed the beginnings of what would become the "Dream Team."
The way Fero tells the story makes it seem like the "Dream Team" wasn't so much about electing a full slate of Democrats as it was about electing one man in particular.
[Garry] Mauro lost by 19 points at the top of the ticket and the next race down was essentially a tie, showing that Perry wouldn’t have won without Bush’s big coattails. The thinking was in ‘02 who could we get at the top of the ticket who could fix that problem because Sharp wanted to run for Lt. Governor again. So after looking at demographics we thought how bout a well-funded Hispanic.
So we thought of Henry Cisneros. I’ll never forget that meeting. After the long pitch, Cisneros looked at Sharp and said, “Sharp, could I win?” and Sharp goes, “No, but I could” only partly tongue in cheek.
Fero is also pretty hard on Tony Sanchez's campaign, who spent $87 million and didn't have much to show for it.
... I got a call from Hidalgo County in the final days before the election saying that the field program that we were hearing about for months amounted to kids standing in medians holding up Sanchez signs. Another person working for the Sanchez campaign told me that the day after the election he tried to return $80,000 in cash to the campaign and they wouldn’t take it. So he bought a new car.
In the end the NASA like command and control center turned out to be a typical street money in south Texas operation. We could’ve run a campaign like that for slightly less than $87 million.
