Tea Parties using Web 2.0 to organize, expand.

Yes, I used “Web 2.0” to describe something. Sue me.

[UPDATE]: Welcome, Instapundit readers. I do actually have a suggested link for you, this time: a little project that you may or may not find amusing…

Instapundit linked to an article about the Tea Parties, and the tech that they’re using:

Anti-stimulus tea parties light up Twitter, YouTube, Flickr and social media

In the latest example of how user-produced media can capture so-called “massively-shared” events in a way mainstream media can’t, a wave of images, blog posts and videos from a nationwide protest has been washing across the Web. The protests, dubbed “tea parties” by participants, were held Friday in several U.S. cities including Portland and Washington, D.C. as a response to what demonstrators see as unfettered spending and encroaching government as represented by President Obama’s economic recovery plans.

[snip]

Though even a year ago it would’ve been a slow and difficult process to chronicle a widely scattered protest such as this, the online community is now mastering the art of high-speed media sharing, a trend that can unite geographically disparate communities via the Web. Much of the sharing is now facilitated by the fast-growing messaging site Twitter, where today the keyword “teaparty” was one of the most frequently used terms. Users sent out a flurry of updates about attendance, links to photos on Flickr and Photobucket, and videos on YouTube and other sites.

The protests appeared to be rather small and did not attract much coverage in the mainstream new media. But interested observers had a remote window into the activities taking place in cities such as Tulsa, Okla., Austin, Texas, Nashville, Chicago, Lansing, Mich., Houston, Hartford, Conn., and Los Angeles, where a group that gathered this morning on the Santa Monica pier. (This blog reports that, as a part of that action, former “Saturday Night Live” actor Victoria Jackson read the definition of “socialism”).

Continue reading Tea Parties using Web 2.0 to organize, expand.

A roundup of today’s Tea Parties.

“Of what use is a baby?”

Glenn Reynolds has two very large links (here and here [the latter being the main page; the link’s goofed up for some reason]). See also Hot Air, Michelle Malkin, the Repurblican, Gateway Pundit, GayPatriot, Riehl World View, Ace of Spades, and a whole bunch of others for details. The biggest one was in St Louis, with about a thousand on hand; I’m going to guess that they probably broke ten thousand nationwide. Not bad for a movement two weeks old, and made up of a bunch of people who all work for a living.

At least, it’s not bad today. Clearly, now that we’re starting to understand the operating principles, the next wave of these are going to have to kick it up a notch…
Continue reading A roundup of today’s Tea Parties.

Turns out that the DABA thing…

…was a parody after all. For those who don’t remember, DABA was Dating a Banker Anonymous, which purported to be the blog of a bunch of women who were having to deal with the horrors of being involved with men who suddenly weren’t rich. I mentioned it here and here, which is one reason why I’m bringing it up again now; there may be somebody who cares enough to appreciate the correction.

The other reason?
Aretha, of course.

Hey, I put up Donna Summer the last time.  Fair’s fair.

Moe Lane

PS: Just in case she ever reads this: madam, my wife loved your hat.

Crossposted to RedState.

Meet Charles Djou (likely R, HI-01).

090225_djonHe’s already filed to run for the House seat on the Republican side. Charles is a Honolulu City Councilman, Army Reserve officer, and law professor; plugged into Facebook and MySpace; decently sound on the issues; and is apparently already endorsed by Gov. Lingle and the Hawaii GOP (H/T: BackyardConservative). Cook currently ranks it as D+7; but both Bush and Lingle did well in the district.

And, most importantly, fairly solid speculation has it that current incumbent Neil Abercrombie will be running for Governor next year.  Even if he doesn’t get the nomination for that, Abercrombie’s focus will be elsewhere, and Djou’s actually doing well in fundraising so far.  So keep an eye on this race; and if you’re a Republican from Hawaii, I suggest that you think about helping out with either time or money.

Because every Congressional race counts.

Crossposted to RedState.

Monsters vs. Aliens.

OK, is it too much to ask that Hollywood just give me things like this?

Monsters vs. Aliens, coming out March 27th.

I do not think that it is very unreasonable of me to ask that the entertainment industry provide us with more things that, well, entertain. It goes like this: you give me something that I am willing to spend ten bucks to go see, and I give you ten bucks. Brilliant in its simplicity, no?

Send Congress a copy of ‘How much is a million?’

How Much Is a Million? Only seven bucks, and goodness knows that it’s written at a level that even our most egregious Democratic spending artists will be able to comprehend by… the second or third reading, tops.

Congressional addresses here; Senatorial ones here; and, of course, the President lives at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue (zip code is 20500, which is… odd, when you think about it. 00001 would have been cooler). Pat Cleary had this idea first, and I am so totally down with passing it along…

Crossposted at RedState.

Shorter Chas Freeman: the rabble at Tiananmen Square weren’t suppressed *enough*.

No, really.

NO. REALLY.

But I want to take issue with what I assume, perhaps incorrectly, to be yoiur citation of the conventional wisdom about the 6/4 [or Tiananmen] incident. I find the dominant view in China about this very plausible, i.e. that the truly unforgivable mistake of the Chinese authorities was the failure to intervene on a timely basis to nip the demonstrations in the bud, rather than — as would have been both wise and efficacious — to intervene with force when all other measures had failed to restore domestic tranquility to Beijing and other major urban centers in China. In this optic, the Politburo’s response to the mob scene at “Tian’anmen” stands as a monument to overly cautious behavior on the part of the leadership, not as an example of rash action.

Via Doubleplusundead, who I think is as appalled as I am. Freeman goes on to slam the Bonus Army of 1932 and endorse Hoover’s suppression of it, which is certainly an… interesting position for a Democratic politician to take. Although not as interesting as calling the deliberate murder of almost a thousand civilians as the “dilatory tactics of appeasement.” Where does President Obama keep finding these people?

Moe Lane

Crossposted at RedState.

K Street is adapting perfectly well to a Democratic-controlled government.

“There is no question that it has been our most productive period since the election since we have been in practice,” said Rich Gold, head of the public policy group for Holland & Knight.

They’re apparently loving it, in fact.

K Street rebounds as many firms sign clients at fast pace

K Street’s economy appears to be on the rebound as a number of firms are reporting a sharp increase in new clients, a trend lobbyists attributed to the new president’s far-reaching agenda.

The combination of a deepening recession and the distraction of the 2008 campaign, which kept Congress out of session for much of the latter half of last year, were blamed for pushing lobbying revenues down in 2008.

Since Nov. 4, however, several top firms have signed new clients at a pace exceeding the growth periods that followed previous election cycles. Lobbyists credited the recently passed stimulus package and anticipated policy fights touching on the energy, healthcare and financial-services sectors for the uptick.

Continue reading K Street is adapting perfectly well to a Democratic-controlled government.

A ‘doctrinal shift’ in the works for the GOP.

Like Gateway Pundit, I didn’t think Bobby Jindal’s speech was bad*, but this DC Examiner article by Byron York is still of interest:

“A Major Doctrinal Shift for Republicans” I just got off the phone with a very plugged-in Republican strategist who told me that Republican reaction to President Obama’s speech, which the party will roll out in the next few days, will mark the beginning of a new GOP approach to opposing the president’s initiatives. (No, Bobby Jindal’s ineffective response was not part of that new approach — everyone seems a little embarrassed about that.) The Republican leadership in the House has concluded that in the stimulus debate, the GOP succeeded in dominating a number of news cycles but failed to score any points on actual policy. That, the leaders believe, has got to change. “You’re seeing a major doctrinal shift in how Republicans are going to focus all these debates,” the strategist told me. “The key is to focus on winning the issue as opposed to winning the political moment. If you win the issue, people will think you are ready to govern.” [snip] Just a few weeks ago, House Republicans cheered and high-fived each other for unanimously opposing the stimulus. Now, having realized they won the soundbite contest but lost the war, they don’t want to talk about it. That is a major shift indeed.

Continue reading A ‘doctrinal shift’ in the works for the GOP.