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Coverage from the Code Red Rally

admin — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 00:42:08 +0000

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to make it to the ‘Code Red Rally’ in Washington, DC today, however I have been following it closely. To help anyone looking for coverage of the event, I’ve put together a small archive of some of the coverage received. If you come across something that I’m missing, simply leave a link in the comments section and I’ll add it as soon as possible.

Links:

Politico: Tea Partiers rally: ‘Kill the bill’

Dakota Voice: Code Red Rally Today Against Gov’t Health Care

The Washington Independent: Nervous About Health Care, Tea Parties Look to 2010

Christian News Wire: Concerned Women for America Joins ‘Code Red’ Rally on Capitol Hill

Courthouse News Service: Right Wingers Dress in Red to Protest Bill

CNN Political Ticker: Dean: Time to ‘kill the Senate bill’

CBS News: Conservatives Rally to “Kill the Bill”

CNN Political Ticker: Conservative ‘Code Red rally’ hits the Hill

The Hill: Tea Party supporters, conservative groups rally outside Capitol

Video Coverage:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Photo Coverage:

Congressman Kingston Speaks at Code Red Rally

Congressman Jack Kingston (R-GA) looks on as Mr. William Temple of Brunswick, GA is interviewed by a correspondent from National Public Radio in Washington.

Code Red Protest in DC

Conservatives rallied in Washington Tuesday to show their opposition to Democrats' plans for health care reform. (Photo Credit: Getty Images)

(AP Photo/Lauren Victoria Burke)

Connecticut resident Tom Hill poses with a homemade sign. The other side featured a health care message for Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.). (Photo by David Weigel)

Video: UPS vs. FEDEX: Ultimate Whiteboard Remix

admin — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 15:00:59 +0000

Here is a great video from the creative geniuses at Reason TV.

“You may have heard the UPS is in quite the political fight with FEDEX. Though both are package-delivery companies, they’re governed by totally different federal labor rules. As a result, UPS’s workforce is much more heavily unionized than FEDEX’s—and more than twice as expensive.

So now UPS is trying to get FEDEX reclassified under federal law as a way of screwing a competitor. That’s horrendous, but it also makes a sick kind of business sense. And it also reveals the real villain: A government that is big enough to absolutely, positively guarantee it can screw any business. Overnight.

“UPS Vs. FEDEX” was produced by Meredith Bragg and Nick Gillespie (who also hosts). Approximately two minutes long.

This video is based on “Using Unions as Weapons,” by Mercatus Center economist Veronique de Rugy, which appeared in the October 2009 print edition of Reason. Read that article at http://reason.com/archives/2009/09/28…

For downloadable version of this and all other Reason.tv videos go to http://reason.tv“

Click here to view the embedded video.

SARAH INVICTUS: The Rise, Fall, and Rise Again of Sarah Palin.

J. Forrest Creecy — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 23:23:24 +0000

I was distraught and anxious in ways I couldn’t articulate. In some ways it was like a dream that wouldn’t end, not a nightmare per se, but not exactly a romp in the sheets with Megan Fox either. It was the discomfort of person well aware of the old adage that one should be careful of what they wish for. In their wisdom the ancients gave warning that many still fail to heed….Yes, I was watching the rise, fall, casting off, redemption of, implosion of and rebirth of the phenomenon that has become Sarah Palin. A year long agony that may never end.

Like pandora’s box I had helped unleash a pox (of sorts) upon the land. For before John McCain made his momentous decision I had been actively lobbying for Palin’s consideration as VP candidate. I wrote, I lobbied my friends and generally pined for an option that few took seriously and I wasn’t the only one. My logic was simple, she was new, she was fresh, she was a reformer and she was a MILF. What more could a public starved for heroes want (or junor officers looking for someone in their chain-of-command to fantasize about)? Of course, I knew that the selection of such a newcomer would come with a price of its own insofar as it would be necessary to continue the defining of Palin well after the fanfare of her entrance. History proved me correct as what followed the perfect introduction was the most imperfect handling of a candidate since Josef Stalin ran on the Green Soil ticket in 1896.

The weeks following the GOP convention were nothing short of a savaging so brutal that few could watch without feeling lurid, shameful and unclean. Distortions great and small abounded, and lies were treated as the gospel. The media whispered openly of salacious and pornographic fantasies so revolting that to replicate them here would send children, nuns, kittens, Mormons and people from Nebraska fleeing to the hills (well, not the Nebraskans, they have no hills). The press howled and leftists jeered and conservatives either rallied around the outraged woman or cast her off for the media wolves to feed on. In the end there was little more than a bloody stain of a candidate, a smear, little more than a caricature and Tina Fey’s well honed delivery. Thus ended Sarah…or did it? It wasn’t over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor and it certainly wasn’t over for Sarah either.

Flash forward a year. Far from being irrelevant Palin is now a force in her own right. A whirling dervish of political power and folksiness leaving destruction, puzzled pundits and insanely incontinent liberals in her wake. Palin rewrote the discourse on the proposed Obamacare overhaul with the infamous and pertinent “Death Panel” speech. She up-ended the special election in New York’s 23rd district (though not to the GOPs advantage). Her every action sees legions of would-be GOP nominees scurrying like rats to mimic her every move. In many ways she is the standard bearer and lightning rod that those seeking the Republican nomination must win over, or supplant, if they are to be successful.

With the publication of her autobiography,“Going Rogue,” Palin’s approval numbers now out-pace that of the Messiah Obama. Whereas the clueless and weak Dear One vacillates on Afghanistan, stumbles to and fro on Health Care and meekly watches as the world laughs at his personal diplomacy, appearances on Oprah and other high-profile shows have largely rehabilitated Palin’s image and have convinced many that she is not the monstrous jezzebel that the media had painted her as.

Once a joke, the thought of Palin running successfully in 2012 is no longer a laughing matter. At the very least, she will play the role of the ersatz king-maker for the GOP in 2012 and, perhaps, far beyond. Where the jackals once sneered and mocked her they now cower and urinate on themselves unsure of what they have done.

Indeed, the very process in which she had been destroyed, the unending and manic misogynistic attacks on her and her children, have strengthened her like the tempering of the blade of a samurai sword. Now rather than believing the attacks on her intelligence and character, more people than not see the media and the hateful Left as bullies, wilding a paragon of American womanhood whilst draped in the illusion feminist clothing. Finally good people everywhere have become sick to the stomach of the truly barbaric and savage attacks that have been par for the course regarding Palin. Robin of Berkeley, an avowed feminist and renounced liberal, writes:

“And so the Left must try to destroy her. And they are doing this in the most malicious of ways: by symbolically raping her…Liberals do this by calling her a c__t, ogling her legs, demeaning her with names like “slutty flight attendant” and “Trailer Park Barbie,” and exposing her flesh on the cover of Newsweek. And from Atlantic Magazine’s Andrew Sullivan “Sarah Palin’s vagina is the font of all evil in the galaxy.”

They say that hell hath no fury like a woman scorned…that is true, though they can now say that hell hath no fury than feminists turning on their own for the crime of ultimately rendering hollow their twisted view of what womanhood can and should be. Nothing so ugly, so rapacious and so vile ever made it more clear that the cretins on the far Left were far from being on the side of women.

Things change. What worked before will not again. Like Count Dooku after Master Yoda casually swatted aside his burst of force lightning in Star Wars Episode II, the bullies in the media are now at a loss as to how to proceed. The radical leftists and all efite, elitist liberal snobs everywhere are at loggerheads of how to treat this whirlwind. Where once they gloated over brie and anti-American slogans on the misery they had inflicted on Simple Sarah, Caribou Barbie of the North, they now quake at the juggernaut that they helped create. After all, how does one destroy a politician that has absorbed every projectile within the Left’s smarmy arsenal?

Only time will tell. She defies explanation. No other politician has ever been so defiled and yet managed to survive and in many ways propser. Some theorize that like all sensations, she will disappear, forgotten like so many Rueben Studdards. But then again, maybe not. After all, hasn’t her fifteen minutes run their course? Will there come a day when the Left rues the day they attacked and sexualized Palin’s minor children? Will there come a time when they regret the horrifically graphic and sexually disturbing slurs and barbs they once defamed her with? Will there be a reckoning when everyone that ever dimissed Sarah Palin as a slutty, trailer trash rube will realize they sowed the seeds of their own destruction? I gleefully await, as should all God fearing men and women, the day that providence punishes those savages in a manner best befitting their worst outrages by electing her President.

DC Tea Party Looking to be a Huge Success

DC Republican — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 15:07:14 +0000

h/t to Ms. Chandler Ramelli at ANotSoCapitolIdea.com for the info, and for helping put this together.

For those who will be in the DC area tomorrow (April 15) between 11am – 3pm, I strongly urge you to attend the DC Tea Party, which will be staged at Lafayette Square and outside of the United States Treasury (yes, we’re talking belly of the beast here).

Here is a partial list of speakers scheduled to be in attendance:

Princella Smith, American Solutions
Grover Norquist, Americans for Tax Reform
Tobin Smith, Fox News
Brian Johnson, Americans for Tax Reform
Alan Keyes, Activist
Mike Church, Mike Church Radio Show
Rachel Hoff, College Republicans
Tom Schatz, Citizens against Government Waste
Josh Bolin, Reagan.org

For those of you unfamiliar with Washington, DC, below is a simple GoogleMap that I put together to illustrate the area.

View DC Tea Party in a larger map

While there is ample parking in the area, I warn you, it’s never cheap, unless you get lucky and score a street spot (usually around the monuments).

Instead of risking a $20 parking tab, or ranging parking ticket fee, my suggestion would be to find parking somewhere in Northern Virginia and just take the Metro in.

The event (both Lafayette Square and the Treasury) are located within a few blocks of 5 different metro stations: Farragut North, Farragut West, McPherson Square, Metro Center and Federal Triangle.

If you’re coming from Northern Virginia, both the Orange Line and Blue Line will get you to the event without transferring. If you have to take the Yellow line, you’ll have to transfer at L’Enfant Plaza.

Don’t forget your signs!

Just how popular is TaxDayTeaParty.com?

DC Republican — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 00:15:36 +0000

There have been many on the left who have been diligently trying to discredit the rapidly growing Tea Party Movement as nothing more than a few angry activists.

Well, I guess in terms of web traffic, these few angry activists are more energized than the ever-so-famous Barack Obama army.

What this link shows is the increase in traffic rank, as calculated by Alexa.com.

Of course, any computer geek will quickly rush in and discredit Alexa’s ranking system. However, if you look at some of the other metrics presented here, TaxDayTeaParty.com comes up strong in every category, bringing to question the real power of the post-election Obama machine.

For those of you who don’t follow this stuff regularly and may be confused, let me just walk you through the more important metrics.

While traffic rank is an interesting number to follow, most techies are more concerned with things like pageviews, as shown on the “pageview” tab here.

Now Alexa doesn’t provide you with the exact number pageviews, but instead displays the data as a percentage of overall online activity.

Even so, TaxDayTeaParty.com comes out strong again.

Using another metric, bounce rate, you can easily see how engaging a particular website is. Basically, bounce rate represents nothing more than a percentage of people who come to a certain page on a site and then leave without clicking to other internal links. This metric is important because if a site has content that isn’t relevant or interesting, they’ll leave.

Looking at the two sties, TaxDayTeaParty.com wins another round. Since this metric is based on a percentage of those who exit the site, it’s better to have a lower a number, which TaxDayTeaParty.com does, with a bounce rate of around 35% versus Obama’s 45%.

Yet they’re still trying to discredit this movement?

While I could easily stop there, I might as well finish this out by examining the “Time on Site” numbers.

This metric is self explanatory, it represents the average amount of time visitors spend browsing a particular website. If you’re a web developer, this is an important metric because the time spent on site will often reflect the quality of your sites content, structure, and interactivity.

So looking at the two sites, once again TaxDayTeaParty.com is the victor, with an average time on site of just under 3 minutes, versus Obama’s, which is right around 1 minute and 30 seconds.

While it’s easy to understand why TaxDayTeaParty.com is doing better than the Obama site at present, it’s important to note that in the weeks following the election, everyone was worried about what Obama was going to do with his “massive grassroots army.”

While he may still have a massive email list and a flashy website, in terms of measured attention, it looks like it’s become a model that can be (and is being) replicated by other organizations and movements successfully.

Just for kicks, here is how TaxDayTeaParty.com does against other sites:

TaxDayTeaParty.com vs. MoveOn.org

Winner: TaxDayTeaParty.com

TaxDayTeaParty.com vs. Democrats.org

Winner: TaxDayTeaParty.com

TaxDayTeaParty.com vs. DailyKos.com

Winner: DailyKos.com (for now)

Is your tea party listed?

DC Republican — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 01:42:46 +0000

A few weeks ago I created a GoogleMap to help a few co-workers and myself keep up all the different tea parties happening around the country. At first, this was an extremely easy project to manage, however, as the momentum started to build, these tea parties spread like wildfire, as the map shows:
View Larger Map

Odds are there are dozens of events that we haven’t even heard about yet, and if that is the case, please leave the details in the comments section below, and I’ll make sure I get them posted ASAP.

Also, if you want to embed this map on your blog or website, here is the code:

View Larger Map

Special thanks to Brendan Steinhauser for helping keep this map up-to-date!

Proof we’re winning: Capitol Hill receiving more than 1 million emails per day

DC Republican — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 16:43:05 +0000

Here is an interesting article from NationalJournal.com that gives a small glimpse into the IT infrastructure currently being used by on Capitol Hill.

As a tech-geek, I’ll avoid going into total analytical nerd mode, however the very fact that National Journal was compelled to write an article titled “E-Mail Surge Forces Hill IT to Keep Up” is a testament to the hard work of activists across the country.

From the article:

“There were delays on inbound Internet traffic yesterday but, given the fact that we receive on average more than 1 million e-mails per day, our system is extremely reliable and interruptions/slowdowns are rare. The volume is constantly increasing and we continually review technology upgrades to deal with it,” Kyle Anderson said in a statement.

One million emails per day, that’s a force to be reckoned with.

What I find even more uplifting about that number is that Anderson says it’s continually on the rise, which leads me to believe that a big portion of this activity can be attributed to the long awaited coming of age (in a technological sense) of the conservative movement.

Now with conservatives having a powerful presence on sites like Facebook, Twitter, Ning, and various other social networking sites, it’s extremely easy to relay information that drives action.

What’s even more uplifting about all of this is that it’s not just Hill-targeted email traffic that is on the rise, it’s also overall web-traffic.

Check out this graph showing the monthly traffic numbers of the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate:

As the graph shows, December saw a decline in traffic, which is to be expected after a heated election with a lame-duck President.

However, what I find more remarkable is how quickly the level of traffic has picked up on the Hill. It’s often the case that after heated elections political apathy on both sides is a symptom that plagues even the most active politicos.

It looks like things are different now.

If political apathy can be avoided month-after-month between now and November 2010, I don’t see any reason why the Republicans in both the House and Senate wouldn’t gain (or at least keep) most of the contested seats.

NBC bans PETA Super Bowl ad. Is it too sexy?

DC Republican — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 20:04:29 +0000

It looks like the executives at NBC have deemed that the Super Bowl ad created by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), titled “Veggie Love,” was just too risque for its viewers.

Here is the video. You be the judge, is it too sexy?:

Click here to view the embedded video.

I’ve had a variety of opinions on this one, but after thinking about it for awhile, I’m set with the opinion that this ad is a bit over the top, even with every Super Bowl advertiser competing for the best ads. With that being said, I’m pretty sure that I’ve seen worse things than this on Saturday Night Live (also on NBC), but that’s amongst an audience that is expecting situations that are crude and/or questionable.

But let’s be realistic, I’m pretty sure that PETA knew this would happen in advance and are just milking (or soying?) the free media. Even though I wouldn’t call myself a PETA supporter, I think it’s a great marketing move.

Besides, if they really wanted to take things over the edge, they could have gotten even more creative with the vegetables.

Oh, ads like these:

‘Veggie Love’: PETA’s Banned Super Bowl Ad

and

‘Veggie Love’: PETA’s Banned Super Bowl Ad

and

‘Veggie Love’: PETA’s Banned Super Bowl Ad

and

‘Veggie Love’: PETA’s Banned Super Bowl Ad

Anyone think the right will ever have any organizations like this? I know they’ve had a great deal of success with this style of marketing with the Conservative Party in the UK, but I guess we’re too puritanical to try it here.

Taking The Air Out Of The Dirigible

J. Forrest Creecy — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 03:35:27 +0000

I was driving to the Shoppette to buy some booze. Hardin County, being the inexplicably dry, or “Clean” county that it is, often forces this inconvenience on me. This particular night the local AM station was re-running an episode of Rush Limbaugh from 21 JAN and tonight Rush was more bombastic than usual.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Following the inauguration Limbaugh took it upon himself to proclaim to the quivering, dejected GOP masses that HE was the only true Republican left and was destined to be the savior of the conservative movement in America. Not only did this clown make the scurrilous claim, but he went on about it for the next 15-20 minutes, or however long it took for me to purchase my badly needed medication. Before I entered the Shoppette he was grousing that he, El Rushbo, was the last line of defense against Obama’s impending holocaust. Already irritated at the painfully stupid assertion of a man who has never held any manner of public office or served his nation, I took my time in browsing the nibbles section and then took about 420 seconds to select and purchase the night’s bottled entertainment (Bacardi 151). As I climbed into my 2002 Stratus, the radio came back on, and to my distinct displeasure, the nit wit, the preening egotist, was still churlishly spouting his drivel.

The Hubris! The Delusion! The utter stupidity of it would boggle the mind of a lesser man, or even perhaps a smart ape. I don’t know what’s worse, the man actually believing he is some sort of paunchy, right-wing messiah, or that the ingrate ejaculated forth his incoherent self-importance for going on thirty minutes. It boggles the mind, how many times he man said I in a segment about someone else. It’s like listening to Bob Dole or Joe Biden on speed…

Perhaps there is nothing that Limbaugh can’t do. It would be worth a Euro to see a contest between Rush and Obama as to who could notionally fix more problems in this country through pure magic. No doubt in his mind Rush is already the savior of the United States, slayer of the vile Clintons and the despoiler of countless big busted models.

At times the man has a point insofar as he can, like any common five year old, point out the obvious. It does not take a genius, a Special Olympics athlete, or even a FSU graduate, to see that a majority of our fellow Americans may have checked their brains at the door when it comes to their dear Obama. However, all men have their limits and today I reached mine. At this moment I would, without any hesitation, punch that SOB straight in his pie hole just so that he would stop polluting the cosmos with his foul screed. I would enjoy it. I would savor it and recall it fondly for years to come as among the highest and best services ever rendered for mankind.

-JFC

2009 March for Life Swarms DC

DC Republican — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 15:46:46 +0000

On Thursday, nearly (possibly more than) 200,000 people flocked to Washington, DC for the 36th annual March for Life, which is held every year on January 23rd, the day a decision was granted in the Roe. v. Wade case.

Last year I saw some of the march and in terms of numbers, it was extremely impressive. While the 2008 march appeared to be successful, it’s quite clear that the 2009 march easily surpassed the bar set last year.

Not only was the weather better and the crowd larger this year, but it seemed that those in attendance were even more passionate than in previous years.

Of course, the timing couldn’t have been any better. This year’s march was less than 48 hours after the inauguration of Barack Obama, an openly pro-choice liberal who is seen as a major threat to the pro-life community.

I had the opportunity to sneak off to the March for Life rally and was able to get some great pictures capturing some of the energy surrounding this important segment of the conservative movement.

While I’m not usually a fan of single-issue voting blocks, I still find it extremely fascinating to see the energy people have for their issues. It’s tough to argue that this block doesn’t do an excellent job of getting their message across.

This picture was taken from the middle of the crowd.

March shot from 7th & Pennsylvania Ave

This guy doesn't mince words

Crossing Pennsylvania Ave.

These signs were everywhere

Clever sign

This is actually towards the end of the procession to the National Mall, just to give you an idea of the massive crowd.

Catholic Priest getting his message out to the media

Even the monks were live-blogging the event