Because bloggers are so adowable. We can't possibly be a threat to the status quo, right?

I like to think this LOL Cats picture sums up my attitude toward special interests.


more animals

Well, my usual level of organization pays off.

Due to an annoying computer crash, I failed to get my application to get into Big Tent Denver. My pass as a speaker for Common Cause only covers me for tomorrow. My alternate arrangement has run into a bit of difficulty. And, of course, such is my fame among the progressive blogger community that no one here knows who the $@! I am or why they should care.

I had hoped to take Henry Cohen up on his offer to see the wireless microphones for the convention in action. Alas, the DNC convention is locked down like a drum, and Henry — despite massive efforts — could not get me in today to see the tech operations. The DNC and RNC conventions have got to be like the superbowl for wireless microphones, so this is also rather disappointing.

So I am sitting in a delightful bookstore/coffee house down the block from Big Tent, contemplating wandering over to the main convention to see if protesters are using sophisticated technologies to outwit security --or not. I will confess that despite news stories of tight security, I was able to drive past the convention center this morning no problem.

If all else fails, I will spend a pleasant day in Denver and can catch up on some other work and various blog things.

UPDATE: Thanks to the amazing work of Katie Flemming at Common Cause Colorodo, I am now inside with a pass.

Stay tuned . . . .

For anyone who cares, I will be in Denver next week, but not for the Democratic National Convention (although I wouldn't say no if someone wanted to slip me a pass — hint, hint). I will be attending the Big Tent event for bloggers, progressives, and anyone else who cares to wonder over and see what the changing face of online politics looks like. The event is running in parallel with the Democratic Convention, with significant overlap, although not actually part of it and far enough away geographically to be separate and distinct. I shall leave it to the reader to draw his or her own meaning from this.

Still, the hope is that the Big Tent event will attract significant cross over from the convention. On Tuesday, in conjunction with Common Cause Colorado, there will be a symposium on media issues and all that policy stuff I do over in my day job at Media Access Project. If you're there, you can catch me speaking on media ownership and its impact on diversity in the afternoon, and/or my colleague at MAP, Parul Desai, talking on network neutrality. In the morning there will be a bunch of other speakers, including FCC Commissioner Jonathon Adelstein, so it should be fun.

Anyway, if you see me out there, feel free to come up and say hi.

Stay tuned . . . .

As regular readers know, I frequently deride those who continue to put their faith in a creed of deregulation despite empirical evidence that this is not suitable to all occasions as worshipers of of the “gods of the marketplace,” after the Rudyard Kipling Poem The Gods of the Copybook Heading (with a fine sense of irony that Kipling would be closer ideologically to the folks I criticize). This leads some to imagine that I am “anti-market” or “pro-regulation” or some other ideology that places process over outcome, rather than a pragmatic sort who believes that the job of public policy is to use all available tools to achieve the goals of prmoting the general welfare, securing domestic tranquility, etc., etc.

I recently came across an illustration of the difference in, of all cases, a collection of Darwin Award Winners (Darwin Awards Iv: Intelligent Design for anyone that cares). The book contains the tale of a “winner” who was a passionate anti-government type who refused to wear a seat belt in protest against mandatory seat belt laws. A car he was in in skidded and flipped over. The the driver and one passenger who were wearing seat belts survived. Our protesting friend was thrown from the car and died.

It occurred to me that this story nicely illustrates the difference between those who favor a free market approach and worshipers of the Gods of the Marketplace. A smart Libertarian may believe that the government has no right to order people to wear seat belts. But, evaluating all the evidence of how seat belts save lives, will voluntarily wear a seat belt even if not required. After all, it would be foolish to put one's life at risk simply because the government wrongly orders people to do what you think makes good sense.

But an ideological driven soul, indifferent to empirical evidence and elevating process over substance, refuses to wear a seat belt because the government says you should, and therefore wearing a seat belt must be the wrong or inefficient result and believes it the positive duty of all anti-government believers to refuse to wear seat belts.

Now go read the dissenting statements of McDowell and Tate in the Comcast decision, the McCain Tech Policy, or any of a dozen or so speeches by elected representatives or pundits who get their economic education from reciting bumper stickers about free market economics they don't understand. Then ask yourself, are these guys actually evaluating the evidence and accepting the result? Or are they driving with their seat belts off?

Stay tuned . . . .