Motley Moose – Archive

This is partly a diary to celebrate the survival of the Moose over the dangerous last few months while Sarah Palin was circling in a helicopter with her telescopic rifle, and also a summary of a talk I will be doing on Thursday November 20th, at a plenary session that will start at about 10 a.m EST and last for an hour and a half.

The Conference is called No Frontiers? Free Speech and the Internet and is hosted by English PEN, the 21st Century Trust, and is being covered by The Guardian in its Comment is Free section. My specific talk is: Crashing The Sweetiegate – how online forums and political advocacy could transform the political sphere

For my fellow Moosers, the title (suggested by the organisers) is self explanatory, and some of you will be familiar with basic argument from my Flaming for Obama piece in Prospect Magazine last month, which drew an unexpectedly benign response from the proprietor of MYDD.

But here I’m inviting you all to show how the liberal blogosphere works, and respond in real time, or whatever time you choose, to the basic points with critiques, thoughts, flames or fail cartoons.  

No point trying to avoid the obvious. Several of the most recent diaries here have actually become intense and fascinating debates about the legacy of sexism after the election.

Above is a word cloud of the debate so far – around 4pm EST 15th Nov.

Good morning/afternoon/evening, my fellow Mooses! Sricki here, welcome to her sentimental rant.  Okay, so I posted some of this in a comment and it was so long I thought I might as well just ramble in a diary.

This election saved my sanity.

No, really.

That is not an exaggeration.

Yes, yes, I know it’s probably only early evening over there, but it’s early morning here so I get a  pass.

Two things for your delectation. How great to see Hillary on the campaign trail. I’ve missed her. A lot.

And she comes out swinging in a vibrant bold attack on the years of Republican mismanagement

“Make no mistake about it. We’ve done it before and we will do it again. America will once again rise from the ashes of the Bushes.”

America can rise indeed. Especially with Hillary on the stump. Inspiring stuff. But it won’t rise with ‘post turtle’ Sarah Palin.

So hands up. Who remembers what a Post Turtle is?

It’s out. On popular request I’m letting you all know my ‘Journal of the Flame Wars’ has now been published in Prospect Magazine .

As with all such articles, they get cut for length, subbed and simplified, and this is even more true in a British publication where the Netroots has to be explained as Blogosphere 101. There are a lot of things – a history of snark, mentions of other bloggers that have been cut because of length and complexity.

Sorry guys. I tried to mention a lot of you. But the editors found it confusing. It really needs a longer piece to get the whole story. Maybe I should write a book

I hope you enjoy despite this. In the fierce urgency of defeating McCain Palin, I don’t want to reignite any unnecessary and ancient flame wars, so the only two issues I want to comment on are these…

There’s been a lot of noise this cycle about Senator Barack Obama’s purported “problem with women,” a talking point which gained popularity during his historic battle for the nomination against Senator Hillary Clinton. Though Obama’s numbers dipped slightly after the GOP convention, polls indicate he is trending upward again. Conventional wisdom among the talking heads and doomsday prophets is that Senator John McCain’s vice presidential pick Sarah Palin might prove capable of pulling Clinton’s female supporters away from Obama, but unfortunately for the McCain campaign, his choice of an unvetted, little-known woman governor for vice president was woefully transparent.