We were having what seemed like a typical RCAC meeting tonight, with a few long-winded discussions about neighborhood events and Raleigh’s UDO. We were already running past our usual adjournment time when Dwayne Patterson of Community Services made a wonderful comment.
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Politics
Politics
There are 1,050 posts filed in Politics (this is page 50 of 105).
Recycled recognition
Remember last year when BusinessWeek.com named Raleigh the number one city in the nation? I sure do. I chuckled when BusinessWeek lauded our city for its wonderful pedestrian mall, even though the mall was ripped out in 2006.
I chuckled again today when a number of folks passed this same article around on Facebook, apparently thinking Raleigh had won two years in a row. Hey, our city gets so many accolades, it’s hard to keep up with them, right?
Launch of TV News Search & Borrow with 350,000 Broadcasts | Internet Archive Blogs
For a while now I’ve wanted to build a search engine that would index TV shows by the shows’ closed-captioning transcript. Now I don’t have to, because the Internet Archive (www.archive.org) has built it for me!
The Internet Archives TV News Search & Borrow is amazing! It’s a catalog of news video which is searchable by keyword. Now anyone can do the video research that the wizards to on shows like The Daily Show do, right from their own desks. Obama made a speech about indefinite detention? Find it in seconds. Want to see Romney mixing up Randy Owens of Alabama with Lynard Skynard? A few clicks and it’s in front of you.
Give it a try and see for yourselves. It’s addicting.
Today the Internet Archive launches TV News Search & Borrow. This service is designed to help engaged citizens better understand the issues and candidates in the 2012 U.S. elections by allowing them to search closed captioning transcripts to borrow relevant television news programs.
The Internet Archive works to preserve the published works of humankind. Inspired by Vanderbilt University’s Television News Archive project, the Internet Archive collects and preserves television news. Like library collections of books and newspapers, this accessible archive of TV news enables anyone to reference and compare statements from this influential medium.
via Launch of TV News Search & Borrow with 350,000 Broadcasts | Internet Archive Blogs.
MiniVAN and canvassing
I did a little canvassing today on behalf of Obama. When I was handed the usual walk lists for the work, I remarked that the campaign has a smartphone app for this kind of thing, called MiniVAN. In a few minutes, the canvassers had downloaded their walk lists to their phones and were ready to canvass. I was amazed at how much more efficient this app made canvassing.
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Chief Dolan retiring
The first time I met retiring Chief Harry Dolan was the night of December 4th, 2007. The 32nd Raleigh City Council had just been sworn in at Memorial Auditorium and a young Travis and I were there. After the short ceremony, we both wandered through the hall only to come across a police officer as friendly as he was tall. Dolan warmly introduced himself to me and to Travis, kneeling down to talk to my son at his level.
Those two minutes told me all I needed to know about Raleigh’s new police chief: Dolan was going to engage the public, and kids mean a lot to him.
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Does Romney have a better Facebook strategy than Obama?
Inside Facebook points to Romney’s Facebook ad campaign as the reason Romney’s page has gained so many likes. Left unexplored by Inside Facebook are the widespread reports that many of Romney’s Facebook page fans were put there without their permission. It’s one thing if Romney wants to build a social following by earning fans, it’s another when he cheats by hacking others’ Facebook accounts.
Republican candidate Mitt Romney is leading President Barack Obama in Facebook engagement and new Likes, in part because of a strong social ad campaign that takes advantage of the latest opportunities on Facebook.
via Does Romney have a better Facebook strategy than Obama?.
Why Rahm Emanuel and The New York Times are wrong about teacher evaluation – The Washington Post
The Washington Post deconstructs why standardized testingis bad for education.
I’ve often wondered why politicians have felt the need to meddle with education when few or none of them are education experts.
The Times can say that using standardized test scores to evaluate teachers is a sensible policy and Obama can say it and Education Secretary Arne Duncan can say it and Emanuel can say it and so can Bill Gates (who has spent hundreds of millions of dollars to develop it) and governors and mayor from both parties, and heck, anybody can go ahead and shout it out as loud as they can.
It doesn’t make it true.
Reelected by acclamation
I found out at this morning’s Parks board planning meeting that I was the only candidate for Parks board chair and the current vice-chair Kimberley Siran was the only candidate for vice-chair. We’re thus going to be reelected by acclamation at the upcoming Parks board election.
In addition, on September 4th the Raleigh City Council reappointed me for another two-year term on the board.
I’m grateful for the trust of my fellow Parks board members and that of the City Council. It’s an honor and a privilege to serve!
The Kerry-ization of Mitt Romney – POLITICO.com
Wow. This Politico article is pretty damning of Romney’s stance on military issues.
“A presidential election is ultimately a character test,” a top GOP strategist said. “This speaks to the credibility and plausibility of being commander in chief, and any candidate for president has to get over that hump. [Romney] looks tone deaf. Everyone is in the faux outrage business. But this time, people are actually offended. He offended military families in some crucial states.”
via The Kerry-ization of Mitt Romney – Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei – POLITICO.com.
Romney rips off Obama website
Whoops! I guess Romney’s team has no original ideas.
After months of telling Democrats that they didn’t build that, the charge may be ironically accurate when it comes to Mitt Romney’s website. The Romney campaign’s “victory wallet” donation page bears a striking resemblance to the Obama campaign’s “quick donate” page. The Obama campaign published its in March and Romney’s site went up in late August.