Saturday, September 06, 2008

More Blog Updates and Business

Yes, I'm still tinkering.

I've modified my links on the side to create an Election 2008 section. The first set of links there are to my local SD Democrats Site to keep track of local races, the ActBlue California page for donations, Wes Clark's Securing America PAC site, and The Democratic Daily for Democratic News.

The next clump are polling and election sites. 270 to Win leads off, and then the Gallup Key Indicators page. This is far more interesting than their plain daily tracking poll because these offer longitudinal reports of key indicators allowing trends to be tracked. They have an interesting mix of reports. SUSA is next because of the range and depth of their surveying and then Quinnipiac, which does some of the best polls out there, but tend to be limited in the number they do. Rasmussen is in there since many people follow it, but their data isn't that useful. The NYT page has an engaging mix of maps. Pollster is there as a poll aggregation site. They pick up polls from less well known operations.

The Hillary sites are in their own section now. I moved my Contact link into the About area. Warning to people who email me directly - I ignore almost everything sent in. Sorry, I have a life. If you want to advance your latest conspiracy theory, tell me how much I suck, tell me how much Palin/Obama/McCain/Biden/Hillary sucks, pass on unfounded rumors, ask me for links/posts/money, or otherwise be a self-centered git, don't waste the effort.

Comments - The comments are getting pretty repetitive now, so most get deleted. Don't forward links from sites linked in my sidebar. Don't tell me how awful [insert candidate name here] is unless you can tie this in a relevant way to Democratic Party policies and goals. Ditto on telling me how wonderful [insert candidate name here] is. Comments that try to bully me for whatever reason are deleted. Comments that try to play "gotcha" by taking a point out of context suffer the same fate. Comments that even hint of sexism, racism, classism, ageism, etc., get deleted. Comments in ALL CAPS WITH LOTS OF !!!! go bye-bye. Comments demanding I take sides in the perpetual tit-for-tat blogger bitchfests get deleted. Sometimes I just delete comments because a bunch have backed up and I'm too tired to go through them all. Comments that have something in them that make me go, "Hmm, OK, I can see your point," even if I don't agree with them have a pretty good chance of getting published. Comments that say nice things about other commenters I try to pass on. Anything marked not for publication will be respected. Regular commenters get a little more leeway than new posters, but not much.

Why do I have links in my blogroll of sites I disagree with or who refuse to link to me? Because I think they say things that need to be heard, even if I find the message disagreeable or at odds with my opinions. Why don't I have links in my blogroll of sites that are in accord with me? Because they don't say things in a way that engages me. Or maybe I'm just too lazy to clean up the link list one way or the other. Or I like messing with people's minds. Or I don't really have a reason, the links are just there. Click, read and make up your own mind.

Anglachel

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the 2008 links especially for the San Diego one. As a graduate student at UCSD (in the middle ages), I lived in SD for severals years. Also, my youngest son is a labor organizer in SD and he tells me about the different council candidates he supports and help organize. He also helps run the Manchester Hyatt boycott.

"Or I like messing with people's minds." I don't believe you; it's way too simple for you.