Suggestion for the 2014 Republican Party Advertising

by Nomad

I thought I would offer this early suggestion for campaign advertising for the 2014 mid-terms. Looks like the Republican Party is going to need every bit of help it can get.

Feel free to copy and paste or link this image wherever you like.

Consider this post and open thread.

Riding the Rails and Ryan's Return to Failed Policies of the Past

by Nomad

While scouring the Internet for anything and everything, I found this extraordinary PBS documentary online called Riding the Rails. Here's a description of this independently produced feature length film.

At the height of the Great Depression, more than a quarter million teenagers were living on the road in America, many criss-crossing the country by illegally hopping freight trains. This film tells the story of ten of these teenage hobos -- from the reasons they left home to what they experienced -- all within the context of depression-era America.

If you have some free time, I invite you to watch. I haven't finished the whole thing yet but just listening to these stories of people at their lowest points (but who somehow survived) is truly inspiring.

Privacy Laws and Citizen Journalism: ACORN and Romney's 47% Speech

by Nomad

I wanted to take a moment to follow up on a post I recently wrote on James O'Keefe III and the ACORN scandal.

In a somewhat related story, CBS has reported details about that notorious secret recording of Mitt Romney last year. The controversial video became known as the "47%" speech.

As it turns out, the recorder of that video was not a reporter (even self-designated like O'Keefe) but a bartender who worked at the site in Florida where the speech was given. 

In the speech he told his audience of wealthy campaign contributors that 47% of the population would never vote for him. That percentage of the population was politically unimportant to him. 

"My job is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them that they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives."

On the surface, he had a point. And the results of the election confirmed it. The problem was the background to those remarks, who spoke them and to whom they were addressed. These factors behind his speech accounted for in the decline in his popularity of the candidate. He was none to popular in the first place.

I saw one comment that interested me since I had recently investigated the James O'Keefe case in which he was sued by a former ACORN employee for recording him without permission.

The comment  points out that since O'Keefe was arrested on Invasion of Privacy Laws, the law should apply to the bartender as well. The comment reads:

This guy should be brought up on charges for filming someone without there knowledge. If the Acorn fiasco taught us anything, it was that it was illegal to film anyone without there knowledge. Then the people in power get a video that was to there advantage and the rule dosnt [sic] apply. Figure that. Illegal is only illegal when? The line is getting pretty blurry.

It's a valid argument and something that troubled me when I wrote the post.