Category Archives: Social media

livelikerick: In memory of Rick (RickCaffeinated) Stilwell

I had a meeting this morning with Chip Oglesby, who hosts this blog, and he happened to mention that he had set up a special Rally page to the memory of his fellow social media guru Rick Stilwell (better known to many as @RickCaffeinated), where folks can leave words of tribute, and also make contributions to help out his family. Chip said that last time he looked, there were about $2,500 in contributions.

Here’s the page. Here’s a comment that exemplifies what is found there:

A real superhero doesn’t wear a cape and “smash.” He is a warm and caring person who helps where help and encouragement where it is needed. Rick was a superhero to so many people and will forever be a champion of social media to all. May God hold you, Rick, in the palm of his hand forever, and may he provide comfort to your family now and always. #LiveLikeRick

I also notice that, on the day after he died, someone used his Twitter feed to share again something he wrote last year, headlined “Working Together,” about the social aspect of social media, and of life. It’s fairly communitarian stuff. An excerpt:

For the past few weeks, I’ve been noticing negativity more and more online. It’s been on Twitter, on Facebook, on Instagram even. And my first self-judgment is that I’m noticing it because it’s welling up in me more than normal, too. My own judgmentalism and negative reactions are leading to me noticing it more all over – so I’m to blame more than anything for the “noticing” part of the equation.

So hopefully it’s without pointing fingers that I am now looking at this from the perspective of relationships and being together in the good stuff of life. We cut each other off in negativity. I cut others off when I’m looking through mud-colored glasses. And we/I end up losing more than we gain when we/I do that. One of the areas we/I lose out on is working together, letting each other influence and impact the whole separately and collectively.

I guess it’s the knowledge that I’m not perfect and that I don’t know everything that leads me to want to get more cooks in the kitchen. I want to know what you think. I don’t want to miss out on your addition to our experience…

So this week, I’m looking for more ways to work together with those around me. Whether it’s in the office or in various extracurricular get-togethers, how can I be a part of something collaborative and more truly representative of everyone together? That’s what I want to be a part of. That’s some of the meaningful stuff that’s been missing in my own recent descent…

Sounds a lot like what I consider to be among the highest aims of this blog, when it is at its best.

Mia keeps up a steady fire on election fiasco

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We discussed this briefly on a previous post, but I thought I’d call attention to it more directly. Read this blog post from Mia McLeod:

Dumb and Dumber…

That’s obviously what they think you are. Otherwise, the Old Guard (a.k.a. “OG”) wouldn’t be brazen enough to “demote” and “promote” incompetence in the same breath. And all on your dime, too.

Let’s see…a newly created $75,000 taxpayer-funded position with a new title, less responsibility, same oversight (aren’t absentee ballots part of what got us here in the first place?) and absolutely no regard for your rights — particularly when it comes to restoring your confidence in our electoral process.

Even Attorney Hamm’s Investigative Report is of no consequence because it only confirms what we already knew. The election day disaster was directly caused by the Director’s actions, inactions and failure to lead. Those are the facts. But let’s not allow a few facts to get in the way, right?

Here’s the deal…the OG and our Governor have something in common. They’ll stop at nothing and spare no expense to get what they want. One of my previous e-blasts was entitled, “BAMN” or “by any means necessary.” It applied to our Governor’s actions then, and it certainly applies to the OG’s actions now.

And just in case you, like many others, mistakenly assumed that either of the former Director’s resignations might actually offer some semblance of accountability, albeit late…think again.

This sweet backroom deal has been in the works for weeks, but the OG needed a little more time to execute it. That’s why Rep. Rutherford messed up the original plan when he “outed” the first resignation before the OG was ready. After all, it takes time to appoint an interim OG director for the primary purpose of rehiring the former OG director. I know…it’s a hard job, but somebody has to do it. And neither the delegation nor the Elections Board has the legal authority.

Now that an interim director has been named and handsomely paid to rehire the former Director, the deal is almost complete. But to ensure that those of us who disagree are unable to dismantle their “master plan,” a few more things still need to happen:

The OG has to replace the vacated and/or expiring Elections Board seats with more OG members.

The OG has to also make sure one of their own remains in the position of Elections Director (on an interim or permanent basis).

The OG has to hold on to the position of Delegation Chair, so that the elections board appointments, as well as the director and (newly created) deputy director positions remain in tact.

So here’s where you come in. Since you’ve already been thrown into “the game,” it might be helpful for you to at least become familiar with the rules:

Rule #1 – The OG can make and change the rules at any time, for any reason.

Rule #2 – Actually, there’s no need for Rule #2 because you’ll rarely make it past Rule #1.

Obviously, you’ve elected us to represent your interests and your tax dollars are footing the bill for these expensive and unnecessary games we keep playing, but let’s not get too bogged down in those pesky little details, right?

The reality is…the OG cares much more about winning “the game” than they do about your rights, your representation or whether your confidence in the integrity of the process is restored. And why shouldn’t they? Earning your trust and respect really isn’t necessary, since you give it so freely anyway.

After all, “the game” protects their power. They’re the players who make the rules. Andyou…well, you’re the enablers who preserve their positions. Thanks to your unwavering support, they’ve been able to preserve and protect their own interests for all these years. Now that’s teamwork at its best. You pay.They play.

Oops…almost forgot. There’s one more rule, and it’s a doozie:

Rule # 3 – Voters…I mean enablers, get to change the players and the game every 2-4 years.

So in 2014, you can either cast a game-changing vote or leave Richland County’s future in the hands of the OG.

It’ll soon be game-day again. Next time, make it count…

Tavis said Mia was starting to lose him on this. Even though, had I been advising her, I might have recommended that she dial the tone down a bit, I’m not where Tavis is. I’m still prepared to give her credit for having the guts to take a stronger stand, by far, than anyone else in the Richland delegation. Maybe it’s because Mia and I are from Bennettsville. My uncle was visiting from there yesterday, and when Mia’s name came up, all he had to say was “You go, girl.” Nothing like B’ville pride.

Sure, the folks she categorizes as the OG probably think she’s just a grandstander trying to get political mileage out of all the folks out there saying “You go, girl.” But when she’s right and they’re wrong, I’m inclined to say she deserves whatever political boost she can get. There’s a point when you go, wait a minute — and my first stirrings of doubt about Nikki Haley came when she was doing her Joan of Arc routine in the House over roll-call voting. But Mia’s not there yet. Not with me, anyway.

Of course, her Twitter handle is “MiaforSC.” As opposed to “miafordistrict79” or something. Which would seem to speak of greater ambition.

Speaking of which, she has become perhaps the one Democrat in the Legislature most worth following, joining such GOP stalwarts as Harvey Peeler and Nathan Ballentine, and inheriting the mantle abandoned by Boyd Brown.

Last night’s debate news (or part of it) this morning — another problem for what’s left of newspapers

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OK, so I’m behind the curve today. I got home from final dress rehearsal last night at about 11:30, heated up some dinner, watched a few minutes of both the beginning and the end of the debate (having heard a BBC assessment of it on the radio on the drive home) then watched some of the PBS commentary after the debate, then hit the sack.

But I’m not as far behind the curve as most daily newspapers were in today’s print editions.

Slate calls our attention to today’s front pages (all taken from the Newseum, where you can see plenty of others), which have a sameness about them: They pretty much all say the same thing in their headlines, and most run photos of the same moment, with the candidates’ fingers pointed at each other. Sure, you might find some “analysis” in there somewhere, and the more enterprising (and better-staffed) opinion pages will have some sketchy opinions expressed. As Slate’s Josh Voorhees writes:

As we explained late last night, the insta-polls and the pundits saw a tight contest on the Long Island stage on Tuesday, but one that was won narrowly by President Obama. Given the lack of a clear-cut win, however, it should come as little surprise that a quick scan of the morning’s front pages show the nation’s headline writers and art teams focused on the on-stage clash and largely left the who-won question to the domain of the cable news talking heads (as most papers had likewise done following the previous two debates).

Once, this sameness, this lack of personality or individualized expression was the glory of newspapers. If 10 different journalists from 10 different papers covered the same event, they would all write pretty much the same thing. It was a measure of their professionalism, and the self-effacement that news writing demanded of them. It was about giving it to you straight, unadorned, plain, and God forbid there should be any hint of opinion in it. Who, what, where, when, maybe how, and, if you put an “Analysis” sig on it, why.

The monotony of it didn’t strike the reading public because unless they lived near an urban newsstand, most people only saw one daily newspaper.

But here’s the problem with that today: What newspapers put in those lede headlines today, and what they conveyed in those pictures, was all old news by the time I was driving home from rehearsal last night.

I hadn’t driven more than a few blocks when I knew the conventional wisdom on what had happened. It went something like this: Obama did all the things he failed to do in the first debate, particularly having a strong finish. Romney did fine, although was maybe not quite as sharp as in the first debate. If you’re declaring a winner, it’s Obama, although I didn’t get the sense that he dominated in this debate the way Romney did in the first one, so if you’re going on cumulative totals, Romney’s probably still ahead in this debate series. How this affects the polls remains to be seen.

I had even heard about “binders full of women,” but I was mostly confused by that.

In the post-debate analysis I watched after I got home, I heard David Brooks and Mark Shields give their assessments. Brooks said Obama won because he was able to exploit Romney’s biggest weakness better than Romney was able to press Obama on his biggest weakness. He said Romney’s biggest weakness is that his numbers don’t add up, and Obama’s problem is that he never provides a vision of what the next four years will be like if he is re-elected. Shields said it might surprise everyone, but he agreed with Brooks on all those points.

Since then, on the radio this morning, I’ve heard that “Obama hasn’t sketched a vision going forward” meme several more times.

I was also interested in what a young woman (didn’t catch her name) who analyses Twitter during debates for PBS had to say. I didn’t get as much of an overview of the Twitter take as I wanted because she decided to zero in on the reactions of women. But I’ve found her assessments interesting in the past: What was trending? What were the memes people were obsessing over? What caught on? I’ve become more and more interested in the instant reactions of Tweeters in the aggregate during events like this. It has something to do with the wisdom of crowds. It’s like having sensors attached to the brains of millions of highly engaged, clever voters — which is what the most-followed people on Twitter tend to be.

And I felt left out because I wasn’t on Twitter myself during the debate. Increasingly, that’s where I like to be during these kinds of real-time shared events, sifting through the flood of reaction as it washes over me.

And in a Twitter world, seeing these front pages feels like reading ancient history. No, it’s worse than that. Historians look at the whole of a thing after it’s over and draw conclusions. There’s a wholeness to historical accounts. These reports — and I’m just reacting to the headlines, mind you — don’t do that. They give only the most noncommital account, essentially just telling you that the candidates came together and vied against one another, and there the account ends. The Des Moines Register headline (“Stakes higher in 2nd face-off”) could have been, and possibly was, written before the debate started. (And pre-Gannett, that was one of the best papers in the country for political coverage.)

And I was already so far beyond that, without even trying hard to be, last night — without even having seen the debate.

I’m not saying these papers aren’t doing their jobs well. What I’m saying is that the job they’re doing, within two kinds of constraints — the convention of not drawing conclusions in a news account, and the severe time problem of the debate ending as they have to get those pages to the press room (depending on the edition we’re talking about, a lot of editions went to bed BEFORE that) — fails to satisfy in a Twitter world.

Again, there might be all kinds of good stuff in the stories, but the presentation — the quick impression that a glance at the front page provides — is deeply lacking. It makes you not want to read more deeply. It causes me to want to go read those papers’ websites today, and see what good stuff didn’t make it into the paper. (And the better papers will have something for me when I go there.) Because the conversation has moved, by the time the paper hits your stoop, so very far beyond what’s in those headlines.

What does a ‘like’ mean, as we slouch toward post-verbalism (if that’s what we’re doing)?

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The top of my main Pinterest page.

Some years ago — it could have been 20 — I read an article by Umberto Eco that seems appropriate to this topic. I don’t remember all the particulars of the piece, or even in which magazine it appeared. But I seem to recall that the semiotician and novelist set forth the notion that we might be moving, beyond a post-literate society, to becoming post-verbal, returning to means of communication common in medieval days when, say, a pub called the Rose and Crown would be identified by a hanging sign showing pictures of those things, rather than words.

The premise would seem excessively alarmist, or at least premature, since the decades since I read that have seen an explosion of the written word on the Web. More people are writing, and reading, a greater profusion of words than at any time in the history of this planet.

But sometimes, we are faced with images alone, and words fail us. On friends’ Facebook pages, I’m occasionally confronted with images that just beg for accompanying text to explain them, but nary a word is offered.

And recently, I found myself in a world that brought the Eco piece back powerfully.

I was going to (and eventually did) write a light item for the ADCO blog about the addictiveness of Pinterest, which has hooked a couple of my co-workers. The spark was a study indicating that 20 percent of women who are online were into the site.

At first, I supposed that only women could possibly get into it, for as I perused the boards created by my female co-workers, I was overwhelmed by all the images of food and housewares and decorating ideas. As I said in that ADCO blog post, those screens looked like “the result of Edward Scissorhands going to town on a 10-foot-high stack of old copies of Better Homes and Gardens and Southern Living.”

But as I went through the little signup ritual for creating my own account, I saw how quickly the screen would morph into something that more interested me.

Here’s what happens: You sign in to the site. You are offered a screen full of slightly-bigger-than-thumbnail images. You are asked to “like” the ones that appeal to you. What you “like” affects what you see as you continue to scroll down. It’s rather fascinating to watch as the algorithm does its work. For a time, for a long time, the wave of images coming at you seems never-ending. The scroll bar on the right will seem to be approaching the bottom, then suddenly it will glide back up toward the middle as a new load of images arrives.

I saw a lot of images that interested me a great deal, but I couldn’t decide whether to “like” them or not. I mean, what does it say if you click “like” on a picture of a B-26 going down in flames? I don’t like that it’s going down, with American airmen dying in it. But I do want the program to know that I find images of WWII warplanes interesting.

Or what about a picture of Michael Caine as spy Harry Palmer? Will it think I like the raincoat, or “The Ipcress File?” This is a place where words would help.

And what does it mean when I “like” a picture of Marilyn Monroe? I mean, have you ever seen a picture of her you didn’t like, on some level or other? I haven’t. And yet, after I liked one or two of them, they kept coming in a profusion that suggested that Pinterest thought I had some kind of Elton-John-like celebrity fetish centered on her. I continued to “like” them, because that was my honest and uncomplicated answer. But I didn’t want it to offer me nothing but movie-star pictures going forward.

Just because I like Sean Connery doesn’t mean I want to see pictures of Rock Hudson (not that there’s anything wrong with that). And my liking a picture of Natalie Wood doesn’t mean I want to see Robert Wagner. And what’s with these Jody Foster pictures you keep throwing at me? I haven’t liked a single one, and they keep coming. Who do you think I am, John Hinckley? And just because I click on an interesting diagram of old military headgear doesn’t mean I want to look at one Confederate kepi after another!

So here’s where you end up, or where I ended up anyway: Pinterest now “knows” me well enough that one out of 10 or 12 things it throws at me will be mildly interesting. Which I guess is an achievement for a computer program.

But the language of social media — “like” and “friend” and other terms that so often don’t exactly describe the relationship in a given case — still needs work. Let’s not give up on words just yet.

Below are some of the pictures I “liked” as they were thrown at me. But really: What does it mean to “like” a picture of Bonnie and Clyde?

: The top of my main Pinterest page.

‘It’s a word. That’s it. That’s all…’

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Speaking of words, I need to warn you of the use of offensive language in this video. Which, like the one I posted earlier, I cannot embed. (All together now: I. Hate. Facebook.)

But since all sorts of strong opinions are being expressed back and forth on the violence in Five Points, I thought I’d share this one, which is… very passionate, to say the least.

I’d not agreeing with this guy, and I’m not disagreeing with him. I just thought this was one of the most interesting comments I’d heard so far. I like it because it’s idiosyncratic. It doesn’t fit into any boxes, at all. Just a man with a very strong opinion.

I apologize again, in advance, for his language, which is of a sort that I don’t normally allow here. But I thought I’d point you to a part of the dialogue you might have missed…

Obama provides strong finish to successful convention

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OK, the quick, overall assessment: However this election turns out, in the short term the Democrats will likely get the bigger convention bounce. They earned it these last two nights.

Yes, there was just as much irritating nonsense at this convention as at the one last week — I turned down the sound and picked up a book to spare myself the aggravation just as many times. But the headliners were stronger. They showed greater conviction, presented more compelling ideas (and, alas, emotions), and I believe did a better job of engaging not only the true believers in the room, but the more important audience at home.

Doubt me? Honestly, now, whatever your political persuasion — do you really think Mitt Romney truly believes all the things he said as much as Barack Obama does, whether you agree with the president or not? And sincerity sells; it connects.

Of course, it didn’t hurt the president a bit that veteran Bill Clinton left him a five-run lead going into the last inning. He just had to hold on to it, and he actually did better than that.

But I’m just repeating what I already said on Twitter. So here are my Tweets as they came to me, starting at 9:02 p.m.:

David Brooks just made the good point that if you talk to both sides’ advisors, there’s not that much polarization over national security…
Biden says Romney & Obama bring vastly different values to the contest. I wish they didn’t. This nation so badly needs sensible consensus.
Tim Kelly ‏@tdkelly Drinking a Red Hoptober by @newbelgium — http://untp.it/NfjegL
One ping. One ping only, Vasily…
The Daily Beast ‏@thedailybeast Biden: Conviction, Resolve, Barack Obama. That’s what saved the automobile industry.
“The finest soldiers in the history of the world.” Hooah, Joe, Hooah.
This may be the first time in my life that talk of whacking a guy was applause line at a national convention. Not criticizing, just noting.
Benjy Sarlin ‏@BenjySarlin Clinton was about policy. Biden speech entirely about character, through policy lens. Different but very effective approaches.
Yeah, but only under a yellow sun… “@scott_english: Biden on Obama: “A spine of steel.” And adamantium claws? #wolverine”
Coo-coo-ca-choo… “@TheFix: Biden’s call outs of people in the audience — “Mrs. Robinson” — is hilarious. #dnc2012”
Even tho admiral advised against. “@alexcast: Per joe biden, Barack Obama is a man of courage. must be. He gave Biden a live mic.#cnn2012”
God love him… “@JKuenzie: Biden says “look” at least as often as “literally.” #DNC2012”
Sometimes I get tired of hearing about all the people who lost their jobs in the Great Recession. And I’m one of them…
I was gonna say “what are VMAs?” but I looked it up. Oh. “@BlondeScientist: Why in the hell are the VMAs on tonight?!?!”
Forrest L. Alton ‏@YoungGunCEO come on Brad, you know you’re a VMA kinda’ guy.
I’m not an ANY kind of pop culture awards guy. And I quit watching MTV when they quit showing videos 24/7.
I love movies, but hate the Oscars…
Commenter on PBS said it looks like Biden WILL stay on the ticket now. Funny thing was, she didn’t sound entirely, 100% certain…
I kid about Joe Biden, but I’ve always really liked the guy. And tonight, his performance was full of Joeness…
Was that George Clooney just then? The voice?
Dan Cook ‏@DanCookSC yes
So was that what we got tonight instead of Eastwood?
Let the man talk! [during prolonged applause when Obama came out]
That critique was dead-on. A philosophy that responds to every situation with a tax cut is surreal, and moronic.. .
“Our problems can be solved.” The candidate who more confidently asserts that is the one who wins. Or should win, anyway…
Cars going twice as far on a gallon of gas is at least less grandiose than lowering the oceans. Magical, but more achievable-sounding.
This is not, and probably won’t be, as exciting as Clinton’s speech. But then, I don’t think it really has to be. POTUS should be cooler…
“… and Osama bin Laden is dead.” Matter-of-fact, not cheerleading. As befits the office. More Michael than Santino…
“My opponent and his running mate are.. . new… to foreign policy.” Excellent timing.
As one who sees POTUS in terms of international relations, I didn’t like that “nation-building at home” bit of pandering.
Nothing against nation-building at home, but don’t suggest we’ll do it by turning our backs on the world…
“This is what this election comes down to”… Have a feeling we’ll hear that as voiceover on an ad…
“Citizenship.” That’s the most welcome word I’ve heard these two weeks.
Roll Call ‏@rollcall Obama: We don’t think government can solve all our problems. But we don’t think that government is the source of all our problems.
“Responsibilities as well as rights.” Wow. Pure communitarianism in a presidential acceptance speech! Who wrote this, Amitai Etzioni?
This isn’t Bill Clinton, but it’s solid, even masterful. More to the point, it’s more powerful, easily, than Romney’s speech.
There was much irritating nonsense in this convention, just as in GOP’s. But the Democrats’ headliners have been stronger, more engaging…
I don’t know how this ends up, but the Democrats seem sure to get the bigger convention bounce. The headliners were more inspiring, engaging
… of course, it helped that Bill Clinton left the closer a five-run lead going into the last inning…
One big difference between Obama and Romney, for good or ill, is that you know Obama really believes the things he’s telling us…
Yeah. Sorta glad I didn’t end up going up there tonight… “@JKuenzie: And now, the traffic. #DNC2012”

Bill Clinton just gave the best political speech of this century, thus far

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Earlier today I wrote something about the contrast that was expected between Elizabeth Warren’s speech and Bill Clinton’s. That was certainly dead on. She gave one of those speeches full of resentments and blame, the kind that makes me dislike political parties so much.

And then Bill Clinton gave a speech that, while lifting the crowd in the arena to their feet, talked right on through them and to all of America, making the case for Barack Obama as no one has ever made it before, in a way that was a feel-good celebration of politics and democracy and this country and the things that make it great.

I can’t remember the last time I heard a political speech this good. Here are my thoughts, via Twitter, as it unfolded. You can see my enthusiasm build from the moment the former president started talking. The Tweets that follow, starting at 9:29 p.m., are mine, except where otherwise indicated:

The most warmly positive, uplifting speech I’ve heard tonight so far was from the sister from Nuns on the Bus. It was beatific…
Back in the day, when there were 3 networks covering gavel to gavel, I seem to recall less gab and more voting; less show, more action.
Wow, they weren’t kidding about this woman [Warren]. Who wrote her speech? Huey Long? https://bradwarthen.com/?p=17980
amhistorymuseum ‏@amhistorymuseum Abraham Lincoln was the first presidential candidate to distribute his campaign portrait all over the country. #campaigncollecting
… Which you wouldn’t automatically assume would have been to his advantage…
Billy’s doing his duty, actually talking about Obama rather than himself. How about that?
Good line about “cool on the inside”…
“Business and government working together… ” That’s a welcome contrast to Warren’s anti-biz, populist rant…
He’s giving the Third Way a hard sell, and doing it well…
They’re not quite sure what to make of Clinton’s lauding of Republicans for the good things they’ve done…
The speech Bill Clinton is giving fulfills the Democrats’ best hopes (and stills their worst loose-cannon fears). This is impressive.
Bill Clinton is reminding American what it’s like to be a Democrat, a winning Democrat, whose politics aren’t based in resentment…
Maybe President Obama should let Bill Clinton do the speech TOMMOROW night, too…
He may have lost weight, but he hasn’t lost his touch. The Comeback Kid still has it. Maybe some of it will rub off.
No, Bill! Don’t say “listen to me…” Shades of the Lewinsky denial. You’re on a roll! Don’t go off course…
When Bill Clinton’s talking, it almost sounds like it would be fun to be a Democrat…
Warren Bolton ‏@BoltonWarren If nothing else, this will have Obama juiced for tomorrow for sure. Can he deliver?
I don’t know, but Bill sure is teeing it up for him. The key to what he’s doing is the confidence, and the sheer joy.
He [Obama] just needs to come out cool on the outside, and burning inside for America…
Bill is the first person speaking positively to independents tonight — except for maybe Sister Simone…
I’ve never heard anyone make the case for Barack Obama this well.
The thing about Clinton is, he convinces you he really understands the wonkish details (mainly because he does), and is really INTO them.
“It takes some brass.” His second best line of the speech. The best was the “cool on the outside” thing…
He knows he’s got them. He can feel it. He can slow it down, or speed it up, and they’re right there with him every second…
John O’Connor ‏@johnroconnor I really only needed Clinton 101, not 201 and 315
This is the graduate seminar course. This is Bill Clinton under a yellow sun, with all his powers.
One of the many things Bill Clinton understands is the importance of talking to the millions of us who are NOT in that room.
Bill knows how to tear the Republicans a new one — or two — without making you think he hates them…
Warren Bolton ‏@BoltonWarren This is where the preacher, with the congregation firmly in his hands, says “I’ about to take my seat.” Then 15 minutes later …
Now he’s schoolin’ ’em on ‘rithmetic…
No, don’t shake your finger at us, Bill. It evokes bad stuff. Stick with the good stuff…
This speech is the most generous and selfless thing that Bill Clinton has done in his whole life.
Bet on America… we always come back… Man, he’s hitting every note, and hitting it just right…

It was amazing. He’s just that good. And I say that as the editor who presided over an editorial board that was tied as first in the country to call on him to resign after he admitted lying to us. But he was always really, really good at this, and I don’t just mean in ways that were good for him. It’s actually good for the country to hear a speech like this. So much of politics these days is depressing, dispiriting. We all needed a lift like this.

Some were complaining that the speech was too long. No. Bill Clinton has given some of the longest, most tedious speeches most of us can remember. But tonight he wasn’t indulging himself. Tonight he was giving.

A good speech that failed to move the needle

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Here’s my reaction to Mitt Romney’s big speech last night (you remember Romney; he came a couple of speakers after Clint Eastwood’s extraordinary presentation of surrealistic performance art), in two parts:

First, I really appreciated his tone. We had heard he would take this opportunity to reach out to us swing voters, and he did, mainly by leaving out any hint of the crazy hate-Obama talk that has become so common among Republicans. Not that he would have talked that way anyway — without the condescension that Marco Rubio applied in saying the president is a “good man,” let me say that I see Mitt Romney as a nice man — but he could have thrown the crowd a little more red meat, and he didn’t. He reached out.

In fact, I think he made his case in as positive a way as anyone could. He mentioned “Hope and Change” without the usual sneering contempt with which Republicans imbue the words, and said too bad, it just didn’t work out. So let’s try something different.

I think that’s his case, put as positively as possible.

That’s part one of my reaction. Here’s part two: I don’t think he made the case — again, to us swing voters, not the faithful in the hall — that he necessarily has a better approach than Obama. In fact, when he tried to explain the difference between the Obama approach and the Romney/GOP approach, he had a tendency to fall back on the red meat stuff, the favorite stereotypes that Republicans spout with regard to Democrats. You know, like the one about how liberals hate success, which was probably one of his bigger applause lines. It went like this: “In America, we celebrate success, we don’t apologize for it.” It has the added bonus of implying, I don’t know how they do it in the country YOU come from, but in America…

And the problem, for folk who are not Tea Partisans or birthers or Club for Growth types, is that we don’t hear much positive in what Romney would do instead that would be better. The clearest message about what he would do that is more or less understandable to all is repeal Obamacare. Which I certainly don’t want him or anybody else to do, especially when they don’t want to replace it with anything better.

And that brings us to the problem with Romney. The poor guy; he’s just a non-ideological businessman who wants this job, and he has to charm all these crazies in order to get to it. So you get some odd behavior. Someone on the radio noted this morning that in the video before his speech, there was not one mention of his one great accomplishment as governor of Massachusetts — the health care reform that helped inspire the national reform that he is obliged to attack.

So here’s what we’re left with: Romney is this nice, non-ideological guy who makes the entirely credible case that what President Obama has done hasn’t worked, or hasn’t worked very well. So we are asked to trust him, as a proven, competent businessman, to run things better. Never mind the details (because when we get into details, it doesn’t help his case).

On the whole, I think it was a good speech. He didn’t hurt himself. But I’m not at all sure he moved the needle, in any way that will last through the polling bump that Democrats will likely get next week.

Speaking of that — some commenters on the radio this morning were saying that puts the Democrats in “a box” — they have to prove next week that what they have done has prevented things from being worse, and that better days are ahead with them in charge of the executive branch. That’s probably doable, if Democrats can rise above their own pander-to-the-base foibles and project pragmatic confidence. We’ll see.

But in the meantime, here are my Tweets and reTweets from last night, showing my real-time impressions of the proceedings from 10:05 p.m. on. All are by me, except where otherwise indicated:

I’m Clint Eastwood, and I don’t have to comb my damn’ hair if I don’t feel like it, punk.
Larry Sabato ‏@LarrySabato George H.W. Bush briefly entertained the idea of making Clint Eastwood his1988 VP ticketmate. It’s true.
I wish Clint weren’t struggling like this…
Scott English ‏@scott_english Clint Eastwood is doing a one man show at the #RNC entitled “This what happens when you cut Medicare.”
Wesley Donehue‏@wesleydonehue Watching Gamecocks, but according to twitter Clint Eastwood is either sucking or killing it.
Kinda both. It’s weird…
Roger Ebert ‏@ebertchicago Clint, my hero, is coming across as sad and pathetic. He didn’t need to do this to himself. It’s unworthy of him.
OK, what’s up? Rubio’s wearing that same weird flag pin with the superimposed star that Ryan was wearing last night. Is it a cult thing?
Oops, I was wrong. It’s not a star; it’s an “R”…
Todd Kincannon‏@ToddKincannon I think the Eastwood speech is absolutely brilliant. He’s not a politician and he doesn’t sound like one.
No. “Gran Torino” — now THAT was brilliant.
Wesley Donehue ‏@wesleydonehue Gotta get Phil back on twitter so that he quits suggesting tweets to me all night. He may become my ghost tweet writer.
Is he trying to get you to post something about a “Mormon Jesus“?
I’ve never watched Rubio before. Good speaker. But I’m struck that Eastwood is followed by someone you’d expect him to call a “punk”…
Wow, they’ve got Mitt doing a “Bill Clinton” through the crowd. Are they desperate to humanize him or what?
Well, the suspense is over — he accepts…
Mitt just said “iPod.” Wow, he must be cool…That hepcat!
Bruce Haynes‏@BrucePurple 10:34pm EST. Working people parties want to appeal to really want to be in bed now. And probably are. When will convention planners get it?
Yeah. And all the really cool voters live in EDT…
At this point, I’d like to see Clint come back out and pretend Mitt is an empty chair: “No, Mitt! I can’t do that to myself!”
Ed O’Keefe‏@edatpost The Clint Eastwood transcript:http://wapo.st/UfbT12 #gop2012
You mean that was WRITTEN DOWN???
Greg Reibman ‏@Greg_Reibman I’m still chuckling over the story of Mitt’s mom discovering her husband died. Nice to see the real Mitt.
You mean like, “Where’s my flower?” That was … odd.
Todd Kincannon ‏@ToddKincannon We may have a new Reagan.
Maybe they should have invited him to the convention… 🙂
Rick Stilwell ‏@RickCaffeinated Somebody please explain the “attack on success” to me. Haven’t seen it, want to know where that’s coming from. #learn #notjudging
Dunno, but @KarenFloyd just quoted it without irony. It’s something Republicans are convinced Democrats believe…
I liked that he cited “Hope and Change” without sneering. OK, that shouldn’t be a biggie, but the civility bar is really low these days…
He’s playing his role. He showed up for work, and he’s doing the job. Not inspiring, not exciting. But solid, workmanlike…
“Unlike President Obama, I will not raise taxes on the middle class.” OK, remind me again where “middle class” starts and ends…
“I want to help you and your family.” Is this the Democratic convention? I mean, is that what I want a POTUS for?
TeresaKopec ‏@TeresaKopec There sure are a lot of countries with CIA installed dictators that would disagree with Romney on that “America takes out dictators” line.
On that one, he was right. Moral relativism (“Oh, America is just as bad as anybody”) is dead end, politically & geopolitically
TeresaKopec ‏@TeresaKopec Obama has never said that. (At least the Obama who is visible to the human eye & not the invisible one Clint was talking to.)
No, he hasn’t. But some of my Democratic friends DO talk that way, as though this country were a net evil in the world.
Where he was WRONG is that in the aggregate, Obama has projected US power more aggressively than any predecessor.
Jack Kuenzie ‏@JKuenzie Ah, the K-Tel version of “Living in America.” #GOP2012
And if you act now, you get The Fifth Dimension performing “Up, Up and Away”…
Bonus question: Compare and contrast this balloon drop to others throughout history…
Amy Derjue ‏@derjue Joe Biden is gonna SCHOOL Clint Eastwood on how to ramble incoherently in Charlotte. See ya next week, nerds! #gop2012 #dnc
Scott English ‏@scott_english Sometimes I wish it was the Party of “Hell No.” RT @tdkelly: Mitt leads crowd in reaffirmation of “party of no.’
No, that would be the Tea Party…

Note that there were a couple of errors, only one of which I correct here (changing “Wow, he must me cool” to “Wow, he must be cool”). Romney did not exactly say, “I want to help you and your family.” He said, “MY promise… is to help you and your family.” That was my best effort to reproduce it on the fly; I messed up.

Brief observations from Monday night

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Since I suffered through enough of the GOP convention last night to send out a few tweets, I might as well share them here (one of these days I’m going to figure out how to seamlessly integrate Twitter into this blog in real time; until then I’ll have to do this).

And “suffered” is the word. After listening to several speakers spout the same, repetitive, intelligence-insulting nonsense for even a few minutes (waiting dutifully for Nikki Haley’s few minutes), I was fulminating in protest to such an extent that my wife threatened to go watch it elsewhere rather than listen to me. So I settled down, and fumed silently.

Speaking of waiting for Nikki, did you see this? We were watching PBS, the only network airing the whole thing, and as Nikki came on, they cut away and took a break. Fortunately, CBS — the first network we hit leaving PBS — had just picked it up, so we caught most of it. Anyway, here are the Tweets, starting a few minutes before that (9:53 p.m., to be exact). All are by me unless otherwise labeled:

If anyone at this convention said ANYTHING thoughtful, original, anything unlike a bumper sticker, I might die of shock. But I’d be happy.
I wonder whether, this time next week, I’ll be as utterly sick, tired & disgusted with the Democrats as I am with the GOP now. Most likely.
TIM KELLY: me, too. And I’m a Democrat.
Nikki sounds like she’s going over like a lead balloon. Oh, wait. Big cheer on Voter ID…
Her timing’s not right… Nikki’s actually a better speaker than this. Do you think she over-rehearsed this?
Nikki seems to be settling down a bit now. The usual stuff is flowing out more smoothly now.
Did Nikki Haley just say, “We deserve a president who will strengthen our military, not destabilize them?” I think so…
Nikki kind of went out with a whimper at the end there. Low energy. When they cut away, CBS people were talking about something unrelated.
AMY WOOD: For those who saw it.. thoughts on Nikki Haley speech ?
I’m not sure that actual THOUGHT is in order, after any of these speeches. And after this, we have another week of it with the Dems.
TIM KELLY: Ann Romney confirms that we’d have no America without women. Cause, you know, they give birth and stuff.”
I agree! That’s one…
@PeterHambyCNN: Mitt Romney will join Ann on stage at the conclusion of her speech
Like HE doesn’t get enough time in the spotlight
THE DAILY BEAST: Ann Romney: A story book marriage? Nope, not at all. What Mitt Romney and I have is a real marriage.
That, and well over $200 million. So, you know, who needs a freakin’ storybook?
TODD KINCANNON: The one what has Mexicans down yonder from it. RT@ShaneEthridge: ??? RT @tcita: Ok, exactly which border is South Carolina worried about?
We have to seal it. If not, we’ll have to keep on hearing ’em talk funny in the Food Lion…
Everybody said Christie was really good. He IS. First speakier tonight who doesn’t sound like a bumper-sticker machine. Regular guy…
Christie has that rare gift among politicians — these days — of sounding like a regular guy leveling with you.
Christie’s like a regular guy sitting around talking it over with Tony & Paulie at the Pork Store. I mean that in a good way…
Aw, now he’s descending into that trite “they want you to be mollycoddled by government” twaddle. Oh, well. Nobody’s perfect…
SAM JOHNSON: Christie: “We believe its possible to forge bipartisan compormise” Where have y’all been the last four years?
Yeah… but it sounds real when he says it. He’s good…
“Real leaders don’t follow polls. Real leaders change polls.” Absolutely. I wonder if anyone there, besides Christie, believes it.

This morning, I noticed that Howard Weaver had replied to that last, saying, “well, for one thing it’s not true.” I replied, “It is if the words have meaning. A LEADER doesn’t join people where they are; he leads them someplace else. He changes minds.”

Poor Nikki. First, the hurricane. Then, she gets rescheduled, and PBS doesn’t air her speech. They were not alone. Adam Beam reported that “NBC not airing @NikkiHaley‘s speech. Brian Williams is interviewing Marco Rubio instead.” Adam had a rough night. He tried the Web, but “the YouTube feed died on me right as Gov. Haley took the stage. Not cool.”

I learned later that C-SPAN had it all without interruption. Of course they did; I just didn’t think of it (I don’t normally look at the non-HD channels, which is where that comes in on my service). Good to know going forward…

Our governor’s latest immature outburst

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Har-de-har-har-har.

This morning, Corey Hutchins Tweeted:

Cue the @BradWarthen blog post about the governor and Gina Smith three days from now…

Yeah. Good one. Ha-ha.

Here’s the thing, folks — I long ago decided that it was better to write about something out-of-cycle than it was never to address it. And them’s the choices you gets, folks, more often than not. Other bloggers, fearing to be seen as slow, will drop an idea after a couple of days. And of course I DO drop far, far more than I’d like. But if I get a chance to go back to something, I do.

The great thing about blogging is that there are no space limits, so you can write about everything you think of, and not be limited to, say, one or two columns a week. The terrible truth about blogging is that it’s impossible to find the time to write about everything that you think of.

I discovered that almost immediately when I started doing this in 2005. The original idea is that I would put EVERYTHING on the blog — my notes from every editorial board interview (most of which never got a mention in the actual paper), every opinion idea that I had but didn’t have room for in the paper.

But that proved impossible. So now I get to the things I get to, and that’s it. The sad thing is, many of my best ideas for posts never get written, because they would take too much time, while I toss up little throwaway things just to keep the plates spinning.

But still, when the occasion arises later, I try my best to get back to the good stuff.

Oh, by the way, here’s the thing that Corey was referring to:

State reporter Gina Smith asked Gov. Nikki Haley during her Charleston press conference Wednesday if Haley’s ethics proposals were part of an anticipated reform package by lawmakers and the state Ethics Commission.

“Gina, I am not going to answer any of your questions,” Haley responded, moving on to take other reporters’ questions.

Asked why Haley would not answer Smith’s question, Haley spokesman Rob Godfrey responded: “The governor believes respect should be a two-way street.”

Yes, it is. And it would be nice if the governor would grow up and start answering reporters’ respectful questions with matching respect, both to them and their readers. A two-way street indeed.

As is her wont, rather than stand up and tell reporters why she is acting like a middle-schooler, our young governor took to Facebook to air her innermost feelings (and you know, that’s what it’s all about — Nikki’s feelings):

In response to my refusal to answer Gina Smith’s question today: she is the same reporter that 1)wrote a Front Page, Above the Fold story about me being indicted, with no truth what so ever. 2)She went on to write a story about my 14 year old daughter without having the facts, against the urging of SLED Chief Keel that said it was unprecedented to write about a governor’s child knowing the safety concerns. Respect is a two way street.

Our virtual governor, in her comfort zone.

Where do kids listen to their pop music today? (All I know is, it better not be on my lawn…)

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Spotify informs me that Darla Moore has subscribed to “my” playlist, “NPR Songs of Summer.” Of course, it’s not “my” playlist. It’s NPR’s.

For a moment I thought I’d discovered what Darla had been up to since Nikki bumped her from the USC board of trustees — listening to Adele, LMFAO, Taio Cruz, Gnarls Barkley, Simon and Garfunkel and the Stones. But then I realized it was another Darla Moore altogether — but one, it should be said, with pretty good taste, who also listens to Emeli Sandé, Kate Bush, R.E.M., Loudon Wainwright III, Beck, the Velvet Underground and the Psychedelic Furs, among many others, according to her public profile.

Which is aside from my point. The point is, I have a confession to share.

After having played them over a bunch more times, I realize I was wrong about some of those songs on the NPR list. Some of the recent songs I rated really low on my zero-to-five-stars scale are a lot better than I thought they were when I first rated them.

For instance… I wake up in the morning with LMFAO’s “Party Rock Anthem,” which has really grown on me, in my head.

And more dramatically, I originally rated Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep” at two stars, which was ridiculous. I now consider it to be worth at least four, if not five. It’s amazing. I didn’t come to this decision because of seeing two of my older (male, amazingly enough) cousins dancing to it with abandon at a wedding a couple of weeks back — doing something that looked very like an Indian rain or war dance, which the song’s driving rhythm tends to abet.

No, I’ve come to that conclusion from listening to it over and over. And eventually going, wow. You know how I posed the question of what, exactly, makes Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” so mysteriously stirring? What, I asked, is the music doing to the ear, the brain, the soul in that part that “goes like this, the fourth, the fifth/ The minor fall and the major lift…?”

Well, something comparably awesome happens, building irresistibly, and then exploding, every time, when Adele sings this part:

The scars of your love remind me of us
They keep me thinking that we almost had it all
The scars of your love, they leave me breathless
I can’t help feeling

We could have had it ALLLLLLL…

It’s just amazing.

But it took time for me to fully realize it.

And it occurs to me that that is a large part of the difference, in terms of my appreciation, between recent songs and something like, for instance, “Honky Tonk Women,” with which I was saturated during the summer of 1969. (When I hear it, it brings one particular memory specifically to mind… driving down Highway 17 between Myrtle Beach and Surfside, passing by right where Tad’s used to be, telling my Uncle Woody — who’s just a little older than I am, and therefore sort of like an older brother — that that was just the best driving song ever. This was possibly influenced by the fact that I had just started driving.)

It’s not that I’m an old fogy — although I’m sure some of you will have your own opinions as to that. The thing is, I react to music much the same as I did in my youth. I certainly feel the same inside when I hear it.

But back in the day, we heard the songs so often, and they had a much better chance of growing on us. On TV, on the radio, walking down the street, coming from a juke box. Music was so common, and shared, and unavoidable. Grownups were able to mock The Beatles’ “yeah, yeah, yeah” because they heard it, everywhere.

There was one Top 40, and everybody was exposed to it. Now… music is more diverse, and specialized, and broken down. And I have the sense that you have to go out and seek it more than you do today. Even if it’s only clicking on a link from a friend via social media, you sort of have to seek it out.

Yeah, maybe it’s just because I’m not invited to those kinds of parties, but music just doesn’t seem as public and as ubiquitous as it once did. Is that a misperception? I don’t know.

I do know that music took a shift toward the private and esoteric and fragmented in the 70s, as we all became “album-oriented.” But then it came back together, became more democratic, in the 80s with MTV, to where most of us have a shared soundtrack for that era.

Now, just as people can choose highly specialized TV channels to watch — rather than having to be satisfied with three networks — they are more empowered to choose a specific musical direction, and have it be private, through their ear buds. Yes, it’s shared, but more person-to-person, rather than communally.

Or so it seems. As I say, I don’t go to parties where current pop music is being played, assuming such parties still exist. But then, I was a pretty antisocial kid, and didn’t go to all that many parties.

So what’s different? How do y’all see, or rather hear, the music scene today?

The music used to be so public, and unavoidable.