Category Archives: Social media

Hamlet misses out on the new iPhone

Alas! poor Blackberry. I knew it, Horatio; a device of infinite usefulness, of most excellent fancy; it hath borne me on its back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is! ... Where be your emails now? your Tweets? your texts? your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the Blogosphere on a roar?

To switch or not to switch, that is the question…

Get thee to a Verizon, go!…

Something is rotten in the state of 3G…

Neither a Twitterer nor a blogger be…

My hour is almost come
When I to sulphrous and tormenting flames
Must render up my PDA…

OK, so none of those work as well as I’d like. But the thing is, my Hamlet-like indecision caused me to miss out on the first wave of iPhones being offered by Verizon, so I will not be one of the cool kids (I’m sure this amazes you). I was thinking about making the move today, but then I see that they’re all gone. There will be more next week, but that’ll be like being the 27th man in space, instead of the first. And now that the first rush of lust for the new gadget has been disappointed… I’m wondering if I should wait a bit longer than that.

Here are the facts, which I’m sure Shakespeare could render more beautifully, but I will stick to plain prose:

I work in an office full of Apple people. All the computers in the office are Macs. For my part, I bring my laptop PC into the office every day, and work from that. Yeah, I get it; Macs are cool. But my fingers do all the PC commands so automatically that I find the Mac functions awkward, laborious.
Some of these people I work with are fanatical about their iPhones (and their iPads, etc., but that’s not what this is about). And over time I’ve seen what their iPhones can do that my Blackberry Curve can’t, and how beautifully they do those things, and I’ve thought that if I could have one, I might want to.
My entire extended family (and I have a large family), except for one of my sons, is on Verizon. Several of us are on the same family plan, which is economical. I just couldn’t see getting an AT&T device. So for the last year or so, I seized upon every rumor that Verizon would get the iPhone.
My Blackberry has been acting up for months — losing the data signal and having to be reset (by turning it off, taking the battery out, putting it back in, and waiting a long time while the hourglass spins before it works again) several times a day. Lately, it’s started turning itself off completely, and refusing to come back on unless I go through the whole reset routine.
I was due for an upgrade as of January. Miracle of miracles, that’s when Verizon and Apple made the announcement that the longed-for day had come.
I figured I could spring for an iPhone at the upgrade price ($199) from my blog account. I would need to, because it would not fit into our new, super-tight, post-England household budget. Besides, Mamanem, who pays the household bills, does not believe anyone needs such a gadget, even though I do. (I’ve tried to explain the critical importance of having constant, excellent connection to my blog readers, Twitter followers and Facebook friends, but she looks at me like I’m babbling in Sanskrit. She thinks of me as being the Dad in the commercial, Tweeting “I’m… sitting… on… the… patio…“)
I started worrying that another barrier could lie in my way: What if the monthly cost of data access was greater than with the Blackberry? No way I’d get that through the family Ways and Means committee.
Last week, I went by Verizon (that is to say, made the trek out to Harbison at the end of a long day) to ask some questions about the upcoming iPhone, asking specifically whether it would cost more per month, and no one knew. All they knew was that I could order one starting Feb. 3. So I left, figuring they’d know more then.
Meanwhile, asking around, I learned to my shock that my friends with AT&T iPhones were only paying $25 a month. This kind of ticked me off, because I was paying $45 a month (part of a family plan account costing well over $200 a month). They had a better device and were paying less for it, which seemed to me outrageous. I began to wonder whether I should secede from the family plan and go with AT&T after all. AT&T had been tempting me with an offer for a TV/internet/landline deal that sounded better than what I had with TimeWarner; maybe I could save even more by adding mobile…
Then someone told my wife that I was probably paying more than the usual because when I got the Blackberry originally, in January 2009, it was on a corporate server (you know, “Corporate Server” is on my list of potential names for my band). This hassle sort of ticked me off at the time, because up until that time I had had a company phone, but now the paper was making people go buy their own phones, and then be reimbursed a set amount that, of course, would not match the full monthly cost of the device. Two months later, I promptly forget that enormous injustice when I learned of another innovative cost-saving measure — I was laid off. No one at Verizon ever told me that I was paying $45 a month because I was initially connected to a corporate server. Nobody at Verizon noticed that I was no longer connected to anything of the kind. So for almost two more years, I paid $15 too much a month.
Last night, it being Feb. 3, I went back to Verizon, hoping for some answers. I was happy to learn that an iPhone would NOT cost any more a month for the data. Then I told the guy that I suspected I was paying too much a month already, and he looked it up, and said yes, I was. So he fixed it, and said from then on I would only have to pay $30 a month for data. I asked him whether I would be reimbursed for all those overpayments. He said no, quite flatly. This was one of those techie sales people who makes you feel like all your questions are stupid and an imposition on his valuable time (every question I asked, he answered with a tone and a look that said, “Are you quite done bothering me?”), so the cold look in his eyes as he let me know what a stupid question the one about reimbursement was was in no way a departure from the rest of our conversation.
He said if I wanted an iPhone, I’d have to order it online, and that the first day they’d have them at the actual store would be Feb. 10, but that if I weren’t in line by about 5 a.m., I probably wouldn’t get one.
I had thought that the new iPhone would work on the new 4G network when that rolled out, but he said no, it wouldn’t.
Then he raised a new problem… he mentioned, in passing, that in moving to an iPhone I’d lose some data — such as old voicemails. Well, I didn’t care about that, but it made me wonder: Would I lose any of my 2,044 contacts I’d accumulated over the years, starting in my Palm Pilot days (and when I say “contacts,” I mean several phone numbers and email addresses each, street addresses, extraneous notes about each person — the crown jewels to me, and quite irreplaceable) or my calendar, and would it still sync with my data on my laptop? (As you may know, I lost access to it all on my computer for several months after a disastrous Outlook crash.) My stuff was all on Google now, connected to my gmail account (which is what brad@bradwarthen.com is), so surely it would work, right? He said he didn’t know. When I insisted upon knowing, he wearily passed the question on to another Verizon employee. She didn’t know either. So I asked the clerk whether he thought I should get a Droid instead, since it is built on Google. He shrugged. I asked him what he would do. He said he had a Droid, and showed it to me. I asked whether he was thinking at all of getting an iPhone instead, and he said, no, not unless they gave him one. Which they wouldn’t.
To me, there is little point to a PDA — Twitter and email and all aside — if the contacts and calendar don’t sync smoothly with something also accessible via laptop. Might as well have an ol’ dumb phone as that.
Lose all my contacts, or even not be able to sync them smoothly? Must give us pause: There’s the respect that makes technological indecision of so long life. I was 99 percent sure that there was no way Steve Jobs would make something that wouldn’t connect smoothly with gmail data. But that wasn’t good enough. Sure, I could go home and order an iPhone online, but I wouldn’t be able to get my questions answered first. Even if I could chat with a person online, to what extent could I trust their assurances? Wouldn’t I need it in writing? And no online salesperson would have time for that — there were millions of others who wanted to buy the thing without asking stupid questions and making demands.
So I began to wonder whether I should do the equivalent of what I do with movies — not rush out and see them in the theater, but wait for Netflix. Patience is, after all, a virtue. Maybe I should even wait until 4G was out, and the rumored iPhone 5, which (maybe) would run on the new 4G network. Maybe, after a few million people actually start using Verizon iPhones, I could find out from some of them whether they sync well with Google. Or I could just go with a Droid. But I’ve looked at both, and like the iPhone SO much better.
I had also learned that a new Blackberry Curve would only cost me $29. So if my old Curve was dying (and it seems to be), maybe I could get one of those now, and wait for more info on how the iPhones actually work. Except that that would use up my upgrade. And without the upgrade, the iPhone would cost more than $700. Which might as well be 7 million. So that’s out.

What to do, what to do? I was too tired to figure it out last night. Today, I had a busy morning of meetings with clients and such. Twice during the morning, I had to reboot my device to check my email or the web. Once, it did that thing where it dies completely, and has to be force-reset. So I’m going to have to do something.

At lunch today with Lora — the most fanatical of my “iPhones are better” friends — I started blathering about my dilemma. While I was doing so, she glanced at her device and informed me that Verizon had just run out of iPhones.

So now I don’t have to think about this for awhile. Until the Blackberry dies completely, that is.

Isn’t it wonderful living in our modern age, with all these fantastic devices to make our lives easier?

Welcome back to the ‘sphere, Laurin!

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Did y’all know that Laurin Manning has returned home to the blogosphere? I expect you DID know, because she’s been blitzing the media the last few days. Here’s her new blog. And here’s her Twitter feed. And she was on Pub Politics the other day. Note below.

And some people think I’m media-savvy. (No, really — some people do. I didn’t say how many.)

Laurin’s candidate Vincent Sheheen didn’t make it, but Laurin has apparently accepted the mantle of loyal opposition to keep his successful opponent straight in office. Someone has to do it, I suppose, and I can’t, because I’m too shy.

An example of Laurin’s Haley accountability efforts:

An intrepid reader points out that according to this article in The State this morning, Gov. Nikki Haley met with fellow Budget and Control Board members Sen. Hugh Leatherman, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, and Rep. Dan Cooper, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, behind closed doors….

So what’s the big deal? Well, the three of them constitute a quorum of the powerful five-member Budget and Control Board, a public body that controls much of the administrative functions of state government. Brian White, head of Ways and Means sub-committee for health care was in attendance too, so they were obviously discussing health care, budgets and deficits. Under the South Carolina Freedom of Information Act, meetings of public bodies must be open, and a “meeting” is the “convening of a quorum of the constituent membership of a public body, whether corporal or by means of electronic equipment, to discuss or act upon a matter over which the public body has supervision, control, jurisdiction or advisory power.”

Intrepid reader remarks: “Where was Loftis and Eckstrom? Transparency so the public can see government, or secret meetings defying the rule of law? Where are the minutes of the meeting? Almost 300 million on the table for deficits and they meet in private and without all members.”

Smoke-filled room indeed. Not exactly the sunshine and transparency we heard so much about in the 2010 election.

It’s good to have Laurin back, and I don’t say that for any sort of political reasons (heck, even Will Folks is glad to have her back — and rightly so). This isn’t business; it’s personal. Laurin was one of my first blog friends back in the early days of my old blog, and helped me find my way as I was figuring the medium out, because she had been there and done that. Despite her tender years, she was old in Blog Years, compared to me. Back in 2005, SC political bloggers were a mutually supportive community, and Laurin was one of the most helpful.

Go check out her new effort. You might want to get oriented by reading her introductory post. If you forget where he blog is at any time, find the link in my rail at right.

Pub Politics Episode 42: The book and the soapbox from Wesley Donehue on Vimeo.

Stand in the place where you live

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Strong misgivings: Yossarian and the chaplain.

For the longest time, I didn’t have a quotation on my Facebook profile. This didn’t seem right. I’m all about words. I’m all about pithy expressions of one’s world view, yadda, yadda. (Although I fear that now that I no longer have the discipline of writing a weekly column, I’ve gotten somewhat lazy about it, hence the “yadda, yadda.”)

Loads of other people — people who were not overly thoughtful students of rhetoric, judging by the quotations they chose — had multiple quotations. They had all sorts of things they wanted to say — or rather, things they wanted to let other people say for them.

But the thing is, I like so MANY things that I read — one of my problems in reading books is that, as I read them, I follow people around reading great passages aloud to them (and a well-written book will have at least one such passage per page), which is why people avoid me when I’m reading books — that the idea of singling out one, or two, or even 10 such quotes just seemed too restrictive. I thought, What is that good that I’m willing to have it almost as a personal epitaph? People will see that and think this sums me up. What quotation is there that I like that much?

It would need to be semi-original (obviously, if it were entirely original, it wouldn’t be a quotation). It couldn’t be trite. I couldn’t have seen anyone else use it. It needed to say something I believe. And it needed to be something that has truly stuck with me over time, as opposed to, say, the funniest recent thing I’ve read on Twitter.

So one day it struck me that I should post this:

“I wouldn’t want to live without strong misgivings. Right, Chaplain?”
— Yossarian, in Joseph Heller’s Catch-22

So I did.

And for the longest time, that stood alone, and I was satisfied to let it do so. I liked it on a number of levels. For instance, in a day when our politics are dominated by people who are SO DAMNED SURE they’re right and other people are wrong, it had a certain countercultural UnParty flavor to it. At the same time, it’s not an existential statement of doubt — the fact that he’s saying it to a chaplain, one who certainly believes in God (although in an unorthodox way, being an Anabaptist), anchors it in belief, but still expresses the idea that one should always be willing to question one’s assumptions.

It also said something I wanted others to know about me. Because I tend to argue whatever position I’m arguing rather tenaciously, even vociferously, people tend to think I’m inflexible. They’re wrong about this. I can usually think of all the reasons I might be wrong just as readily as they can, perhaps even more readily. (After all, one of the main steps in building an argument is imagining all the objections to it.) For instance, take our arguments over the Iraq War, or the debates I have with libertarians. My interlocutors think I’m a bloodthirsty war lover, and a rigid authoritarian. But I’m not, not really. I have a tendency to argue very insistently with your more radical libertarians because I think they go overboard, and that I have to pull REALLY HARD in the other direction to achieve any balance. And on the subject of the war, well… when you reach the conclusion that military action is necessary, and that action is initiated, I feel VERY strongly that you have to see it through, and that the time for debating whether to initiate it is long past. At least, that’s the way I saw the Iraq situation. That doesn’t mean I didn’t think there were viable arguments against it in the first place — I was just unpersuaded by them.

I suppose I could go on and on about why I like the quotation, but that’s not what this post is about.

This post is about the fact that I thought that quote was sort of lonesome, so I added another today:

“Stand in the place where you live.”
— R.E.M.

And here’s why I picked this one.

I’ve always had a beef with people who constantly tear down the place where they live. You know, the whiners who always want to be someplace else. The people who seem to think that if it’s local, it’s no good. These people are destructive. They’re not good neighbors to have.

You know that I’m a born critic, and I’m constantly expressing dissatisfaction with aspects of Columbia, or South Carolina. But I do it from a love of my home, and from a determination to make it better. If there’s something you don’t like about your home, you should be trying with all your might to make it better.

To me, this is a fundamental moral obligation. And like most true believers, I can find Scripture to back it up. Remember the passage that Nathan Ballentine came up with to encourage me when I got laid off? It was Jeremiah 29:11:

For I know well the plans I have in mind for you, says the LORD, plans for your welfare, not for woe! plans to give you a future full of hope.

Well, when I looked that up, I found that I liked what preceded that just as much, the passage in which the prophet told the people not to whine about being in exile, but to affirmatively embrace the place where they were, and get on with life in it:

Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I exiled from Jerusalem to Babylon:

Build houses to dwell in; plant gardens, and eat their fruits.

Take wives and beget sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters. There you must increase in number, not decrease.

Promote the welfare of the city to which I have exiled you; pray for it to the LORD, for upon its welfare depends your own.

Let’s repeat that last:

Promote the welfare of the city to which I have exiled you; pray for it to the LORD, for upon its welfare depends your own.

Amen, I say unto you. Stand in the place where you live.

Happy 45 birthdays, Sammy!

1 Reply

One of the miracles of modern information technology is the fact that one can maintain calendar, contacts, e-mail and so forth on one’s PDA, and have it automatically update on one’s computer, and vice-versa. I used to use Outlook for this, but after a major Outlook meltdown from which I never recovered, I switched to Google, which works fairly well for me.

But, as we Catholics well know, miracles tend to be accompanied by mysteries. And one of the mysteries attending this miracle is this: For some reason, my Google calendar takes note of some people’s birthdays, and not others. What I mean is, it does this spontaneously. There are some — families, close co-workers — whose birthdays I’ve entered onto my calendar, with the annual repetition feature. Others just crop up on their own. This has something to do with the interface between Calendar and Facebook on my Blackberry, but why it picks SOME people’s birthdays to take note of and not others, I have no idea. Probably something to do with the way they set their profile settings on Facebook, but as I say, I don’t know. That’s why it’s a mystery.

Another mystery is this: Sometimes these folks’ birthdays appear on my calendar more than once. Why, I don’t know. I finally figured out that when you reload your contact files onto a platform (because of technical problems such as the aforementioned Outlook meltdown), the contacts will sometimes duplicate. And weirdly, it’s only SOME of the contacts. Some of them will only be there once, others will be double, and still others will appear five or six times. Another mystery.

But I take note of this today because a record has been set. When I came back from England and started trying to get my calendar for January in order last week, I couldn’t even SEE the calendar items for this week, because the entire laptop screen was taken up with repeated notifications of Sammy Fretwell‘s birthday. In fact, “Sammy Fretwell’s Birthday” appeared 45 times at the top of my calendar — I counted them as I deleted them (or, all but one of them — wouldn’t want to forget your birthday, Sammy).

Fortunately, I caught this before the reminders started going off on my Blackberry. Previously, when I’ve had multiple notices of someone’s birthday, I’ve had to click “dismiss” on every one of them, one after the other, before I can use the device.

Now, Sammy and I are buds, and I’m happy for him that it’s his big day. But I really didn’t need to be reminded of it 45 times. Why did this happen? It’s a mystery.

Now that I’ve typed this, one more thing to do: I need to go say “Happy Birthday” to Sammy…

My deep (get out the hip boots!) question of the day

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I asked this on Twitter this morning, and meant to bring it up on the blog ere now:

Today’s question: Why is it that Libertarians — the champions of radical individualism — have a party, and communitarians do not?

9 hours ago via ÜberTwitter

But as it happened, it engendered a thread of comments on Facebook, which I share…

Phillip Bush well, if you take the religious component out of it, I’d say the Democratic party comes closest in the US, and various Social Democratic parties in Europe.

8 hours ago · Like

Brad Warthen Why not the Christian Democrats? To me, religious faith is far more likely to lead to communitarianism than without it.

8 hours ago · Like

Phillip Bush Yes, you’re right, that’s closer still. Also paradox of US politics: GOP touts religious/cultural “values,” but central ethos to me is more anti-spiritual than US liberalism, which seeks to balance community and individual, and acknowledges values beyond just $.

8 hours ago · Like

Stanley Dubinsky Because communitarians, having community and (hence) lots of friends, are busy building their community and have no time for the pointless activities that are the hallmark of party politics. Libertarians, on the other hand, are very lonely (being out hiking on the Appalachian Trail or traveling alone to Brazil, and all that). They have few friends, and the few friends they do have are narcissistic to the point of being poor company. Desperate for something that has at least the appearance of social interaction, they form a political party. Through this, they can convince themselves that they have friends … or at least imaginary ones.

7 hours ago · Like

Doug Ross Libertarian: I’ll do it

Democrat: YOU should do it because it will make ME feel better

Republican: We won’t do anything unless there’s something in it for us

Communitarian: I hope someone else does it

There’s no Communitarian Party because there are no Communitarian principles. As soon as the community picks a side on one topic, they lose everyone on the other side. You can’t be a pro-choice Communitarian or an anti-war communitarian, can you?

9 minutes ago · Like

Brad Warthen No, you can’t be a “pro-choice” communitarian, since that’s one of the most libertarian positions you’re likely to find. I suppose you COULD be an anti-war communitarian, in that you could believe war is not healthy for communities and other living things. Of course, Tony Blair’s support for the Iraq invasion, and my own, arose from communitarian attitudes…

3 minutes ago · Like

What sort of person SAYS things like that?

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Gina reported a minute ago that Speaker Harrell was “overwhelmingly re-elected, 112 to 5, over Ralph Norman.”

As we expected.

But that’s not what interests me today. What interests me is the sort of rhetoric Norman was using going into this vote:

Norman

“In 2011, if (House members) give lip service to conservative values but don’t follow through, I’m going to be part of pointing it out and recruiting candidates to run against them,” said Norman,who defines conservative values as funding core services like law enforcement and education while making cuts elsewhere and dismissing “feel good” legislation.

“I’m planting the seeds and willing to put my name on the line with it,” he said.

What sort of person says things like that? Particularly when everyone knows he has no support. Has he no sense of irony? Has he no decency? Does he really think he sounds like anybody any sensible person would want to follow, talking about how he’s going to make the General Assembly — the same General Assembly that is rejecting him and his “leadership” — conform to his almighty Will?

This takes me back to that Nikki Haley/Sarah Palin rally that depressed me so. Nikki gets away with saying such obnoxious things because she has a pleasant voice and pleasing face and because, let’s face it, she’s a dame. Put enough sugar on it and it doesn’t sound so bad (unless you actually listen). But that doesn’t mean the things she says — such as the fact that established politicians are “scared” is “a beautiful thing,” or that she will “burn” lawmakers if they don’t obey her — are any less ugly. (As I said at the time, “What’s the difference between ugly good ol’ boy populism and Palin/Haley populism? Lipstick.”)

This mode of expression, this obnoxious, chip-on-the-shoulder attitude toward other human beings, is a distinguishing characteristic of this political trend with which Mrs. Haley, and Mr. Norman, identify.

And you know what? It is probably the one thing that bugs me the most about them.

Couldn’t they advocate the things they advocate without this hostile attitude? Is it really essential to who they are and what they stand for?

It’s too easy to get my conscience on my case

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FYI, folks, I got this from Randy Page over at SCRG, in response to this earlier post:

Appreciate your selective use of tweets from the SCRG account….

Ouch. I hate it that Randy feels put upon — I think he’s a nice guy and I want him to think I’m a nice guy, too, and all that — but it wasn’t all that selective. I mean, go look at the timeline. You be the judge.

I said the Onion thing reminded me of SOME of SCRG’s Tweets, and I showed you some of the ones I was talking about. And I didn’t have to look hard. (And the ONE Tweet I found saying something positive about schools — “Schools’ Report Cards Improve” — hardly disproves my thesis, since in the same span of time I easily found seven negative ones. Since my post, SCRG has had two new Tweets. Neither was complimentary toward public schools, and one said “South Carolina’s Worst Elementary and Middle Schools.” I’m not holding my breath waiting for that companion Tweet about the BEST schools…)

I don’t see that I did a single wrong thing there. I definitely didn’t misrepresent the overwhelmingly predominate thrust of SCRG’s Tweets. But I still feel bad about it. As Mark Twain wrote (in the voice of Huck Finn):

But that’s always the way; it don’t make no difference whether you do right or wrong, a person’s conscience ain’t got no sense, and just goes for him anyway. If I had a yaller dog that didn’t know no more than a person’s conscience does I would pison him. It takes up more room than all the rest of a person’s insides, and yet ain’t no good, nohow. Tom Sawyer he says the same.

Uh-oh. Now I’m going to get in trouble with animal lovers. Hey, it was Huck Finn who said it, not me… There’s goes my danged conscience again…

Wearing your allegiance on your sleeve — or on your Facebook page, anyway

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Right after the election, I noticed a Nikki Haley bumper sticker, and it struck me that I hadn’t seen a whole lot of those during the election, which caused me to Tweet:

Ever notice how you see more bumper stickers for a candidate AFTER he/she wins than you did before Election Day? I do…

It may be purely a perception flaw on my part, but after a number of elections I have strongly suspected a belated “bandwagon” effect accounting for the number of fresh, unfrayed, clean bumper stickers that I see for the new officeholder even a year or more after the election.

It’s probably a little of both. But that means the bandwagon effect is to some extent at play. And that, to me, is one of the oddest things about human nature. I just don’t understand the bandwagon effect in politics. Either you like a candidate or you don’t. Either you believe in a cause or you don’t. What sort of weak-willed person adjusts his judgments according to what’s more popular? But we all know it happens. It’s one reason why campaigns stress polls that show their side winning; it tends to contribute to a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I can sort of see it working with sports. After all, I ignored the Braves for years until their worst-to-first performance in 1991, after which I couldn’t get enough of them for several years. But that’s about the fact that it’s more enjoyable to watch someone play baseball WELL than to watch them play badly. And I’m very much a September/October kind of baseball fan, because that’s when you see the best, most exciting play.

But choosing whom you’ll support on the basis of who you think will win, or even worse, someone who has already won? That’s either contemptible, or just plain weird.

But anyway, I didn’t think any more about the bumper stickers until I saw this Tweet today from Nettie Britts:

If you still have a Sheheen avatar you really need to change that.

Really, I thought… how come? And why Sheheen specifically? I asked that, and Logan Stewart jumped in with:

lbstewart Logan Stewart

@BradWarthen @nettie_b the day after he lost election, I made my FB profile pic one of @vincentsheheen & me b/c I’m proud of his work in SC

I guess she was talking about this.

Nettie responded:

@BradWarthen @lbstewart I think it looks silly to still have campaign stuff up. You don’t need to communicate message anymore.

This seemed sensible enough. It’s sort of what I think when I see those bumper stickers. Nevertheless, I was inspired to go put up a picture with Sheheen in it on the blog — I put it on the page you get when you use the search function.

Because Lord knows, we’re going to see a lot of pictures of Nikki Haley — the choice of just 51 percent of SC voters — over the next few years. Bumper stickers, too. Just watch.

So what’s the harm in having something up for the rest of us?

The big, gigantic, huge ideological shift of 2010: About 4.76 percent of voters changed their minds

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Sometime over the last couple of days I was talking to a Republican friend who insisted that the American people decided to reject Obama and all his works on Tuesday, that the ideological message was clear and unequivocal.

His view was similar to the one express in this Tweet posted by @SCHotline today:

SC Politics 11/5: America to Democrats: Stop what you’re doi…http://conta.cc/cz79tE viahttp://SCHotline.us #scgop #sctweets #scdem

I, of course, disagreed. I believe that elections seldom express clear messages, for one thing. People have many reasons for voting as they do, and it’s almost impossible to classify or quantify them with any degree of certainty, even with exit polls — which necessarily boil motivations down to explanations that can be quantified. Voters could vote against a guy because, deep down, they don’t like the tie he wears — something a pollster is unlikely to capture.

What happened was that a small proportion of the electorate — a minority of us independents in the middle — voted Democratic in 2006 and 2008, but Republican in 2010. And they are just as likely to vote the other way in two or four years. Believe me; these are my people. I’m one of them. It’s a swing voter thing; someone who calls himself a Republican, or a Democrat — something who really believes all that junk they spout — couldn’t possibly understand.

My friend saw the election, for instance, as a clear, unambiguous rejection of Obamacare. Please. The word may poll well (for Republicans), but most voters couldn’t explain to you what the recent health care legislation actually DOES. Neither can I, unless you give me a couple of days to refresh my memory on it. I don’t even understand how it’s going to affect me, much less the country. If you don’t know what it is, how can you possibly know, clearly and unambiguously, that you are against it?

As a measure of how the country FEELS about the president, sure. But as a measure of a clearly defined ideology, no way. Which is good, since I don’t like ideologies.

Anyway, today my friend sent me this piece from The New Republic (hoping I would consider the source favorably, no doubt), headlined “It’s the Ideology, Stupid.” Well, I was offended at the original version of that phrase when the Clinton people used it; I am no more persuaded by this one.

What I DID like about the piece were the stats provided from exit polls. To begin with, they told me that in 2006, “those who voted were 38 percent Democratic, 36 percent Republican, and 28 percent Independent,” and this year the self-identification was 36/36/28. Well, right there I’m not seeing a big ideological shift. But my favorite stats were here:

We get more significant results when we examine the choices Independents made. Although their share of the electorate was virtually unchanged from 2006, their behavior was very different. In 2006, Democrats received 57 percent of the Independent vote, versus only 39 percent for Republicans. In 2010 this margin was reversed: 55 percent Republican, 39 percent Democratic. If Independents had split their vote between the parties this year the way they did in 2006, the Republicans share would have been 4.7 percent lower—a huge difference.

OK, let’s parse that. Independents are 28 percent of the electorate. In 2006, Dems got 57 percent of that segment, while the GOP got 39 percent. This year, they went 55 percent Republican and 39 percent Democratic. So that means roughly 17 percent of independents switched their preference from Democratic to Republican.

Seventeen percent of 28 percent (the percentage of the electorate that is independent) is 4.76 percent. I make no claims to be a statistician, so y’all check my math there. But I think I’m right.

So… instead of “America” sending a clear message to Democrats, or to anyone for that matter, what we have is 4.76 percent of the electorate voting differently from the way it voted in 2006 — for whatever reason.

“America” doesn’t change that much from election to election, folks. A few people in the middle slosh back and forth. And I think my explanation for why they do is as valid as the grand, oversimplified ideological one: People were dissatisfied in 2006 and 2008, so they elected Democrats to fix the things that were making them dissatisfied. Nothing has yet been fixed (even, for instance, if Obamacare will do the trick — which I doubt — it hasn’t accomplished anything yet), so they’re still dissatisfied, so they’re taking their custom to the other shop.

And that’s what happened.

Oh, by the way — the writer in TNR went on to explain his grand theory that it’s all about ideology in the subsequent paragraphs. I found them unpersuasive. At the very most, he quantifies an “ideological shift” of 11 percent — and I don’t think it’s ideological, I think it’s semantics. I think the word “conservative” feels more comfortable to more people this year. But even if he’s right, that’s an ideological shift of 11 percent. And 11 percent ain’t “America.”

Go read it and see what you think.

Just the facts, Jack: Dept. of Ed. employment

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So we’ve heard Vincent Sheheen say there are only about 800 something state Department of Education employees, and Nikki comes back that no, there are eleven hundred and something (going by memory, since I can’t see my DVR from here).

And you think, “Whoa! Surely she wouldn’t give an actual NUMBER if it’s not true!” That is, you think that if you’re one of those simple folk who think numbers represent a special kind of truth.

And if you don’t know our Nikki, who is completely unbothered by actual facts.

Happily, self-styled “Crafty ol’ TV reporter” Jack Kuenzie bothered to check:

Debate issue: # of employees @ SC DOE? Dept. says 1,179 FTEs authorized, many slots vacant. Filled: 449 in bus shops, 434 administrative.

Those of you inclined to be overly kind will say, “Then they were both right!”

No.

The context in which this keeps coming up has to do with Nikki repeating the canard that our wicked, evil public education system never lays off “bureacrats,” but always lays off teachers first, because… well, just because it’s mean and evil.

Which, like most of what she says, is not true. The Department of Education — you know, the place where you find people actually enforce all those accountability rules and regulations that people who don’t trust public education have instituted over the years — actually employs far fewer than it’s authorized to employ.

And half of them (actually, more than half) keep the buses running. Just as Vincent keeps explaining.

Is that really Andre behind those souvenir photos?

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Since I watch my football on HDTV and don’t actually rub elbows with the fans, I haven’t seen what Andy Shain, business editor at The State, wrote of on Twitter the other day:

Spotted Lt Gov Andre Bauer hawking framed photos after USC game. Hid himself behind one of his photos when I tried to shoot a pix. #sctweets

@Erinish3 @paigecoop they were gamecock-related photos. The one he held up was the USC flag atop the statehouse. Will post photo soon.

@TheBigPicture it was a surreal sight after the surreal sight of watching the gamecock football team beat no. 1

Look who’s hawking: Lt gov Andre Bauer shields himself while selling photos after USC game. #sctweets http://twitpic.com/2w76h9

Above you see the image to which he was referring.

If that is Andre, then, as a guy who was unemployed for nearly a year, I’m all for what he’s doing. To quote Don Corleone, “I want to congratulate you on your new business and I’m sure you’ll do very well and good luck to you. Especially since your interests don’t conflict with mine.”

Actually, I don’t know if it’s a new business. I seem to recall that Andre started a business when he was in college having something to do with Gamecock memorabilia, but I had idea he was still doing it.

And the thing is, if there’s a fortune to be made in souvenir photos, Andre will make it. He styles himself the hardest-working man in SC politics, and the hustle he’s always shown on the hustings backs it up. I’ll bet if HE were trying to sell blog ads, he’d do better than I have…

Et tu, Chip? Not quite, but almost…

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It says a good deal about Nikki Haley that even one of Mark Sanford’s closest allies is joining, however tentatively, the Greek chorus of Republicans concerned about her candidacy.

I thought it was remarkable enough that Chip Campsen’s sister would lead a dissident group of mainstream Republicans in challenging the Haley insurgency. Republicans don’t do that, not after the primary is over.

But now, Sen. Campsen himself is showing up in a news story about his sister’s group, as I learned from the Republicans for Sheheen Facebook page:

Sen. Chip Campsen, R-Isle of Palms, last week acknowledged that the questions surrounding Haley could have consequences.

“I’ve been on the sidelines,” he said. “Party loyalty is subordinate to principle loyalty. It’s important to commit to the principles the institution stands for more than the institution. If this stuff is true (about Haley), then there are certain principles in the party that are at stake. I’m not saying it is true, but if it is, my party loyalty would not override my commitment to principle.”

Campsen is Mosteller’s brother and a former senior policy adviser to Gov. Mark Sanford. Campsen has not disclosed publicly what he thinks about Mosteller’s efforts.

No, he’s not going to come out for Vincent Sheheen, any more than Bobby Harrell will openly do so in his tortured missives aimed at debunking what Nikki and her supporters say.

But folks, this is about as close as Republican officeholders, from the Harrell variety to the Sanford wing, are likely to come to screaming “Don’t vote for this woman!”

This is probably still too subtle for the people likely to consider voting for her. But to people who know the score, the message is clear.

Meanwhile, sister Cyndi — who was an acknowledged power in GOP circles before her brother was — is claiming her group has grown to 100, “including former Charleston County Republican Party Chairman Samm McConnell and Chairwoman Linda Butler Johnson.”

How much do YOU text? And why?

13 Replies

There was a fascinating piece in The Wall Street Journal today, headlined, “Y U Luv Texts, H8 Calls.” Cute, huh? Anyway, the short answer to the implied question was, “We Want to Reach Others But Not to Be Interrupted.” But there was more to it than that.

There were some pretty incredible numbers in there:

For anyone who doubts that the texting revolution is upon us, consider this: The average 13- to 17-year-old sends and receives 3,339 texts a month—more than 100 per day, according to the Nielsen Co., the media research firm. Adults are catching up. People from ages 45 to 54 sent and received 323 texts a month in the second quarter of 2010, up 75% from a year ago, Nielsen says.

100 texts a day? Yeah, kids are pretty nuts about these things, but 100 texts a day? And that’s the average, rather than a pathological extreme? Come on.

Still, its undeniable that for the younger generations, texting is far more important than using the phone as a, well, phone.

That’s true even for an alter cocker like me — although “texts” aren’t my preferred medium. I’m far more likely to use my Blackberry to send an e-mail, or post a Tweet, or send a DM, or respond to a blog comment, than I am to use it to talk to anyone. Enough so that I’ve crippled my thumbs. (The pain is still considerable; I see a doctor next week.)

In total, I’ve sent out 2,702 Tweets since I started a little more than a year ago. That’s a lot, but hardly 100 a day.

Texting is undeniably useful, particularly for communicating under certain circumstances with people who have cell phones that are not “smart.” Last night, for instance, I went to a reception at Rosewood’s at the fairgrounds. When I was leaving that, I planned to connect with my daughter, who had brought her kids to the fair. I tried calling her, and couldn’t hear her over the fair noise. So I texted, “Where are you? I couldn’t hear…” She replied, “We’re @ the picnic tables under a tent right outside entrance to grandstand,” and I answered, “OK, stay there…”

Undeniably useful. But as a substitute for other forms of communication, no, I don’t think so. And how on Earth is it appealing for people who don’t have full QWERTY keyboards on their devices? Talk about tedious…

Kids don’t seem to mind, though. Which provokes a thought: Back in the ’60s, many of us thought we were SO different from our parents. And outwardly, perhaps we were. But this latest development suggests that kids today are actually, cognitively different from us. They’re wired entirely different, and technology has done the wiring.

And what are the social, cultural, political and personal consequences of that?

Promote the welfare of the city to which I have exiled you; pray for it to the LORD, for upon its welfare depends your own.

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