Voice in the Wilderness

After two days of new media oriented sessions, I need to have

Cathie Adams:
Went to Kyoto and quickly figured out it was all about politics.

"Global Warming" is now "Climate Change". Models can't work sun, wind, ocean currents into climate change simulations.

Kyoto delegate admitted it had nothing to do with the environment and everything to do economics.

17k scientists are saying that there is "no convincing evidence" of global warming.

Bali Conference: Al Gore claims in two years, the US will be "somewhere else"...hints at Dem administration

Already spend $16.6B in federal tax subsidies for "green" energy. $24/unit of solar power, $23/unit for wind, clean coal $20/unit (which all = less than 1% of energy produced).

Windfall profits tax on oil companies? 1980-1986 already had it...now were twice as dependent on foreign oil. Bummer! "Drill here, drill now, pay less!"

Iain Murray, from the Competitive Enterprise Institute
Fled Great Britain 10 years to Virginia when the Tony Blair Gov't was elected....Brits now looking at carbon emissions ration.
Author of "7 Really Inconvenient Truths" ....it's all a hoax to let them take over your life. They're following the DDT model in 1960's, now many people in Africa have died b/c DDT is not allowable.

See "Global Warming: What should Texas do?" for TPPF
Concl:

• Science inclusive
• Expand capacity
• Cap and trade is a scam

Obfuscation of climate science: recent NOAA press release was propagandized: Was this June the 9th warmest or 113 coolest? How are they being measured? See http://www.wattsupwiththat.com/ and http://www.icecap.us/ for more details. Also, check out globalwarming.org

Affordable energy brings immense benefits: Wind and solar in 10 years per Al Gore. Need $88B subsidy for Wind/Solar to replace oil/gas/coal/nuclear. When the price of energy goes up, the burden often falls on the poor.

Emissions: Europe and Kyoto countries are worse emitters than the US since 1997. Plus, costs of compliance exceed the costs of the steady state.

Phil Kerpen:
Cap and trade "hidden tax": $1.2trn tax increase over 7 years. Both McCain and Obama support it....ugh! So, see NoClimateTax.com. Pledge you won't hide a big tax hike in an environmental bill.

EPA may do these initiatives through rule making, without Congressional and Executive direction. Even commercial kitchens could be subject to it. See the public comment section on http://www.epa.gov/ or http://www.regulations.gov/. Blog on this and distribute now! Comment ASAP!!!
Here's the URL: http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsf/0/CE6311A041013ACE85257483005CDD68

Also, see "The Great Global Warming Swindle" by the BBC.

See also http://planetgore.nationalreview.com/ and http://www.cei.org/

Should look at "no regrets" mitigation steps, like changing air line routing from beacon-based to GPS-based.

Sherry Sylvester: There is no counter in Texas for liberal local press bias.
The biggest tilt is in local papers. AAS 2X as likely to put positive story about Dem Congressman than a Republican.

We don't be need to beat the NY Timees, we need to beat the Statesman and the Star-Telegram.

Dan Gainor: Lots of layoffs in MSM organs. But traditional journalism isn't going away, they're only shifting to the online world. So, blogs will be competing more with MSM online offerings.

So, work to build and protect credibility: be right on the facts. So, have someone to help proof my content.

MSM still burdened by old bureaucratic, unionized mindset.

Know your opposition: Have files on all the local editors and reporters in my local market. Use what they do for my benefit: call them on biased content.

Douglas Kirk
What is the difference b/t old and new media

Who
Old looks at subscribers, new looks at traffic

What
Old has books/mags by topic new has communities by topic

Where
Old: Usually local, regional, national by specialty new: global, with some local specialization

When
Old: periodically: monthly, weekly, daily, etc. More archivable New: immediate, archving is catching up, easier to retrieve. Google teaming with with small town publishers to capture, index small town newspapers, currently scanning and indexing many years worth of small town papers

Why
Both: want to change the world

The revolution: Old media hard to access, new media is much easier. Old media the danger is the bias, danger with the new media is possible inaccuracy.

Old media, had too much control, but getting easy. New media has too much liberty, now more control is beginning to emerge.

Rumors of the death of the MSM are greatly exaggerated

Q. Is the banner ad business model sustainable?
A. Some model is sustainable:

• Small central office, with distributed workforce (not paying for overhead)
• Sugar daddy/Soros approach, run MSM outlet as a non-profit....they become even more liberal

When we're blogging, might think about buying MSM ads

Q. Texas Muslims, praying imam flap in Texas Senate

A. Bloggers should work with small town papers to get the story out, start making yourself a source; call/contact bloggers going off on the other side of the issue (building the relationship, getting to know the person, helps diffuse issues)

Next steps:

• see http://www.businessandmedia.org
• also see http://www.smalltownnewspapers.com, see Bulverde Standard (with Freedom Fighter in the subject line)
• Get permission to put small town paper editors on your emailing list, ping them with serious newstories of local interest

Sorry for my poor resolution pix...time for a new digital camera

• Pro-military, anti-anti-war
• American SheepDogs
• Anti-jihadist efforts
• John Murtha v Bill Russell. MSM won't talk of Russell, so keep up the blogging and web 2.0 activity

Consider LtGen Chesty Puller pearls of wisdom

• Now we can shoot at those bastards from every direction
• Hit hard, hit fast, hit often

Every blog post helps save this constitutional republic.

I'm here liveblogging with Robb Wilson, the Samuelson's, and David Shieh from the Austin American Statesman.


"The program will begin in one minute. " I wish I had that deep, resonant, non-regional-radio-voice.

The morning session boasts an all-star line up, though I've been informed that many are neocons...I'll be on guard.

Now showing the AFP anti-earmarks video. It's encouraging to see that grass-roots lobbying and activisim can have an impact.

Tim Phillips



Off the bat, the first message is showing the media that citizens can stand up against overzealous government.

It's also to send a message to elected officials. AFP summits help right thinking pols will know they is a constituency for them.

The third reason is to educate, train, motivate, inspire grassroots activists....and bloggers.

Global warming (or is it "climate change"?) is the biggest threat to our freedom 'cause it means:

1. Massive new tax increases. $1.2 trillion federal tax increase over a decade. Yee-ouch! Also, look at gas and energy price increases, too.
   
2. Lost jobs. $1.2M lost jobs, not just in energy sectors either. Less freedom. We already have to deal with the growing alphabet soup of gov't regulators. Now come the energy police....

Likes melding conservative activism and online world. Lone Star Times outpaces Burnt Orange Report on total traffic ...heh

Have the potential to get ahead online overnight....Need to communicate new messages using the new media.

Stephen Moore



A gun club newby....welcome to the club Mr. Moore. He got outshoot by little girls ;-)

But shooting guns is a God given right as is driving 75 mph in western states.

These and other freedoms are in great peril right now because of

1. Taxes: Mr. Moore is not a fan of Jimmy Carter. He's quoting numbers....speaking my language: Top 1% of income earners pay 40% of taxes. Top 10% pay 72% of taxes. All Americans above the median pay 97.1% taxes. Under Obama, the highest tax rate would be 53%....up to 60% in NY, CA, NJ.

Yet, in the rest of the world, low taxes and free market policies are sweeping the rest of the world, especially sub 20% flat taxes. I guess Reagan was right!

Spain, Sweeden, France (France) all cutting taxes.

Ireland 48% -> 12% corporate tax rate

Capital is always Dublin Ba. Dum. Ba. Cha.

In 2010, estate tax goes from 0% back up to the 50% or whatever....not a good prospect for older Americans that year.

2. Global warming hoax: "The greatest canard every played on the American people." It's hard to get accurate, or accurately portrayed, data on global temperatures.

Polar bears 25k to 50k...they're not going extinct.

$1.2 trillion

3. No bailouts! The mortgage companies got themselves into this mess, they can get themselves out. Amen brother.

Lots of work to do to protect and advance prosperity.


Grover Norquist


15 years w/o a tax increase.

On one side, many people just want to be left alone: Tax payers, property owners, business owners, 2nd amendment advocates, practicing faith community. So, in spite of other difference, these groups can coalesce around being left alone.

On the other side: trial lawyers, coercive utopians, the two-sided welfare regime...all with a long list of mandates for tax-payers supported goodies.

So, we need to restrain the tax-payer money going to them, then they'll have to turn on each other.

Discussion on branding: Republicans who vote for tax increases are the "rathead in the Coke bottle": it hurts the Republican brand. So, tax issue should help with the election this fall.

Obama tax scheme is going to hurt 2/3 of voters who own stock.

See http://www.congressionaleffect.com/: Investments when Congress out of session 1.6% market return vs 17%.

Vision is to get every government check written documented online.

Merrie Spaeth

Swift Boats Veterans for Truth proved to John Kerry that paybacks are hell. So what's relevant today:

1. Power of negative words: Don't repeat and deny!

2. There is a role for storytellers. Need to tell true, compelling stories that characterize the entrepreneurial spirit. So, our assignment this election is to do what you can, where you are, with what you have.

Michael Williams

The solution to the energy problem is Michael Williams. Simply channel his energy and light half the cities in Texas ;-)

Still a friend of Bush....Pray for the President.

Talk on blogging community. He's been blogging since 2005.

But seriously, on energy

1. More supply is a good thing. Liberals kinda' understand this: they
With almost with a street preachers zeal..."Drill for the benefit of America".

Don't put our food in our cars! Drill on East coast, West coast, ANWR, whereever we have energy within our grasp at home.

2. Continue with natural gas, coal. We have a 200 year supply in Texas alone! But isn't coal "environmentally unsound." Well, Comm Williams is partial to black stuff ;-)
Seriously, can do clean coal.

3. Fire up the Nukes! We can safely store the spent nuclear fuel.

God bless Michael Williams!

John Fund

Pessimism is due to "lame stream media" filtering. But can't be guided by their spin and defeatism. Smart libs know theirs is a minority view. The polling on small gov't vs big gov't same as 2004, so there's potential to turn things around.

So what to do? Ignore MSM spin, attempts to demoralize. "They fear campaigns in the fall like dracula fears a cross". Heh

In fall campaigns, where voters start paying attention: in last 10 pres. elections, Dems lead in Gallup poll 8 of 10 times in July, only 3 won office. 1976, 33 pts to 2 pts down, and others. Only once, since 1944 have Dems gotten 51% of vote in the presidential election. All is not lost, so stop acting like a big wuss.

Don't wait around till 2010. If they have all 3 branches, they'll change the rules in their favo

• Card check elections: no more secret ballot elections for union members
• See Michegan court purging plan
• Same day voter registration....gasps and sighs!
• Felon voting
• No excuse absentee voting
• Campaign finance reform

So, man up!

1. The election is not over!
2. If not enthusiastic about beating Obama, get ready for not having power again for a long time

Elizabeth Ames Jones

Texas is rich in energy

• 30% of natural gas from Texas
• Suprisingly, lots of uranium in coastal counties

Remaining oil and gas reserves, while mature, do exist and can be produced. So embrace new technologies, competitive market, responsible transportation and refining.

• 26 trillion cubic feet of natural gas known in Prudue Bay, plus 114 trillion more potentially.
• 300 bn cubic feet of natural gass per day produced from Barnet Shale

Technologies: Can use horizontal drilling

What about the future: Need to encourage nuclear, other alternative sources and conservation

Can't wait for government to solve this problem!

We lost because we did not stand for anything positive or constructive.

The Honorable Steve Lonegan

Talking against the entitlement state....because he's a victim of it.

Had eye disease then moved in with grandparents after death of father. Family never expected an welfare check.

Following college, totally lost eyesight, became client of NJ HHS agency.

Saw affirmative action putting him in a box post MBA school, made it hard to get a job.

So took up kitchen cabinent sales job. Liked the $$$ in the classified job posting. Became successful, eventually became presented opportunity to buy the business.

1995 ran for mayor and won in an upset.

Ended up as 3 term mayor with a budget lower than when he took over! (editorial note: this is real "change we can believe in!")

Can look to Founders for inspiration, but must look to the living for leadership.

The Honorable John Carter

Why pull together and defeat Obama....

• Supreme Court recently upheld 2nd amendment
• Liberal Dems trying to national oil industry

On energy

Liberal Dems want to tax people who want to look for oil and gas. Carter would drill through the hotel floor to get oil if it was here. Liberal Dems energy policy wouldn't get them to work tomorrow!

But we're winning the war on oil and drilling: President announcement for off shore drilling has reduced oil price $11/barrel in last week.

"We're not going to convince Nancy Pelosi because she's brain dead." But have won over some Dem colleagues by standing firm.

Erick Ericson

"It's great to be in Austin, and not be indicted by Ronnie Earle."

Need to stop being pundits and start being activists. See RedState.org: going local. So share your story of what is going on.

2010 is a big race because of upcoming reapportionment. This year's legislature will redraw the lines.

Can be the Samuel Prescotts, get our friends and families engaged.

The Honorable Michael Steele

What he learned from Senate run, can't please everyone, but can tick them all off at the same time. So, that's kinda' what happened in in 2006: R's failed to lead and uphold their principles.

Thus, an opportunity to stand again on principle: Wealth is created by individuals encouraged to take risks.

Likes the AFP them, but want's conservatives to live by their principles again.

Before we leave, today, should answer some questions:

How serious am I about rebuilding the conservative movement one person at a time

How committed am I to fiscal restraint

How committed am I to fight cultural relativism, fight for property rights, transparency in gov't and elections, to start acting on what I believe?

America has changed, but our principles haven't nor their proven effectiveness. We just need to "get our mojo back." Same issues motivate voters today as during the Reagan years.

Gov't should be restrained so as to not infringe individual freedom and responsibility

In this 2 year campaign, many have talked of change. So let's

• Change education from gov't control to school choice
• Change the tax code to encourage savings
• Change energy policy: Drill, baby, drill
• Win GWOT

Our best days are ahead of us!

Steele's mother sent him to private school and Johns Hopkins on $3.80/hr.

Take up the call to spread the message and stand against socialism and Marxism.

What am I prepared to push back on? What am I prepared to fight for? If you're not grasping it and moving forward, there's the door.

American will always be a place of opportunity: blog about it, talk about it, sing about it. Move arm in arm together.

Online Identify Management a form of Search Engine Optimization with William Beutler



"Search Engine" = Google, all other search engines run similar to Google

Need to get to the top. 1st three results get the most hits. Only 1/3 goes to the second position.

At most, some will go as far as the third page to find something.

Monitoring:

• Google yourself
• Set up Google alerts to see if anyone is talking about you, can receive via email and/or RSS. (BTW: Technorati.com not as good in blog search anymore)
• Set benchmarks

Then, blog, twitter, use social networking accounts (see New Media Strategies)....throw content out there.

Google seem to favor blogs vs regular new sites: more cross-linking increase the credibility score.

Then, build out the online profile: LinkedIn, YouTube, FriendFeed, Flickr, RapLeaf, Naymz. Create accounts using my name as I want it to be searched. RapLeaf, Naymz take it a step further for online reputation management. FriendFeed aggregates the other sites.

Cross-post blog entries: Find allies where can comment or submit guest posts.

Use digg, magnolia, newsvine, delicious.com, stumbleupon to ID user use and tagging, as well as more content for Google to find.

Find something bigger than myself to which to connect.

Answer stories about you.

Use consistent names when commenting

Buy opponents names on Google to make their reputation management harder

Wikipedia: Own the topic; find one strategy and stick to it - have one person be the owner, preferrably one who is trustworthy, competent w/Wikipedia, and some "distance" from the client or campaign

Stay ahead of new platforms and technologies. Consider mahalo.com

Employers, voters, opposition will all "Google" you.

Memerandum.com (sp?): a good aggregator for political blogs - ID's blogs getting linked to. Good place to find what bloggers are talking about, contribute to the conversation, link and get links. Use it to build relationships with higher tier bloggers, but don't be a sychophant about it. Might track along with their content and write posts that build upon or relate to their posts.

Wikipedia: Check out the "Village Pump" forum to ID the guidelines that you really need to follow

Ralph Benko: "We're at the inflection point of a revolution."

NTU YouTube vids



Elizabeth Terrell on web 2.0 tools to learn



Tax Freedom Day song and vid: Uncle Sam eating my paycheck...nice visual
The song is funny, entertaining and makes the point in less than 3 minutes.

UStream.tv
Digital video stream
Includes a built in chat feature and archiving

Qik.com
Computer or phone vid streaming: great for streaming city council meetings on the phone

Seesmic = Twitter + YouTube. Post vids, get quick feedback.


Ralph Benko remarks
How to use these tools to win political battles? Don't use only for communicating a message. Must use to build community, make them simple direct, and action-oriented. See moveon.org example where a lot of people can do a little bit.

• Post a Tsunami story, then have a "Contribute" button
• Post a story on a bill, then show a link to contact your Congressman

Build partnerships, not just an audience.

See AFourP YouTube channel for Al Gore gas-guzzling entourage. Find and capture the daily hypocrisies of elites. Also, see TheNextRight.com.

Q. Libs are more agile with technology, how can we make a better use of web 2.0 technologies
A. We haven't had to be ahead online before. Should avoid duplication, but try to innovate for independent conservative thinkers.

See "How to Use the Web to Help the World" By Ralph Benko
Benko's Laws include:

1. Joseph Pulitzers Law: Put it before them briefly, clearly, picturesquely, accurately


2. Thomas Nast's Law and Boss Tweed's Complaint: Tweed - stop those d--- pictures! Use pix, vids


3. Arthur C. Clarke's 2nd Law: The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to venture slightly past those limits into the impossible


4. Limon Beecher's Law: No great advance has ever been made in science, politics, religion without controversy


5. Emma Lazarus' Law: Web can be the means to unleash the "imprisioned lightening" of the American people


6. Metcalfe's Law: The value of a telecom is proportional to the square of the number of users


7. Beinchini's Law of Viral Loops: If you create something people naturally enjoy, they will sell it for you. Then you become a public utility.

So, get the style clear, compelling, sexy. Make it hip to be conservative!

C/C Obama vs. McCain website: Lots of social network features on Obama site, like Twitters, Meetups. Sam Adams people have researched Obama, McCain sites. On top of that, many voters seem to be wrapping themselves up in his identify. Obama's site seems to make it sound like he cares about other's message, and let me tell you how it fits in with mine. It makes connections locally and socially.

A similar dynamic occurs in churches: newer churches focus on building community, small groups, etc.

Ron Paul supporter: Felt excluded, though agree on 90% of issues.

BTW: "Focusing on the 90% we agree on" has been a common theme in all the sessions I've attended so far....perhaps a pre-emptive maneuver to prevent a mini-Ron Paul Revolution at the conference.

Benko: Check out thedemocracyproject.ning.com. 3 classes of people

• Spectators
• Commentators
• Players

The real battles played out in the nominating process, not necessarily elections. So, volunteer on the county committee.

Hosted by Matt Sheffield of Dialog Media, formerly of RatherBiased.com

Why we're here: to have blogging enabled for activism

"Someone should do something" that's the activist impulse.

Know your site

• What is the genre? Political, Personal.


• Avoid schizophrenia

ID a focus area or a few focus area(s) to have the most impact. Concentrate on doing a few things well to distinguish yourself

Be a reporter to control the information and the debate. But also must be responsible and have facts to back up the story.

Originality: Find something that other people aren't saying. Do original stories, analysis, pix, vids, interviews....write about pols and bloggers will make them care about your.

Find way to plug into posting stream with other likeminded blogs hitting the same topic.

To get the word out, email links to reporters. They're lazy and will likely welcome sources of easy content. Write about:

• Events
• Public Meetings
• Election Coverage

Use Twitter

To improve search engine score:

• Use category tags on blogs
• Use same phrase for same topic to improve search engine score
• Use key words in the title tag
• Surround search terms with teaser content to drive click throughs on search engine

Vids

Can be good supplement to content

Include maps/graphs to illustrate stories

Vids are high work/high reward actvity (be sure to rate vids as needed, low for libs, high for conservative clips)

Agenda for Blog Audience Generation

• Organize
• Connect: Find sites that want my content: blogivist.com, redstate.com, freerepublic.com, youtube.com, wikipedia on topics in which I'm interested (and have blog posts to link to), word content in a neutral-sounding tone and constantly visit and edit the page..."own" the wikipedia page
• Report: Report new stuff! What are other people not talking about that's important? And get to know MSM reporters too, even if they're liberal, they can be good to get to know. Also, in the Web 2.0 world, sharing information is power.
• Market: To boost traffic, write about/link to other bloggers, email original content to other bloggers (whole post, or maybe teaser content). Traffic expectation: 1/day and cross post to other sites: w/in 6 months, could get 1000 unique visits per day. Though there's more to blogging than just traffic, need to also think about influence close to home.

Time and content production: should post once per day....fit activism into your lifestyle. If crunched for time, may join group blog.

Stream of Consciousness Brain Dump on the Samsphere session

Judging from the agenda, there are some promising themes to explore:

• Intro: the SamSphere and Blogivists.com
• Objectives, Strategies, Tactics
• How the Other Half Lives
• Building and Sustaining the Texas blogosphere
• Blogivists and Wiki's

I. Introduction

SamSphere: community building, invite-only "jam session"

blogivists.com

II. Discussion #1

Group sharing session: The questions seem intriguing, but the format seems a little awkward...maybe I spend too much time online. It's not entirely clear which group I'm in. Could use a facillitator....but, like all good bloggers, we're beginning to self-organize.

How to make money with blogging? Need to make my blog part of something bigger. Should also discuss how to measure, monetize, and capture the value created by quality web 2.0 content.

Bulverde Standard publisher: Send him our blog links. Interesting perspective about how newspapers have a built-in editorial filter, but the web does not. Later, we should talk more about how to make web news and blogs a better, self-policing entity.

"My name is Harvey and I'm an alcoholic"...oops! Blogs to re-establish constitutional principles.

RightWingSparkle.com: blogging for the children ;-) Wants to influence her children.

YeahRightWhatever.com: Home schooling her kids, wants to influence them. Being conservative is not only a political exercise.

III. How the Other Half Lives

Emily Z.: why do this exercise...to start building community...."community is the soul of revolution". Good point. What are the ongoing, purposeful community-building activities we should engage in and who should do it?

Liberal bloggers are better at and started with community. They seem to be far more invested (emotionally, spiritually even) in politics. Can independent-minded conservatives, with jobs, coalesce in the same manner? How?

Thinking Globally, Acting Locally:

• Develop clear overarching message
• Select an idealistic, achievable goals
• Make contact with like-minded person
• Share your information
• Connect and build your network
• Identify specific big goal and move forward (or a lot of something small)

In order to change, one must be bold. "Well behaved people rarely make history." Think w/courage.

Send information on to friends, family, online associates....do "Drill here, drill now, pay less" on a local scale.

See americansolutions.com for contributing and bubbling up ideas.

Be a part of other mainstream communities: Wikipedia, YouTube.

Online Community Building

• Helps counter isolation, online and face-to-face
• Connect groups that are issue-oriented
• Connect the groups to state parties

Why here, now? Why do we care?

• Blogosphere is a sanity aid
• Serve as rsc for other media

IV. Discussion #2: Building a Liberty Minded Online Community

Should start an Austin conservatives blogger alliance, make it more open, moderated but otherwise freewheeling like RedState.org.

Erick Ericson chat:

Libs have fewer bloggers, but more group blogs. Conservatives are more individually-reliant.

2008 is a big election, but 2010 is the really big election: That's when state legislatures will be reapportioned. So, now's the time to organize. \

See the Georgia example: local bloggers can have an impact.

Cross post to RedState, TownHall, even local content....Add to the conversation!!!

Nic Hall: Online ID managment

Be sure to make online personas the same across social networking communities and applications

What's the attraction of Blogivist.com

1. Community
2. Support
3. Recognition

Wiki's: Use them to aggregate and evaluate content on a particular topic.

Check out UrbanGrounds post and pix on this session here: Good resolution pix, tell-it-like-it-is commentary.

Ballotpedia.org and Judgepedia.org are also useful research tools.

Sunshine Review: Could be a useful tool for digging deeper into government activities and ranking their (mostly inadequate) websites.

Today marks the beginning of the first RightOnline summit, a confab of conservative and right-leaning libertarian bloggers from around Texas and the nation, convening in Austin on June 18-19.

The RightOnline home page says: "RightOnline will serve as a meeting place for the free enterprise movement, focusing on how we can more effectively leverage the power of the internet and work together to achieve our common goals. "

To better understand web 2.0 technologies and build the Texas conservative online community, I propose that the the issues below more thoroughly explored at the conference:

• Why do we blog? What needs are being met by blogging? How can the broader Texas conservative blogging community address those needs to increase the community's numbers, quality, and influence?
• Community building: Should there be some intentional shepherding of the Texas conservative blog community? If so, what form would it take?
• Unified online presence: Is there some aggregation portal (like a community blog populated by RSS feeds from member blogs) that could serve as a community rallying point and clearing house of quality content from Texas conservative bloggers (similar to the RedState.org model)?
• Multimedia authoring: I really need a primer on how to create quality podcasts and streaming video offerings, as well as integrating them with other media, like blogs and wiki's.
• Credibility: How is it built, maintained, and lost in the web 2.0 world?
• Influence: How can the community of Texas conservative bloggers influence the broader media and public policy? How can we learn, analyze and disseminate goings-on at the Texas Capitol?
• Sustainability: What would be needed to ensure the Texas conservative blogging community continues creating a critical mass of compelling content and increasing its reach?
• Monetization: Related to sustainability, is there a business model that would help make the conservative alternative media presence more robust and self-sustaining? How can consistent, quality content producers (be it blogs, podcasts, video, etc.) capture some of the value produced by their efforts?
• Next Steps: What should we do between now and the general election in November and the beginning of the Texas legislative session in January?

Also, for some principles on user generated content, see this post from the editor of OhMyNews.com: 10 Preconditions for the Value of User-generated Content

Am I asking the right questions above? Are there others that should be addressed? Please add your thoughts and, even better, links to your blog posts on any of the issues raised above in the comments section of this post.

More later....

School Choice an Hispanic Opening for Texas GOP?

Yesterday's Wall Street Journal carried a story on the opportunity John McCain has to make in-roads with Hispanic voters: School choice. Money quotes...

Fifty-two percent of Hispanic voters have a favorable view of school choice, according to the poll, while only 7% had an unfavorable view. When asked about vouchers pecifically, 32% expressed a favorable opinion compared to 13% unfavorable.

Unexpected numbers for sure and definitely at odds with the teacher's lobby, one of the Democrats' core constituencies.

But where the poll really gets interesting is on school choice as an electoral issue: 65% of those surveyed reported that they would be more likely to support a candidate for office who supports school choice, including 35% who said they would be "much more likely." Only 19% said they would be less likely to vote for a pro-school choice candidate.

65% are more likely to support a candidate who supports school choice?!? That is a game-changing number.

Hispanic voters are overwhelmingly young and have exhibited a propensity toward political independence -- and no issue is more tangible for them than educational opportunity. If Hispanics align their voting with the educational interests of their children, it could alter the electoral landscape -- not merely for this election, but permanently. (Emphasis added)

And as if that were not juicy enough, consider that, in Texas:

• Nearly 25% of eligible voters are Hispanic (nearly 3.6 million total potential voters)
• Nearly 63% of vote-eligible Hispanics are under 45 vs 52% for the overall population
• Hispanics are projected to become a majority sometime between 2025 and 2035

1/4 of Texas voters, at the family stage of life, will be the majority within a generation: Will someone please call the Texas GOP and let them know a big opportunity has just dropped in their laps?

Ideas have legs. Unfortunately for local politicians, so do most citizens.

It's been a year of life changes for the my family, including marriage, a new job in different part of town, and our first child on the way. Thus, my wife and I were faced with a decision about where we want to reside for the next chapter in our lives.

My fashionable southwest side bungalow was too small and too far away from work and family, so we had to undertake a move. Furthermore, the weirdness of south Austin was a little too present in my old neighborhood. Booming car stereos, bizarre lawn ornamentation, the occasional transient, six cars per house in some cases, and generally careless attitude of some residents may seem quirky or even chic for a young person aspiring to urbane hipness. But for my money, those items are deal killers when it comes to raising a family.

Thankfully, God opened a door to move to a charming house in culturally conservative, southeast Cedar Park, just northwest of Austin. As our home search progressed, we were presented with decisions that brought into sharp relief the differences that exist between municipalities. The decision makers at city hall have tremendous power to shape the lifestyle and environment of the lowly property owner and resident.

Our target neighborhoods were quickly narrowed down to two: Forest Oaks in southeast Cedar Park and Avery Ranch in far northwest Austin. Separated by only Brushy Creek Road and a couple of miles, at first blush the two neighborhoods are very much alike: similar location, both close to the popular Brushy Creek Lake Park (like Lady Bird Lake without the bums), similar demographics, both in Leander ISD.

However, an analysis of property taxes reveals an important difference: comparable houses in our price range in the Forest Oaks are taxed at an average rate of $2.10/square foot versus an average rate of $2.56/square foot in Avery Ranch. Both neighborhoods are in the same school district and in Williamson county. Therefore, for a 2100 square foot house, that comes out to a $964.35/year or $80.36/month premium for the privilege of living within Austin city limits. That's over 20 gallons of gasoline/month!

The difference can no doubt be attributed to the City of Austin's proclivity for incrementally bumping up property taxes through fashionable referendums for questionable school improvements, the largley unaccountable county health district, and stealthily gaming the property tax equation by slightly reducting the tax rate but dramatically increasing property valuations.

And I'm not encouraged that the Austin City Council will be able to restrain itself from further gorging itself on city property owners' bank accounts. City leaders have been signalling their appeasement radical environmentalists for several years. More recently, they've been trying to put this collectivist worldview into action by imposing "point of sale" restrictions on property owners trying to sell their properties that require several thousand dollars of "green" upgrades before a house can be certified for sale for the supposed cause of "protecting the environment". A recently elected city council member bragged she would "Support the City's Climate Protection Plan and ensure that an inclusive stakeholder group develops future energy efficiency standards. " The past, present, and future omens are seeming very favorable to radical ambitions.

Therefore, I assess that the risk of increasing local tax burdens, even in the face of increasing gas and food costs, is too high in Austin. So, for the benefit of my current and future family, I chose the Cedar Park neighborhood even though it is slightly further away from work than the Austin neighborhood. How about that? The Austin City Council's kowtowing to environmental radicalism is encouraging suburban sprawl.