Saintless

The Utah Community Action Partnership Association is hosting Democracy Day this coming Monday, February 2, on Utah’s Capitol Hill. I’ve RSVP’d, and it looks like it might not be too late for you to RSVP, also. Registration begins at 8:30, and the forum begins at 9 am. Donald Mathic, the President and CEO fo the National Community Action Partnership will give the keynote, with other speakers going through 11:15. Then, until noon, will be the Legislative Tours, where I’m guessing we’ll get a guided tour of what happens where up on the Hill.

At noon, the event will wrap up with a (free!) lunch with your legislators. An email I just got asked me to make sure to contact my Senator and Legislator, to ask them to be sure and attend.

I went to an event a few years ago that I think was probably this same thing, and it was a very good experience. I can’t even recall who my legislators were then, and I didn’t know anything about what I was doing. I can’t even find a blog about it, so it was probably 3-4 years ago, before I had even put my little toe into the world of politics. I’m trying to remember what would have prompted me to attend back then, and coming up empty. I’m very glad I did, though!

I’ve put a call into Senator Waddoups’ office to find out if he is attending the lunch portion. They will be calling me back to let me know, so I will update this when I find out. Wow! That was fast. I had a call less than 10 minutes later confirming that he was planning to attend.

I also put a call in for Representative Holdaway, and was given his intern’s cell phone. She was very nice, and said that she thought he was going, but would check and call me back. Again, I will update this when I have confirmation. Representative Holdaway has confirmed that he also plans to attend the lunch.

I would recommend that if you’re going to this, that you put calls in, as well. Knowing that constituents will be there will make them much more likely to attend than they might otherwise be. I’d love to hear whether you are coming in the comments, as well as what your experience calling your legislators was!

Update: If you want to register, it still seems to be open. You can do so here. Also, if you want to find out who your legislators are, check this out.

Tags: Democracy Day, Representative Holdaway, Senator Waddoups

I had the opportunity to sit down with Salt Lake City Ralph Becker for breakfast this morning, along with several fellow bloggers. It was a relaxed atmosphere, for the most part. My trusty little notebook is now full, and requiring a replacement, though.

We talked about the Mayor’s transparency web site, and how you can now schedule Mayor Becker using online tools. I’ll be exploring that transparency web site over the next few days and weeks. I’m very interested in the fact that there’s a wiki and a blog, among other features. I recognize some of the names I’m seeing there, and I’m very happy that the public has been given this resource.

We discussed the “Sugar House Hole”, and while the last I’d heard of this was that Craig Mecham was still not honoring his obligation to fill the gaping hole in the heart of Sugar House, Mayor Becker said that he’s been told that Mecham has financing in place, and expects to begin construction in August or September. Also, Mecham is set to fill the hole left from demolition.

Also among the topics of conversation was the jaywalking that happens near the Trax station on 400 South. People crossing in the middle of the road, without using crosswalks, are putting themselves in danger, both from traffic and from the Trax line. Although he did not confirm any plans for this, Mayor Becker mentioned that he was looking into the possibility of a fence along the line, so that people would be discouraged from crossing without a crosswalk.

When asked about the airport Trax line, Mayor Becker said that because of surrounding construction, it looks like the viaduct at Redwood Road North Temple would need to be rebuilt, and that is apparently the delay in that line.

My personal favorite part of the conversation though was bikes. I know that Mayor Becker is a fan of alternate transportation, and that there has been rumor of bike rentals coming to downtown Salt Lake City. The Mayor confirmed that there was an RFP sent out, and that he’s working with UTA. He gave me contact information for the person in the Transportation Department so that I could verify details, and I will be following up on this. In the meantime, there’s some hope that we might have a Humana-Style bike system similar to what was available during the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver (though I doubt it will be 100% free!). He mentioned that Humana has been helpful in the process of getting this off the ground.

For anyone who doesn’t enjoy the health benefits of bicycling, you may be in luck with a possible Zip Car system coming our way.

I’m hoping that these “blogger breakfasts” will become a regular thing with Mayor Becker. There are so many things going on in the world of politics that sometimes it’s hard to keep up. These issues that were discussed at breakfast this morning are very important to me, and yet I would have continued to overlook them if it were not for this meeting. It has helped to refocus me on important local issues, and hopefully I won’t make the same mistake in the future.

Much thanks goes out to Mayor Becker, as well as his Deputy Communications Director, Helen Langan, for recognizing the value of bloggers, and reaching out to us.

Tags: Mayor Ralph Becker, Salt Lake City

Last night was a gathering of Twitter users in Park City, UT, during the Sundance Film Festival. It was arranged through Twitter, and we all chipped in $5 or more, and at the end of the evening voted on which charity got the money that had been donated. Serenity won the popular vote, and got a little over $600. Serenity is Twitter user @Phil801‘s daughter. From Serenity’s web site:

Serenity was diagnosed with Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia on May 24, 2008. Lifting Up Serenity is dedicated to her recovery and supporting her family throughout their journey through childhood cancer.

Donations can still be made on the Social Hat web site, or directly to Serenity.

The panel talked about how to use social networking in the business world. The panel and organizers consisted of:
@ghennipher
@jyl_momIF
@krista_parry
@Jesse
@EXIT_Stage_Left
@startupprincess
@carysnowden

And honorable mention goes to @H0neyB for helping with the door and the video, as well as giving me a ride up to Park City, since my Jeep is having issues.

We streamed the event live using UStream. One of the founders, Brad06, was watching our stream, and put us on the front page. We had over 130 people watching the stream! Here are the clips:

You can also see photos from @slc_jm on flickr.

Tags: Sundance Film Festival, suntweet, tweetup, twitter

Because voting for things on the web make you feel like your voice counts, right? Some of my favorite authors are up for awards on Urban Fantasy Land’s web site. I voted for Neil Gaiman and Laurell K. Hamilton and Jim Butcher in several of the categories, along with Richelle Mead, who I found out about the awards through.

Go vote.

This was from an email that I received, and I am not finding the original source and it turns out that it came from The Daily Show With Jon Stewart – video below. I’ll be happy to credit the author if anyone knows.

At the close of Mr. Bush’s Presidency, we’d like to give a moment of thanks for all the folks who made it such an interesting time. Here’s your credits for the last 8 years.

Written and directed by: Karl Rove

Cast in Order of Appearance:
Decider - George W. Bush
Actual President - Richard Cheney
Mr. Cheney’s Attempts at Human Emotion by - Industrial Light & Magic
Decider’s Wife - Laura Bush
Decider’s Actual Wife - Condoleezza Rice

The Supreme Court 
John Roberts
Samuel Alito
Clarence Thomas
Antonin Scalia
Anthony Kennedy
William Rehnquist
Sandra Day O’Connor
…and some other people who don’t matter

Prop Master - Gen. Colin Powell
Evildoer - Osama bin Laden
Mr. Bin Laden’s Stand-in - Saddam Hussein

Guantanamo Detainees - [censored by order of the Department of Homeland Security]

Heckuva-Job Doer - Mike Brown

Best Boy - Gen. David Patraeus
Worst Boy - Richard Clarke

Iraq Location Team
Second Unit Director - Donald Rumsfeld
Location Scout - Paul Wolfowitz
Iraq Extras Casting - Pal Bremer
Additional Material by - Ahmad Chalabi
Abu Ghraib Sequences Directed by - Donald Rumsfeld A few bad apples
Guantanamo bay Sequences Directed by - Dick Cheney a few other bad apples
John Bolton’s Mustache Wrangler - John Bolton

Unit Publicists -
Sean Hannity
Steve Doocy
Bill O’Reilly
Brian Kilmeade
Greta Van Susteren
Glenn Back

Undercover CIA Agent - Valerie Plume Ooops…sorry. Forget we mentioned it.

Stenographer - Judith Miller

Scapegoat provided by - I. Lewis Libby

Shrapnel Collector - Harry Whittington

Reporters -
Stretch
Super-stretch
Little Stretch
Hammy
Slick
Tiny
Ox
Moose
Helen Thomas

Coalition of the Willing -
England
Austrailia
Estonia
Lithuania
Slovakia
Tonga

Coalition of the Unwilling -
Everybody Else

Pooty-poot - Vladmir Putin

Executive Boob Coverer - John Ashcroft

Rich Uncle Pennybags - Henry Paulson

Chief of Stuff - Joshua Bolten

The Truth Squad -
Ari Fleischer
Scott McClellen
Dana Perino
Tony Snow

Sweat Hog (Uncredited) - Scott McClellan

Key Grip - Lynndie England

Promotional Considerations Paid by - Haliburton
Additional Dialogue - Roger Ailes
Gaffer - Douglas Feith

Songs
“I (don’t recall) Remembering to Recall”
WRITTEN AND PERFORMED BY
Alberto Gonzales

“Let the Eagle Soar”
WRITTEN AND PERFORMED BY
John Ashcroft

“I am the Decider”
WRITTEN BY
Karl Rove
PERFORMED BY
George W. Bush

SOUNDTRACK AVAILABLE:
Inside your head for the rest of your life

Mr. Bush’s suits courtesy of BOTANY 5000

Mr. Cheney’s suits courtesy of the Filipino women locked in his basement

BOTCHED ON LOCATION IN WASHINGTON, IRAQ, and NEW ORLEANS

SPECIAL THANKS TO: 537 confused elderly voters in Florida

I spent this past weekend at Sundance, and will be seeing a few movies later this week. I’m guest-writing for Park City Voyeur. Here is the first of the articles for the Voyeur:

Jimmy Newquist, lead singer for the band Caroline’s Spine, played acoustic on Sunday evening at the Star Bar. He will be returning Monday night, January 19, with the whole band.

If you aren’t familiar with the music of Caroline’s Spine, there are a few songs that are not to be missed. His song “Sullivan” is the true story of the five Sullivan brothers lost during WWII. He recently played this song at the opening of the Sullivan Brothers Iowa Veterans Museum in Waterloo, with the Sullivan brothers’ family in attendance. Crowd favorites also include “Work Song”, often known as “The Ice Cream Song”, and “Varsity Blues” from the title track of the movie with the same name.

Jimmy Newquist has an amazing voice that almost anyone will fall in love with. You may find yourself singing along after the first verse of many songs, because the band really knows how to excite the crowd, and pull everyone into the songs they play.

The free show begins at 9 PM at the Star Bar, with the local band Jack Jones opening.

I’ll try to post a link to the Park City Voyeur once it’s live on their site.

I also had the chance to see a longer acoustic show on Thursday at Allure, in Sandy. My friend Maria turned me onto the band a while back, and I intend to see the band whenever they come to Utah. Thursday I met the wife of Jack Jones’ lead singer, Dustan Neil. Ginger, Dustan’s wife, talked to us for a bit after Jimmy’s show. She’s pretty excited that the Jack Jones band is able to open for Caroline’s Spine when they play in Utah.

Is it just me, or is music more fun when you’ve met the people behind it?

Update: Link to article on Park City Voyeur.

AARP has caught my eye recently with their “Divided We Fail” campaign. If you missed that, it’s worth checking out. They caught my eye again with their “U@50″ contest. 

 ”The aim of this contest was to create a dialogue between the generations and to gain an understanding of what concerns our future members,” said AARP Director of Academic Affairs Harry R. Moody. “We have been impressed with the enthusiasm young people have had for this contest. These videos have done a great job of highlighting the issues that are important to younger Americans in facing their futures.”

This video came in second place, and it’s absolutely beautiful:

You can see all of the winners and the submissions on YouTube.

I think that we need more understanding between groups that seemingly have little common ground. And I’m the first to say I’ve really failed at that, lately. When I see people using religion or power to take away the rights of other people, I get angry. When I see people using presidential power to justify torture, I get angry. When I see stupidity, I get angry. A lot of things just really make me angry.

I recognize that I’ll never get anywhere with those of opposing viewpoints by giving into anger. The point isn’t always to get anywhere, though. The point is sometimes just to bring it up, make people aware. So, sometimes I feel fully justified in that anger.

But, a goal I recently decided on was to react less in anger when it comes to politics. Not that I won’t react that way (and I do plan on continuing the asshat awards), but there are times that restraint is called for. Hopefully, fewer of my blog posts, and fewer of my comments on others’ blogs will show much of the anger I feel inside. Perhaps I should watch the above video more often. And we should all look for common ground. It’s all about the accentuation and order of the words, right?

What is a leader? Well, let’s ask Dictionary.com for a definition:

 

1.	a person or thing that leads.

2.	a guiding or directing head, as of an army, movement, or political group.

3.	Music.  a. a conductor or director, as of an orchestra, band, or chorus. b. the player at the head of the first violins in an orchestra, the principal cornetist in a band, or the principal soprano in a chorus, to whom any incidental solos are usually assigned.

4.	a featured article of trade, esp. one offered at a low price to attract customers. Compare loss leader.

5.	Journalism.  a. leading article (def. 1). b. Also called leading article. British. the principal editorial in a newspaper.

6.	blank film or tape at the beginning of a length of film or magnetic tape, used for threading a motion-picture camera, tape recorder, etc. Compare trailer (def. 6).

7.	Angling.  a. a length of nylon, silkworm gut, wire, or the like, to which the lure or hook is attached. b. the net used to direct fish into a weir, pound, etc.

8.	a pipe for conveying rain water downward, as from a roof; downspout.

9.	a horse harnessed at the front of a team.

10.	leaders, Printing. a row of dots or a short line to lead the eye across a space.

11.	Nautical. lead 1 (def. 40b).

12.	a duct for conveying warm air from a hot-air furnace to a register or stack.

13.	Mining. a thin vein of ore connected with a large vein.

 

Ok, which one of these are we going to go with, when talking politics? I’m thinking in Utah it might be number 4, even though we might like it to be number 1.

Last year, Senator John Valentine was the Senate President. Apparently, being the “leader” of the Senate meant that he couldn’t “lead”, though.

Apparently, we Utah taxpayers have been footing the bill for our legislature to stay in Little America, regardless of how far away from it they lived, to the tune of over $5,000 per legislator each year. Even if they spent the night in their own beds. This means over $600,000 was spent, and we have no idea how much of that was actually necessary. Here’s what The Trib is reporting:

 
Valentine says he will propose legislation this session that would make the lodging expense optional: It would remain available to those who live hundreds of miles away or in the shadow of the Capitol, but only if the lawmaker actually stayed in the hotel.

Those who live near the Capitol and stayed in a hotel would have to justify that to their constituents, he said.

Valentine said he floated the idea when he was Senate President last year, but was met with resistance from some of his Republican Senate colleagues and abandoned it.

Now, out of leadership, he feels free to push it in the upcoming session and thinks it has a good chance of passage.
 

Ummm, hello? Now that he’s not the leader, he can lead on this? What sort of oxyMORON does it take to hold elected office in Utah?

I’m thinking of holding an “Asshat of the Week” contest while our Legislature is in session. Valentine gets it this week.

Tags: corruption, Senator John Valentine

I recently posted my thoughts about the upcoming booze-battle in the Utah Legislature. After all of the many comments on the Senate Site’s “Alcohol Policy Tutorial”, it looks like there’s a new twist on this.

The Utah bar industry is proposing that the private club memberships be eliminated and replaced with ID scanners. They’re making the argument to the Utah Legislature that private club requirements aren’t doing anything, and that the real solution is to check everyone’s ID.

This sounds all fine and dandy to me. Except one part. The article mentions that there are versions of the ID scanner that do not store personal information. What isn’t clear is whether the industry will push for the regulations to require that the information is not stored?

If bars keep a record of every time I enter, and are required to do so legally, that would be a violation of my privacy. I want to know the details of what is being proposed here, and I want the Utah bar industry to stand up for privacy.