Personal stuff – Page 19

It’s official…thank you!

Now I can take the signage and authority statement down after three months; as of yesterday the election count is in the books.

While 2,139 votes may not seem like a lot it was enough to keep me in ninth place and the top nine become the new Central Committee. The 30-vote margin between ninth and tenth tied for the closest, and really there’s no shame in finishing either second or third (Ann Suthowski and Bob Laun, respectively, also were 30 votes apart.) But when the margin is pass or fail, it’s a little different.

I also want to take the opportunity to thank Kim, my significant other and all-around wonderful woman who both served as my treasurer and probably talked me up to enough of her friends and co-workers to push me across the finish line! You better believe every vote counts and in this case she’s probably the difference between me being in and being out.

So here is your new Wicomico County Republican Central Committee who will officially take over after November’s election – although most are already hard at work:

Blan Harcum
Ann Suthowski
Bob Laun
Dave Goslee, Sr.
John Palmer
Dave Parker
Joe Collins
Mark McIver
Michael Swartz

It should be a very interesting four years. We don’t know who the party chair will be; while the top vote-getter traditionally takes the post he or she can delegate it according to his or her wishes whether directly or via a vote of the committee.

I will say that there will be some TEA Party and AFP influence since I saw two others on my list this evening and another two members have also been known to attend frequently. I suppose those naysayers who claim AFP is nothing more than a shill for the Republican Party will take from that what they will, but I also saw the two leading Libertarians locally last night too.

But once again I wanted to take the time to thank both the Republican voters in Wicomico County who retained their faith in me and the other candidates who ran for making it a race on issues rather than personalities – wouldn’t it be nice if the rest were like this? Obviously this was a fairly low-key race and for the most part we all get along so it was a good exercise for all involved.

Oh, speaking of the AFP meeting last night: it was pretty dull as we talked about the upcoming Constitutional and charter amendments facing voters. (The most animated exchanges were afterward, but what happened in Brew River will stay in Brew River.) We did hear the announcement former Democratic County Executive candidate John Wayne Baker endorsed Joe Ollinger for the post, so that was newsworthy.

I was hoping to find out more about the NOvember is Coming bus tour arriving here next week, but the update will have to wait I guess. That’s my summary.

Reprehensible

Radio edit: I’m tired of the he said/she said over the alcohol allegation because I have people I trust telling me both ways (in both e-mail and comments.) Had I known that would be an issue, I’d have skipped the mention because you can judge the video on its other merits, or lack thereof.

Not all of my readers have been with me for the duration of nearly five years I’ve done my site, but some may recall just how mad I was when a political candidate called bloggers a “cancer.” Two years later, that sentiment was repeated by Salisbury mayor Barrie Tilghman.

Every so often I have to be a (self-appointed) blog policeman and call out inappropriate behavior, and in a lot of cases it’s because of the same guy. I have pride in my craft and encourage others to be as responsible, but this rant takes the cake for vindictiveness and lack of character.

Okay, you don’t like the Brewingtons – we get it. Over the last three months or so it’s been an obsession of yours to try and wreck their campaigns (along with the local Americans for Prosperity chapter and anything else they’ve touched.) Yet the 2,486 votes they received are 2,486 more votes than any campaign of yours picked up, and I applaud them for at least stepping into the fray and attempting to make a difference. If you looked at what they actually stood for rather than the personalities, you may have found their platforms quite agreeable.

I didn’t call you Sideshow Bob on a previous post for nothing. Words mean things, and these words are a message for you.

I don’t know how many times you’ve claimed to be turning over a new leaf, but eventually the same old destructive tendencies come through. Is this really an example for a professional journalist to follow? (I use the word professional in the sense that you solicit for and have advertising on your site, not based on the quality of writing.) If I were Bob Ehrlich or any other politician who has sat down with you I’d be embarassed to have spent time in treating you seriously once I saw this video. Maybe Andy Harris learned this lesson the hard way last time?

I’m not going to claim I ever went to “j-school” either but the one thing which has gotten me to the places I’ve made it to in this second career is integrity. It doesn’t seem like too many people back you in your stories anymore and in a case of your word against hers I’m not too sure I’d put a lot of money on your chances given some of the whoppers you’ve had to retract.

Let’s just put it this way: I’m glad I made the decision I did about three years ago to stay away from that mess. I feel no need to build myself up by tearing others down.

But I can understand why most of your contributors wish to go by assumed names. Maybe it’s time for them to consider washing their hands of the situation too.

I’m not going to be childish and suggest a boycott of advertisers, but they may want to ask themselves if that space is really worth it.

And to the readers: I find that I get better and more accurate news from other sources.

I’m certainly not the first to describe the site as a “train wreck” and there is an aspect of it which people have to see. But invariably train wrecks destroy lives and that’s the sad part of all this. How much of the collateral damage being caused is necessary? (That also goes for some of the “anti” blogs out there.)

Fortunately, the occasional barbs I’ve received from that direction haven’t been fatal and, in all honesty, while we both are local blogs I don’t consider him direct competition because I focus on the political side of news. Obviously we cover many of the same political events, but you won’t see me covering a car crash because I don’t find that sort of writing as interesting. Much of this whole blogging exercise amuses me because I like to be creative.

What I don’t like, though, is to have him depicted as a representative of all of us local writers. I link to about 40 local sites and almost to a person they don’t care much for you being seen as some sort of spokesperson for us. Maybe it’s time for people who really give a damn about the Eastern Shore to start looking at what they have to say.

As you see in the video above, this particular protagonist has little useful to add to the conversation.

Oh, just as an aside: why do you make political contributions from a Maryland address when you live in Delaware? I find that a bit shady.

Picks and pans from a Shorebird fan – 2010 edition

In wrapping up my 2010 Shorebirds coverage, I’m actually going to borrow from the 2009 edition to see what was addressed and what was not.

Each year I talk about what I liked and disliked as a fan, and 2010 had a lot to like – except I’d have liked a little better team recordwise because things definitely fell apart in the latter part of the season. But those are things neither I nor the local Shorebirds management could have done much about. And they still drew about their average attendance over the last few years, drawing 221,051 and rebounding from an all-time low last season due to some nice weather. Too bad they weren’t in a pennant race or we may have reached 250,000.

The staff did its usual good job, although some of those who left were missed. Hopefully Stefan, the onfield host, has found a home since he’s survived here two years. Unfortuately, aside from my suggestion on the clam strips I don’t think the food was any better and the pizza vendor not as good. I do have kudos for Karin and the crew at that concession stand, though, they were very receptive and helpful (and most nights knew that I wanted my large diet Pepsi, light on the ice.) And while she didn’t care much for Thirsty Thursday, I do (more on that later.)

Unlike 2009, we did get back a couple of the local favorite national acts early on as I recall Myron Noodleman made an appearance and Reggy came a few weeks later. Certainly the kids liked Spongebob, although they probably liked the mid-game weather break that evening where the players were signing autographs waiting for the tarp to come off. But what happened to the Redskins cheerleaders? And it might be time to bring back that dog act from a few years back and also see if we can’t get Principal Financial to come back here (they did a parking-lot carnival here at the end of the 2009 season. It was fun.)

To me the giveaways were pretty good. One advantage of being a season ticket holder is that I automatically get each one – so I didn’t have to be there at 4:30 to get a Brad Bergesen bobblehead. (They actually took my suggestion from last year and picked Brad Bergesen. How about my soon-to-be-inducted newest SotWHoF member Brandon Snyder for 2011?) And I suspect we’re going to have at least one other water bottle giveaway; apparently those things went like hotcakes.

Oh, and bring back the Peninsula Home Care wheelchair races!

As for “pans”, yes, they haven’t changed much over the last several years. However, I’m told there will be action on my number one beef over the offseason since we’re hosting the 2011 SAL All-Star Game. And I deleted the fireworks music selection; they’ve done a pretty good job of mixing it up over the last couple years. The shows do seem to be a little shorter now than in past years, though.

Just as a review:

New scoreboard and videoboard, along with a small alternate scoreboard along the first base line.
A closed-circuit TV system for the concession stands so we can watch the game while standing in line.
More player availabilities in the “Bird Pen.”
No bands on Thirsty Thursday. It was a common practice in 2005, my first season here and I STILL miss it!

From what I understand, the offseason plan regarding the scoreboard is to maintain the frame but put all new “guts” inside. If they can upgrade it to an LED board like several other parks have (Frederick comes to mind since we went there in April; I think Lakewood does too) that would be acceptable to me. We did endure the better part of a homestand where some of the components would not work, so it’s obvious our current system is on borrowed time.

I suppose the drawback to #2 might be that the Ovations workers may watch the game on TV rather than pay attention to customers (and I’m sure creating a CCTV system from scratch isn’t cheap.) Perhaps as a compromise they can set up a zigzag system of queueing people (like you might find in a Wendy’s or a bank) so that people in line can face the field yet be in line, at least for the two main concession stands upstairs and perhaps the adjacent Sweet Shop too. Obviously you have to maintain a certain amount of egress width on the concourses and I think this may actually help.

I know #3 is up to the players and manager, but is doing this for at least the Sunday games too much to ask? Seems to me a number of teams have player availabilities as a Sunday attraction and it would tie right in with Sherman’s Sidekicks. We’re trying to get kids to be baseball fans for life, and I can pretty much guarantee you that you couldn’t walk into an NFL stadium on Sunday and get pregame autographs from the players.

In all honesty, all #4 needs is a sponsor. I’m sure the bands would jump at the chance to do a set or two (the sponsor is there to advertise and to pay the bands) and we could set things up the same way. I notice they sometimes do pregame concerts outside, but I think they are better served in the ballpark as a postgame activity (or shorten the pregame announcements for Thursday only and let the bands play from 5:30 to 6:30 – open the gates at 5:15 for those interested in checking them out. Depending on the band, I might be there about 4:45.) Outside would be good if people tailgated but we don’t do that for a Shorebirds game.

Most people don’t know that the Shorebirds are part of a group which owns several teams, including a third they purchased in 2009. The 7th Inning Stretch LLC family includes the Stockton Ports of the California League (a advanced-A team comparable to the Orioles’ Frederick affiliate) and the Everett (Washington) AquaSox of the Northwest League (a short-season rookie league team similar to Aberdeen.) And once again, of the three 7IS affiliates Delmarva had the best attendance – Stockton drew 198,016 for 70 games and Everett drew 90,079 for 36 openings. (I don’t think that counts playoffs – Stockton was knocked off in the opening round but Everett won their league title for the first time since 1985.)

So we have found that our fan base is relatively loyal, although it’s not as large as we had during the early days of the franchise. But next year they won’t have the hooks of it being the 15th anniversary season, a new logo, or new uniforms to draw people in. (On the flip side, we do have the All-Star hoopla, at least for the first two months of the season.) Obviously we can’t do anything about the players we get either, although I’ve heard we are dropping one of rookie league affiliates so that the overall talent level in the Orioles organization will increase. My polling (albeit a small sample) suggests we’d rather have a winner than an Orioles’ affiliate but perhaps we can get the best of both worlds with some tweaking.

As I said last year, the Delmarva Shorebirds can be the jewel of the 7th Inning Stretch empire. If they follow through on some of the key problems they encountered this year, next summer looks to be another fun summer at the ballpark. We’ll get to see the best of the other teams come here, but why not bring home a title while we’re at it?

My annual 9-11 statement

I’ve done something pretty much every September 11 I’ve had a website, but I think the best piece was the one I wrote three years ago to mark the occasion. I pick it up in the second paragraph.

**********

That day was a glorious Tuesday weatherwise, a perfect late summer day in northwest Ohio. At the time I was working for my last firm, Hobbs and Black Architects, and as was normal on most days I had my headphones on listening to a CD when the phone rang. For whatever reason, I picked it up and it was my co-worker Larry who informed me that he would be in shortly and did I know that a plane had hit the World Trade Center? I told him no, and I’d see him shortly.

What I assumed, not knowing the whole story at the time, was that what struck the WTC was a small Cessna-type plane. I had no idea that it was the first jetliner to hit or that by the time Larry made it in that a second plane was making contact. But when Larry turned on his radio straight away to continue monitoring the events, we all knew something bad was happening. This was probably about 9:15 or so.

Obviously we were all glued to the radio accounts of the news, but we did have work to get done. Some of my cohorts were wrapping up presentation drawings for a new synagogue that was to be presented in a meeting to the congregation that evening. But later that morning we got a call from the design architect who decided maybe meeting that night would not be a good idea. Not a whole lot was done that day as obviously we were all waiting for another shoe to drop, particularly when we heard that the Pentagon was hit and there was another plane that had dropped out of contact over Ohio (this would be Flight 93.)

It seemed like an eternity until 5:30 when my workday was done. I figured I’d better stop for gas on the way back home and found that the gas priced at $1.10 or so when I went to work was now $1.80. Still, there were lines to get in the station. And all that was normal when the day began was now different. There were no ballgames on, nor any of the regular TV shows. All we had on was the wall-to-wall coverage of the mounting death toll and the question about why we were targeted.

In the days that followed, the questioning turned to mourning and then to solidarity. I remember all the members of Congress singing patriotically on the Capitol steps. For a few days afterward we weren’t Democrats or Republicans, liberals or conservatives, we were just Americans.

But when I think about that day, I think more about the effect it had on my daughter. We all live some of our lives through our children and even though I wasn’t around when she was born Dani is still my daughter. So perhaps the thing that upsets me the most is that this occurred during her senior year of high school. It’s supposed to be one of the most fun years of a child’s life, but hers forever has the black mark of being associated with 9/11.

There’s one incident that typifies that melancholy feeling I get when 9/11 comes up. On the Saturday afterward, Dani’s high school hosted a band concert with several other bands in the region. They all played 3 or 4 songs, essentially a typical halftime show.

As was traditional, her school’s band closed the show. Instead of a regular show though, as I recall they marched onto the field and took their formation. Then, to the sound of a single drum keeping time they slowly and somberly marched off one by one. It’s a bitter memory that I have, thinking about the joy that a high school marching band generally brings tempered by events beyond their control.

9/11 was an event that continues to define a generation. It’s Dani’s age group that volunteered to fight against the enemy who took the fight to us on that brilliant day turned dark, and it’s her age group that takes most of the casualties in that fight on both sides.

But for those of us who were just doing our jobs on a regular workday not unlike the thousand before, living through that one changed us too. We still take time to remember and mourn those for whom it was their last workday; the ones who never knew what hit them, those on the planes who never made it to their destinations, some who died trying to save their cohorts in the Twin Towers, and still others unfortunate enough to be at the top of the towers who faced a horrible choice of how to end their life.

Because of some agenda, political or otherwise, we rarely see the pictures anymore. But placing the events that happened on a Tuesday not unlike today six years ago out of sight cannot and should not place them out of mind. We owe it to my daughter’s generation not to forget.

luvya, kiddo.

**********

You know, with all the hullabaloo over the mosque nearby Ground Zero, the events of 9/11 remain on our mind and the wounds unhealed. Personally I’d prefer they built it someplace else in New York (my understanding is there’s another mosque just blocks away) but what will be will be I suppose. Just don’t be surprised if someone tosses a firebomb in the place sometime down the road.

But as the years are removed and other events occur in our lives, my fear is that we return to the so-called 9/10 mindset. Just because we have ceased operations in Iraq and are getting ready to pull out of Afghanistan next year doesn’t mean the threat from Islamic terrorism has ceased – in fact, they may see this manuever as a sign of weakness. Perhaps the next anniversary and the prospect of the groundbreaking for a new mosque will bring us a new vigilance.

Pushed back again

With getting the yard cleaned up and uploading some videos to my YouTube channel, the post I meant for today will need to be slotted tomorrow. It wouldn’t be right to push this below my final Shorebird of the Week this season and only have it on the top for a couple hours, so I’ll have it as a special edition of FNV tomorrow night. (Hopefully everyone will be recovered from Earl’s brush by then.)

The three videos I’m uploading come from last Sunday’s event and address a particular concern of mine, land use. But I want to address part of the premise of the question (which I didn’t record) regarding the two political parties working together.

Needless to say, I’m a Republican and by being in the party I adhere to a particular set of principles. To be perfectly honest, I’m not sure the Democrats have their own set of principles but it can be safely presumed that theirs would be the opposite of ours; at least as opposite as one can get given our republican (small-r) foum of government. There’s not a lot of middle ground to be had without one side or the other compromising on their core beliefs.

Obviously there are situations where this doesn’t matter, but in the big picture if one side compromises too much we have things go too far in the opposite direction. In my estimation, Republicans compromise too much and have done so for most of the last eighty years. And while people in either party can have good ideas, I prefer the ones which minimize government involvement and maximize freedom. Government at any level should be limited.

So you get split party-line votes sometimes. I have to put up with being in the minority at the state and federal levels while the other guys are saddled with being the minority locally (not that it matters much in their top-down manner of thinking.) Understanding that there is a difference between parties – if they are proper in maintaining priciples – helps to understand the political system we have and why compromise isn’t always easy or desired.

One day delay

Yes, I was away again today so Candidate Wednesday will be delayed until tomorrow. I didn’t have a chance to upload a couple videos I wanted to add so that will be on my agenda.

I also missed the State’s Attorney forum, which hopefully wasn’t too much of a circus considering who was asked to provide some of the questioning. Maybe he came up with something decent. Anyway, back at full strength tomorrow barring the creek rising.

Candidate Wednesday begins this week

The other day I told you folks that I was going to become another outlet for the Right Coast interviews being done by local questioner Matt Trenka. Tomorrow I will replay three of the nine videos done so far, somewhat randomly selected to present candidates in three different races. These will appear both here at monoblogue and in a slightly different format at my Wicomico County Examiner page.

There will also be my commentary on what was said, although I will limit it to a paragraph or two. I may also lend a hand to future interviews as my schedule allows, perhaps as an off-camera guest questioner.

So far the nine interviews which have been done include:

U.S. Senate candidate Jim Rutledge
House of Delegates candidates John Hayden, Mike McCready, Marty Pusey, Mike McDermott, and Dustin Mills
County Executive candidate John Wayne Baker
County Council candidates Chris Lewis and Mike Brewington

Of the group five are Republicans and four are Democrats so it is a nice bipartisan mix, although all are challengers.

At the moment doing three per week means I’ll have videos on August 11, 18, and 25. If there are more the date will be September 1 and as we approach the primary it may mean I add a day or two during that week since early voting begins September 3 and absentee ballots are out shortly.

Look for the first three videos tomorrow afternoon.

Channeling Billy Mays…

I couldn’t pass up making this prospective comment a post, particularly when the same pitch was made to me in an e-mail earlier in the week.

Hello,

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5. Detailed Control Panel to see the visitors, leads, revenue….

Join OVLG Affiliate Program Today and earn!! Our present affiliate partners are earning over $2000 per week.

For more questions please visit https://www.ovlg.com/affiliate/faqs.php or email me.

Thanks,

Brian Jones
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After I received the earlier e-mail I looked this up to see if it was legit, and Oak View Law Group is indeed a California-based law office which specializes in bankruptcy. But the most intriguing thing about it was that most of the personnel went by Americanized pseudonyms of foreign (my guess is Indian/Pakistani) names. Thus, I suspect this “Brian Jones” is not really who he says he is – obviously there are hundreds of people actually named Brian Jones out there. (One is a fellow YR from my Toledo days, so the name stuck out at me.)

What sticks in my craw about this, though, is the idea of profiting from other peoples’ misery. Obviously in this day and age there’s a need for this sort of law firm, although in my estimation they rank just barely above the worst ambulance chasers and mesothelioma hustlers which populate the commercial airwaves.

Do I sell advertising? Yes, I do. I even participate in an affiliate program where if you buy from Amazon through my site, I get a small commission. (Trust me, it’s small. But every so often I do get a few bucks in my PayPal account.) I have sold ad space to those people you see in my upper-right hand corner as well.

But my advertising is based on trying to help these people succeed, not take advantage of others’ failures. Obviously Marty Pusey and Julie Brewington will consider their political ad a success if they win their respective primaries, while another advertiser who’s not up yet will find out whether he’s successful on November 2nd. And should you buy your formal wear from Marty’s store? Absolutely! She’s a small business owner and I want her to prosper on that front regardless of whether she’s elected to be my Delegate or not (preferably the former.)

If others (who just may have gotten the same solicitation as I did) want to be OVLG’s affiliate, well, I can’t stop them. But I would rather be part of a win-win situation than a zero-sum (or worse) game.

In case you are interested in advertising on my site, you can go here. Let’s see if we can help each other prosper, even in these trying times.

People to thank: my readers!

Since some bloggers around here put a lot of stock in Alexa rating numbers, I want to thank each and every one of you reading here for jumping my Alexa rank from the 2.6 million range to a six-digit rank in the space of about 3 weeks! As the campaign season has heated up readership has surged. Considering I’m being ranked against ALL sites (not just blogs, but commercial entities, search engines, and the like) that’s pretty good for what would be considered a regional political website for the most part.

This success has also placed me as the top dog (almost) among local bloggers – and if you don’t count the one which makes its living from copying and pasting various “news” items and look at ones which do mostly original writing and analysis then I’m right there. (I’m sure the person in question will have fun with this statement, but it is what it is.)

In the next few days, you will see the first advertisers on the site so things are definitely looking up here at monoblogue. I encourage you to patronize the businesses and look into those candidates who believe this is a good place to spend their advertising dollars. Moreover, there’s other possibilities in the works for this humble website to become better known, too – more details when the time comes.

But it all begins with you, the reader. It’s you who comes back and makes this the success that it is – all I do is try to provide insightful and accurate “news and views from Maryland’s Eastern Shore.” That’s what I’ve done for almost five years and perhaps good things may come to those who wait and work at their craft. In the meantime, I’m sure I’ll be looking for another political news story to write about and share.

Has BlogNetNews met its demise?

If you weren’t aware of this already, I’ve been doing a little bit of pruning around the site.

Back when I did the redesign earlier this year, I kept the two little Blognetnews ranking badges and the search engine icon but placed them down at the bottom of one of my columns. Since I checked the rankings weekly, I noticed my site was ranked last Sunday…but a couple days later the ranking badges had disappeared. (The search engine icon is still there.)

Without going into a detailed explanation of HTML code, those badges remain up as long as the BlogNetNews site is extant. Obviously I was curious to why they disappeared, so I checked a couple times this week. In both instances, what I found was a DNS lookup error -” The address www.blognetnews.com cannot be found” – thus, it appears that the blog aggregator has run its course, or, to give the benefit of a doubt, they’ve had a serious server problem booting them offline. Obviously no one is acting with great speed to fix it – maybe I’m the first to notice?

Perhaps this is an indication that the blogosphere has reached a level of maturity that, while not sounding its death knell, portends a further shakeout. The more hip among us have graduated to Twitter, home of the microscopic attention span and a place where this very sentence is far too long to be remotely Tweetable. (By the way, BNN’s last tweet on their Twitter site was over a month ago.) Meanwhile, the oldline established news sources have simply relocated from the newsprint and broadcast media to the internet.

And while BlogNetNews had a period of growth a few years back, the Maryland edition rarely had more than a few dozen active blogs featured – barely a representative sample of the scope of state blogs. My own little bloglist has nearly as many as they did at the peak and I don’t try all that hard to find new ones.

We in the local blogosphere have had our issues with their so-called rankings, crowing when they were high and complaining when they were too low. But apparently the webgoing public has spoken and BlogNetNews’ ranking among web surfers plunged to the point of being irrelevant, so now BlogNetNews is gone.

Looks like I have a little more pruning to do and extra HTML code to eliminate.

A call to action

First of all, thanks to those who have come here lately – readership is on a definite upswing!

With the possible exception of a few candidates who can be added for vacancies on the ballot (such as a Republican running for State’s Attorney or a Democrat jumping in to make it a Sheriff’s race) we pretty much know who is on the ballot now. But here’s where I could use some help.

On the far right-hand column I list the 100 names who will appear somewhere on the ballot in Wicomico County – out of them I have 47 website links. Presumably not every candidate will have (or need to have) a website; however, out of those who do I want to link to all of them. I’m guessing I’ll have another 20 to 30 before this is all said and done, and the column will get a LOT shorter after September 14th. But I want to give readers the maximum opportunity to educate themselves on these candidates.

(I have another trick up my sleeve there, but that’s for another day.)

So if you’re aware of a website that I’m not, kindly let me know either through a comment or e-mail: ttownjotes (at) yahoo.com. While there are many sites out there delivering election news, only one can be the best and most accurate and I aim to host it.

Happy 234th birthday America!

Don’t look for an LFS op-ed this week because the one I wrote didn’t clear. That’s okay because I know from experience readership lags on holidays anyway.

You can all catch up on Monday. Unless something absolutely earthshattering breaks where I need to comment, I just might see you at the Allen parade or more likely at the Shorebirds game tonight. But I won’t be here.

So enjoy the day and celebrate what’s great about America – while we still can.