StallNine: Spirit of the blog

Nedrenaline continues!

MoveOn had an online primary for it's Connecticut members on Thursday. The primaries were open for 24 hours and the results came out this morning. Found in my email inbox:

Dear MoveOn member in Connecticut,

I wanted to share the results from our online primary with you before we tell the media. Drumroll, please: By a whopping 85% to 14%, MoveOn members supported Ned Lamont for Connecticut's U.S. Senate seat—securing him the MoveOn endorsement.

Now that we've decided together to support Lamont, please consider making a contribution to his campaign by clicking on the link below.  Senator Lieberman has a war chest of over $4.2 million—so Ned will need all of our help to wage a good campaign.  Can you chip in a few bucks to help elect a new Democratic senator for Connecticut?

https://secure.nedlamont.com/page/contribute

Did you see that? 85 percent for Lamont! Lamont and Lieberman were both asked by MoveOn to send an email to CT MoveOn members requesting their vote. Sure, Lieberman decided not to email MoveOn members asking for their vote after committing to do so. (In case you're wondering, MoveOn sent tons of info on Lieberman so people could make an informed decision.) But still, I didn't expect Lamont to win by that much. Eighty-five to fourteen. Awesome!

Funny

Go see how Microsoft would "fix" the ipod packaging. So true, so true.

Btw, I've been brilliant lately but you haven't been able to tell because half the time I turn on my computer (yup, it's a PC) it doesn't work. Not completely true, I think the fan works, or at least something that makes some sort of quiet noise. The rest of the computer, not so much. Sometimes I get lucky and my laptop works just fine... until it doesn't. It'll freeze and there's no way I can find to unfreeze it. Thankfully, it's uncharacteristically cooperative right now. Man, I can't wait to get a mac.

Happy Birthday!

Congrats to Spencer for becoming a big brother today!! Welcome to Spencer's brand new little brother!! Congrats to LL and Aaron!

Nedrenaline!

We have a primary! Ned Lamont needed the support of 15% of the delegates in tonight's State Democratic convention to make it onto the August ballot. He got 33%! Looks like I won't need to go petitioning on Sunday. Btw, I am now a registered Democrat in CT. And the woman who took my registration knew my dad when he was in college. Very bizarre.

The final count:

Ned Lamont: 505
Joe Lieberman: 1004
Total Needed for Ballot: 15%
Ned Receives: 505 (33.4%)

Yahoo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I can't even remember the last time I was this happy about political news. Sigh, these last five years have been brutal.

A day without rain

...but with Ned Lamont!

Before:

After:

Go Ned!

Check out Ned Lamont's new campaign video!

Quote of the day

...that probably very few people who read this blog will understand. From Atrios (bold mine):

Time to face up to the fact that I got a lot of pony pictures, and I'm going to be able to use them.  I think it'll be pretty much impossible for Bush to climb above about 42 on a sustained basis until he's about to leave office. Unpopular until the end.

I don't know the exact origin of the pony thing but Holden, a regular commentor at Eschaton (home of Atrios) and a blogger at First Draft, wanted a pony. When Bush got below 40%, Holden would get a pony. As you can imagine, Holden has gotten a boatload of ponies over the past six months. Some even have wings and most are shiney. But to get to the bigger picture, Atrios has a good point -- why the hell are the powers that be in the mainstream media so tied to the "Bush is a good guy" shtick?!  Even if he were a good guy interpersonally, which I don't believe he is, that would NOT negate the fact that he is destroying our rights, our constitution, our country and our relationship with the rest of the world. That's all.

Very sad

The suicide rate is up among those serving in Iraq and those at risk are being redeployed.

Despite a congressional order that the military assess the mental health of all deploying troops, fewer than 1 in 300 service members see a mental health professional before shipping out.

Once at war, some unstable troops are kept on the front lines while on potent antidepressants and anti-anxiety drugs, with little or no counseling or medical monitoring.

And some troops who developed post-traumatic stress disorder after serving in Iraq are being sent back to the war zone, increasing the risk to their mental health.

But don't worry, we are assured this is only happening because recruiting has been a challenge.

Ritchie said the mental health of troops remains a priority as the war enters its fourth year. But she also acknowledged that some practices, such as sending service members diagnosed with PTSD back into combat, have been driven in part by a troop shortage.

"The challenge for us ... is that the Army has a mission to fight. And as you know, recruiting has been a challenge," she said. "And so we have to weigh the needs of the Army, the needs of the mission, with the soldiers' personal needs."

I can't imagine why more people aren't signing up. The Courant is doing a series on this issue, go take a read.

Anyone know what Barbara or Jenna Bush are up to lately? Maybe they could help on the lines...

Dear 18-24 year old who hit me today,

I understand that the light was green so I should have been going but the car in front of me was stopped and therefore I was stopped with my brake lights on and all. Given the fact that I was not moving despite the light being green, you should have actually stopped or at least cleared my right bumper when you tried going around me. That's all.

(Btw, my bumper was not scraped any worse this time than the time the Marilyn Monroe/Madonna impersonator hit me in LA so I won't even bother getting it touched up, but still, the chick's "light was green" excuse was pretty lame.)

I spent three years in the midwest

and yet I still cannot bowl. Tonight I scored a 77 in Game 1 and a 91 in Game 2 (which included two strikes in a row! But lots of gutter balls to balance the strikes out). Part of the problem may be that I started my illustrious bowling career at a duckpin alley where the balls are small and light. I have a really hard time letting go of regular balls without flying halfway down the alley much to everyone's enjoyment. I'm pretty sure the foul line is just a suggestion, not a real rule. Ah well, I still have my fallback career as a croquet player. (I'm undefeated in action. And yes, I've only played once, but clearly I'm a natural.)