No, this is not The Electric Company.

I FINALLY started another blog, and I'm gonna update it for real this time. Because now I have rules for myself, making it WAY easier to produce content.

It's here: http://skeltzer.wordpress.com/

So I'll be over there, probably not for good, but for most. It'll be about things, not about me.

I've already got some stuff up there, including a picture of my cat. That should make you all rush over there AT ONCE.

So, if someone can point me toward a video of Radiohead with the USC marching band from the grammys, I'd be forever grateful and will write you a poem.

I got a cat.

I've moved over to a blogspot account and am writing there, but I'm still reading everything on LJ.

But this: The U.N Security Council overwhelmingly approved a ceasefire in Gaza between Israel and the Palestinians. You know, this thing.
14 out of 15 voted for it.
The one that didn't vote?
Condi Rice abstained for the U.S.

Friends,

Fifteen months ago, I was lying in my parents' front yard in anaphylactic shock, unconscious and not breathing. It was the day I had set as a deadline for deciding whether to get into this Congressional race, and I was helping my parents clear brush in preparation for my sister's wedding reception. About 80-yards deep in the woods, I kicked up a massive yellow jacket nest, and the rest is a blur. I came in and out of consciousness as I crawled to the edge of the woods and collapsed. Just a few weeks earlier, I had been on the ground in Southern Afghanistan, but here I was, facing death in the woods where I grew up.

It was there in the ambulance, on my way to the hospital, that I decided to take the leap of faith and run for Congress. I simply saw no reason to wait for another year of failed politics, fear, and marginal reforms. For too long, my generation had tried to make a difference through the non-profits, but kept hitting up against political games that amounted to rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. To be honest, almost everyone I talked to at first advised me not to run and assured me that Rep. Goode could never be beaten. But the reasons they were offering sold voters short and assumed the election would have to be a referendum on the incumbent rather than a chance to make the case for something better. What we wanted to offer was a people-powered, principled, problem-solving campaign that was not about tearing apart the other side, but rather about leaving behind a failed approach to politics from both sides.

I had a strong sense that 2008 would be a movement year – one of those rare moments where we might have a chance not just to change who was in power, but to transform the rules of politics and expand our sense of what is possible. But as I came to in the ambulance, I could never have imagined how much this year would be defined not by the candidates but by the people who got involved in politics for the first time. I could never have imagined how many all-nighters my underpaid staff would pull, how many hours our network of volunteers across the district would put in, how deep our supporters would dig, and how much I would lean on my family to keep going through a campaign that seemed set never to end. With the recount over, and the margin of victory now final at 727 votes, I know that every hour you put in, every dollar you gave, and every last vote made a difference.

During my recent listening tour through Southside and Central Virginia, I have been meeting with many elected officials who did not vote for me. What they keep saying to me over and over again is how impressed they are with how hard our team worked and how focused we were on a plan for moving forward. The gains in Southside that put us over the top came from making the case at the grassroots level--not through the normal gate-keepers--but now we have a chance to build partnerships that will help us make a real impact in this economy.

I am touched that so many voters took this leap of faith with me. I have been blessed by the generous and consistent support you have all shown to help us pull off one of the biggest political upsets of the year.

And now the next chapter begins. We all sacrificed because we believed that we had a better plan for helping struggling families, creating the new energy economy, and confronting our most serious security threats. We face immense challenges in our district and our nation but also immense opportunities. This is our time to build America's new competitive advantage for a new century through workforce development, infrastructure, and the new energy economy. This is our time for a new justice-based security strategy that invests in our intelligence and diplomatic corps. This is our time for a new era of accountability, from the consumer to the corporate CEO. We are not Democrats or Republicans in this crisis, but Americans, with a common struggle and a common future, and I will work for the common good of the entire district.

I am forever grateful to have the chance to represent the Virginia Fifth in the 111th Congress. And I am going there because all of you made this most improbable of upsets a reality.

Blessings,

 

Tom

I am crunked, legally, in the United States of America.

Happy Thanksgiving, and to the foreign friends, happy Thursday.

So because Virginia is just so awesome, the race for the 5th Congressional district (including where I live) has not yet been decided. Last I read, there were about 200 votes between the two. During the day today at work, I heard it was six.
SIX. SIX VOTES.
What is that? Seriously. That's democracy. That's Virgil Goode, six-or-so-time Republican congressman being almost beat by Tom Perriello, zero-time Democrat. Goode was supposed to win in a landslide.
Virginia turned blue, which was also nice to see. And Florida, and Ohio and Pennsylvania.

I didn't cry when I saw it on TV. I was surprised a bit when McCain conceded so early in the night, but it just showed how tired he was of running a campaign that wasn't true to him at all. I'd like to think McCain is still a good person (see McCain version 2000), and this election was a fluke. It is somewhat tragic that his best speech was last night. It harkened back to the old McCain. What a sad man.

I cried on my drive to work. It was, and is still, a rough week with incredibly long hours. I was tired. But I felt then that everything would be OK and the cliched nightmare of the past four years would be over.

But also, I could not escape these fleeting thoughts of my father, remembering him talking about how I'd see a black president in my lifetime, but he wouldn't in his, and how it was my generation's fight to make it happen, and how true that became; that he did not see it happen in his lifetime--if ever there was a way to feel abstract things such as history and generations, that was it. To think people who had lived through the civil rights movement and came-of-age during that time weren't able to realize this, that it has taken so long to accomplish this. Accomplish is such an odd word for this. An accomplishment for the man, of course. An accomplishment for a country? That's a loaded idea; complex, to be sure. It is mind-blowing to think it has taken this long, but at the same time it is awesome it could happen at all at this time.

In the days after he died, in the abashed stupor of mourning, I searched for his name, hoping I would find one last piece of nothing to hold on to, or to find out he wasn't really dead and had left some hidden message on some corner of the universe. And I discovered that he'd donated most of his savings two weeks before he died to the Obama campaign. Of course, my mother was on fire because there was almost no money left for me, but it was so comforting and almost a relief that one of the last things he did was, in all uncertain terms, right. And perhaps, for all of the injustices in the world, all of the struggles in this country, all of the pain and tragedy he saw in his life and every thing he fought for, both in uniform and in a wheelchair, this event, this national outpouring of hope and faith in ourselves has not taken history and the work of our parents and grandparents and great-grandparents for granted, and in whatever we think of when we think of America, is, in essence, right.


So I've decided to start a project I've been thinking about for some time, and I need your help. I need to talk to people. About a lot of things, but mostly about growing up. I'd like to eventually compile it into a book and perhaps get it published. It sounds sketchy, but there are details. Shoot me a line if you're interested.

Now go celebrate the success of the political process. Everywhere except in Virginia.

Also, on NBC last night, Rudy G. was saying that despite whoever won the election, "tomorrow (meaning today), you know what happens? We all become Americans." No lie. Apparently we weren't Americans and now we are? Hey, foreign friends, are you guys American now? What about the Georgians? I thought we were all Georgians, and now we're all Americans?

Gotta say, I am so glad he's not president.

I love Joe Biden.

The Sarah Palin Baby Name Generator


If Sarah Palin were my mother, my name would be:
Taupe Armageddon Palin

So it looks like it's going to be Joe Biden.

That is probably one of the best moves Obama could have made.

So LeRoi Moore died today after complications from an ATV accident that happened on his farm outside of Charlottesville.

It'll be interesting to see what kind of tributes and things happen around here tomorrow and in the next few days.

I don't know whose lifetime this is, but I'm making a meme out of it.

Bold the ones you own
Italicize the ones you've heard in part or in full
Underline your favorites



I only got 23 that i own

John Adams, to his wife, Abigail:

Philadelphia July 3d. 1776

Had a declaration of independence been made seven months ago, it would have been attended with many great and glorious effects. We might, before this hour, have formed alliance with foreign states. We should have mastered Quebec, and been in possession of Canada.

You will, perhaps, wonder how such a declaration would have influenced our affairs in Canada; but, if I could write with freedom, I could easily convince you that it would, and explain to you the manner how. Many gentlemen in high stations, and of great influence, have been duped, by the ministerial bubble of commissioners, to treat; and, in real, sincere expectation of this event, which they so fondly wished, they have been slow and languid in promoting measures for the reduction of that province. Others there are in the colonies, who really wished that our enterprise in Canada would be defeated; that the colonies might be brought into danger and distress between two fires, and be thus induced to submit. Others really wished to defeat the expedition to Canada, lest the conquest of it should elevate the minds of the people to much to hearken to those terms of reconciliation which they believed would be offered to us. These jarring views, wishes, and designs, occasioned an opposition to many salutary measures which were proposed for the support of that expedition, and caused obstructions embarrassments, and studied delays, which have finally lost us the province.

All causes, however, in conjunction, would not have disappointed us, if it had not been for a misfortune which could not have been foreseen, and perhaps could not have been prevented – I mean the prevalence of the smallpox among our troops. This fatal pestilence completed our destruction. It is a frown of Providence upon us, which we ought to lay to heart.

But, on the other hand, the delay of this declaration to this time has many great advantages attending it. The hopes of reconciliation which were fondly entertained by multitudes of honest an well meaning, though short-sighted and mistaken people, have been gradually, and at last totally, extinguished. Time has been given for the whole people maturely to consider the great question of independence, and to ripen their judgment, dissipate their fears, and allure their hopes, by discussing it in newspapers and pamphlets – by debating it in assemblies, conventions, committees of safety and inspection – in town and country meetings, as well as in private conversations; so that the whole people, in every colony, have now adopted it as their own act. This will cement the union, and avoid those heats, and perhaps convulsions, which might have been occasioned by such a declaration six months ago.

But the day is past. The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epocha in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations, as the great Anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the day of deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp, shews, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations, from one end of the continent to the other, from this time forward forever.

You will think me transported with enthusiasm; but I am not. I am well aware of the toil, and blood, and treasure, that it will cost us to maintain this declaration, and support and defend these states. Yet, through all the gloom, I can see the rays of light and glory; I can see that the end is more than worth all the means, and that posterity will triumph, although you and I may rue, which I hope we shall not.

This is scary:

Google must divulge the viewing habits of every user who has ever watched any video on YouTube to Viacom

Full article HERE

Justices Rule for Individual Gun Rights

By DAVID STOUT

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court declared for the first time on Thursday that the Constitution protects an individual’s right to have a gun, not just the right of the states to maintain militias.

Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the majority in the landmark 5-to-4 decision, said the Constitution does not allow “the absolute prohibition of handguns held and used for self-defense in the home.” In so declaring, the majority found that a gun-control law in the nation’s capital went too far by making it nearly impossible to own a handgun.

But the court held that the individual right to possess a gun “for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home” is not unlimited. “It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose,” Justice Scalia wrote.

The ruling does not mean, for instance, that laws against carrying concealed weapons are to be swept aside. Furthermore, Justice Scalia wrote, “The court’s opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.”

The decision upheld a federal appeals court ruling that the District of Columbia’s gun law, one of the strictest in the country, went beyond constitutional limits. Not only did the 1976 law make it practically impossible for an individual to legally possess a handgun in the district, but it also spelled out rules for the storage of rifles and shotguns. But the court did not articulate a specific standard of review for what might be a reasonable restraint on the right to possess a firearm.

 

Discuss?

Tim Russert died today after collapsing while recording voiceovers. We've lost a big one.

I figured as much:

-45 As a 1930s wife, I am Very Poor (Failure) Take the test!

Once again, Barack Obama made a speech that made me cry.

This is such a historic day. I'm so looking forward to the debates with McCain because Obama will blow him out of the water.

Any thoughts on the speech tonight? My favorite line was concerning McCain's accomplishments: "I respect his accomplishments even if he denies mine."

Update tomorrow on what happened today.