(Originally posted at the Guardian website – will be a bit of a rerun if you’ve been viewing the zannel vids)

There are many metrics by which one might differentiate the Republican from the Democratic national convention, but if there is one that has struck me immediately since my arrival in Denver, it’s the fact that it seems, no matter where I go, somebody wants to hand me a condom.

And it’s not simply at the events, such as the star-studded celebrity gala Monday night hosted by Rolling Stone and Trojan Condoms. The event showcased a stand up performance by comedian Bill Maher and featured luminaries on the red carpet such as Spike Lee, Susan Sarandon and Alan Cumming – and of course, plenty of condoms. Young, lightly clad women passing them out at the door, carnival-style condom trivia games, a condom bus. Additionally, there are several evening mixers hosted by Planned Parenthood with plenty more available.

But people are also handing them out on street corners and in doorways, and the overall effect is to put sexual health and pregnancy-prevention consciousness front and centre – which is clearly a good thing (and, I suspect, a good message for many of the convention-goers on this particular trip).

Nevertheless, despite the quality and importance of the messaging, there’s no getting around the fact that being handed a condom by a complete stranger every hour or two is inherently amusing.

And it’s happened enough that it becomes possible to glean patterns in the distribution. The first condom I was given was a standard lubricated Trojan, quite unremarkable. The second, however, was a larger-sized “magnum” version. I laughed and thanked the young man handing them out for his vote of confidence, and the next day my first condom was also a magnum. Perhaps I was impressing people more than I believed?

But then I noticed the pattern: the women distributing the merchandise had exclusively handed me standard-issue Trojans, while the men – to a person – offered the jumbo editions.

Now, I am not one to speak to the social-psychological implications behind which condom I’m handed. Perhaps, if I were a man passing them out, passing out a large-sized condom to a fellow male of the species would feel like a friendly pat on the back, and I would save the standard sized for the women. It doesn’t seem too likely that the choice of condom had sexual innuendo attached, but if it did … well, the mind boggles.

I won’t be attending the Republican convention. As a partisan progressive Democrat, I’d have no interest beyond the anthropological, and that would get old fast. Something tells me, though, that in contrast to the plentiful prophylactics and accompanying messaging here in Denver, the RNC will be more of a, shall we say, abstinence-only affair.

Today's Free Press article on new income data from the Census Bureau may have unintentionally caused some confusion (http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080827/NEWS01/80827030)

The article refers to a decline in the two-year moving average for median household income. It quoted several people who were at pains to explain the data. A little context will help.

First, the source of the data is the March Supplement to the Current Population Survey (CPS). It measures self reported income for the previous year. While the national sample for the CPS is quite large, the state samples are small and not always representative. This means that in any given single year, the sample might include too many high- or low-income respondents to be a fair representation. That's why Census publishes two- and three-year moving averages. This smoothes out the spikes in those odd (anomalous) years. Obviously, a three-year moving average will be less likely to show large spikes than the two-year average. The table below shows this clearly.

VT inflation adjusted median household income: Two and three-year moving averages (Census)

Notice how the annual % change is usually much greater in the two-year average.

three year rolling average: http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/histinc/h08B.html

two-year rolling average: http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/histinc/h08A.html

Second, the article referred to the change from 2005 to 2007 (4.7%). I'm not sure why the reporter used the change over two years instead of one (2006 to 2007), but the one-year change was 6%. This was more than twice the change in the three-year rolling average of 2.9%. Clearly, something is going on and it's not good. But the change appears to be less dramatic than first reported.

In any case, the response from the Governor's spokesperson was noteworthy for several reasons. Here's what the article reported:

“Jason Gibbs, spokesman for Gov. Jim Douglas, said the administration is leery of the Census numbers given that poverty levels have not increased and per-capita income has risen. He said one possible explanation for the decline in household income over the two-year period is the state's aging demographics. As more people retire, their household income declines, he said.”

1. While it's understandable that the Governor would be disappointed in such figures, it is a bit disingenuous to blame the Census Bureau, especially since the CPS is also the source of the monthly unemployment data (which the Gov. likes to cite when he thinks it reflects well on him). In any event, I have indicated above why I think the two-year figures are less than optimal, but even the three-year figures show a decline. We cannot wish this away or blame someone else.

2. The reference to rising per capita income demonstrates either a failure to understand the data or an attempt to mislead readers. Per capita income is simply total income divided by total population. It ignores the distribution of income, which is why the median is a better measure (the midpoint – ½ above and ½ below). The two measures are apples and oranges. Total income is heavily influenced by non-wage income (interest, capital gains, and dividends). And since almost half of all new income is going to the top 0.25%, it's not necessarily surprising to see an increase in per capita income as median incomes decline. They are not mutually exclusive.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/26/business/economy/26income.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=income&st=cse&oref=slogin

3. The suggestion that the decline may be related to an aging population is similarly uninformed. Although VT – like most other states – is aging, the number of additional people reaching retirement in any given year is much too small to effect the median household income.

Number of Vermonters 65 and older (Census estimates)

2006 — 82,966

2007 — 84,425 (change = 1,459; 0.2% of the total 621,254)

Census reports there were 240,634 households in VT in 2000. Nationally, the average household size for those 65 – 74 is 1.89 persons

(http://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/hh-fam/cps2007/tabAVG1.xls).

Thus, the 1,459 additional people over 64 in 2007 represent about 772 households or three tenths of 1% of all households. It is inconceivable that these few additional elderly households could have a measurable impact on the statewide median household income.

Moreover, according to the VT Tax Department, the average income of Vermonters 65 and older is higher than the statewide average income so it's not at all certain that the aging factor is relevant here.

Note: Howard Dean also complained about the reliability of the income data in the `90s when it showed a decline. Wouldn't it be refreshing if elected officials just acknowledged the problem?

From Politico’s Ben Smith:

Leahy told Vogel yesterday the media has given McCain a free pass on flubs including mixing up Middle East geography, Shiite and Sunni Muslims, and referring to Russia’s relationship Czechoslovakia – a country that hasn’t existed for 15 years

With Democrats on the precipice of raising the age issue against John McCain, Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont seemed to cross the line completely, then immediately backtrack, my colleague Ken Vogel reports.

…The press “let Ronald Regan get away with” slips, Leahy said, though he denied he was suggesting that McCain was experiencing mental decline.

“No, I’m just saying he gets a free ride,” Leahy said.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t see Leahy broaching age at all. He’s no spring chicken himself, after all. I see him broaching the issue of incompetence, and the refusal of the traditional media to face such questions. I see no mention of McCain’s age being mentioned, and even the new media ubersite Huffington Post is casting this as an attack based on age. User diarists on dKos are all a-twitter.

Hogwash. It’s about competence, and we have to be able to have the conversation plainly, without falling into the trap about people’s birthdates and courting charges of ageism that would hurt us in the senior community needlessly.

That said, Leahy needs to firm up his point, lest he invite just this kind of criticism.

When I went to the “gala” Monday night featuring the likes of Bill Maher, Susan Sarandon, etc, I had in mind a diary juxtaposing the well-intentioned frivolity of the event against the simultaneous “serious” conventioneering happening – in that case, a speech by Michelle Obama. Over the last day, though, I’ve changed my mind. There is no juxtaposition – the gala affair actually fit right in to the greater context.

And before you assume that’s a sneer, put-down, or dismissal of the convention – it’s not. It’s just a… thing.

I suppose if I’d thought about it very deeply I would’ve come to this conclusion anyway, but being immersed in it now makes it easier to recognize. A political convention like this is always made up of 1 part politics, a pinch of activism, and about 10 parts fluff. Fluff like the kind of marshmallow fluff that doesn’t have any nutritional value, but it really makes the people who reach for it feel good. It’s simply the nature of the beast, and the longer I’m here, the more I feel that those who are criticizing it so venemously are criticizing it on their personal terms, rather than on its own terms. Call it a pep rally, a revival tent, or whatever – these conventions serve to gather, energize and support the faithful, and in the process do some basic (and I mean really, really basic) messaging to the traditional media. Although the traditional media coverage has been (for the most part) predictably banal, it’s clear at this point that – barring any big disaster – those goals are being met.

But I’ll go a step further still. This convention, with all its obligatory pageantry and silly peripherals, is accomplishing more than what a traditional convention does, and although its happening organically, the DNC deserves a share of credit for helping seed the process.

The presence of new media and their (our) impact on the character of the overall event is pronounced, and seems to be growing daily. In fact, the traditional media have been roving for something different to cover as their largely fabricated “disaffected PUMA” storyline has fizzled, and the Recreate 68 protests have not been entertainingly violent enough (its a real crime that the media only want to cover “lifestyle anarchist” style, slash-and-burn protests and are neglecting some of the extraordinary and effective demonstrations underway by groups like Iraq Veterans Against the War and the like…. but that’s a diary for another time).

Increasingly, those traditional media folks are gravitating to the “Big Tent” new media hub, where unknowns like myself are only a table or two away from luminaries like Markos Moulitsas and Jane Hamsher. Today, especially, you couldn’t spit without hitting a professional journalist. Two reporters from The Financial Times stopped by to speak to me this morning. JDRyan called me from his cell and reported that a journalist from an Italian paper had stopped him to chat in the street. And I’m still on call to possibly talk to local Denver TV.

Increasingly, the emergence and convergence of new, citizen media are becoming, if not the story, certainly a story. And in a classic case of self-fulfilling storylines, the more such coverage increases, the more prominent, meaningful and significant the new media become. More attention makes us a bigger part of the story, and the bigger a part of the story we are, the more good we can do – and influencing the very traditional media that we’re all interfacing with is a big step towards maximizing that effect.

The point is, there’s a real community of progressive, citizen media – and its maturing daily before my eyes. It’s a process that couldn’t possibly be unfolding in such a way without the catalyst of the convention to power it. And that’s just a simple fact.

A lot of people deserve credit for making this happen, but clearly DNC Chair Howard Dean is among those on the top of the list. Dean has a real affinity for the blogs, and his opening the convention (and the convention floor) to bloggers and new media sites in such an unprecedented way set the stage.

Also at the top of that list are Markos Moulitsas and his cohorts at Daily Kos (even that Kagro guy). The extra-convention blogger space dubbed The Big Tent is more than just a new media hub, its a full blown incubator – and, as mentioned above, a space where the new and old media are increasingly coming together.

So a big thank you to both of our hosts is in order. Whatever else comes out of this convention, progressive citizen media has been given a real steroid shot in the arm, and the repercussions of that shot are likely to be many and varied… and very, very interesting…

This just in from Kevin J. Kelley:

Vermont’s Clinton and Obama delegates have reached agreement on how they will vote when the state’s turn comes toward the end of this evening’s roll-call vote at the Democratic Convention. A statement of unity, drafted last night with the help of former Governor Madeleine Kunin, recognizes the historic achievement of Hillary Clinton’s campaign as a prelude to a unanimous Vermont delegate vote for Barack Obama.

Kevin is posting updates on Blurt, the Seven Days Staff Blog. Click here to read the rest of his post…

Too much to say, too little time. I got into the Pepsi Arena but my pass was only good for the hallways, not the arena itself. Still… I got some good pictures. JD Ryan said it best about the convention. It’s too damn surreal. I would add that when you get in the arena, you’ll notice it DEFINITELY doesn’t have the feel of a “people’s party.” It’s a good thing the blogosphere is filling in that hole.  

Stay tuned y’all. Here’s my slide show from yesterday, If you have any questions, Comment here and I’ll respond. All of you at Docudharma GREEN MOUNTAIN DAILY are the best!

– Christian

h/t to Raw Story for covering this. Amy Goodman, host of Democracy Now!, and A-list bloggers Glenn Greenwald and Jane Hamsher were all shut out of a Blue Dog Democratic party sponsored by AT & T. All three of them had press credentials. Here’s how Amy Goodman covered the event. Welcome to the Dems version of Dick Cheney’s energy council.

No, they won’t. And the reason is simple: as demonstrated by decades of approval and cowardly acquiescence, the Democratic politicians in general approve of this.

We can be shot and killed, tortured with tasers, and beat for no reason … and the Dems will gather in corporate infested Pepsi Center (see here) to tell us how much hope we should have for change.

Myopic merriment … yeah … that describes it. Self indulgent, self (undeserved) congratulatory, and self delusional.

Real change comes from actions, and words based upon nothing mean nothing. To date the Democratic Party politicians have demonstrated they love big corporations and big corporate power (go Joe Biden), they love big military and big military spending (Obama’s own plan here), and while the claims are made to protect voters and voters’ rights past votes have put that to a lie.

So while the Colorado cops brutalize women dressed in pink and peaceful demonstrators and arrest them “before they could break any laws” (Protesters challenge Monday arrest by police in Denver, Denver Post story reprinted in Times Argus but not on web site, 08/27/08), Democrats will enjoy their corporate welfare inside the comfy environs of unreality.

To paraphrase dumbya Bush, “Nope, no change we can believe in under here.”

A few things I noticed reading today’s news:

I’m not linking to this one because it’s an AP piece, but apparently Pollina is in talks with one of his donors who happens to be a lawyer who wants to sue in federal court to overturn the campaign finance law.

Brattleboro suffered major flooding today:

There are two water mains on this stretch of Putney Road, one on either side. On the west side, the main dates from the 1940s, and is made of asbestos lined with cement. On the east side, installed in the late 1960s, is a pipe made of cast iron.

In other antiquated utility news, Vermont Yankee was evacuated Tuesday.  Per the Reformer:

At approximately 11:09 a.m. Tuesday, plant operators received a reactor building high radiation alarm, he said. At the same time, operators received a report that a technician had “misoperated” a valve in the reactor coolant water clean-up system, said Sheehan.

“They determined the radiation levels were consistent with those expected for a clean-up filter resin intrusion event,” he said.

Radiation levels were higher than normal for about 10 minutes before the began to trend downward, said Sheehan.

“The reactor building was evacuated until the radiation protection personnel could survey the building and release it for unrestricted use.”

According to Rob Williams, “We are looking into where and how the error was made.”  

Well that’s comforting.

Oh, and I hear Leahy gave some kind of speech yesterday:

( – promoted by odum)

Good catch by jvwalt regarding the slurs against Representative Floyd Nease and Democrats in general in yesterday's Rutland Herald.

The anti-Democratic policy slurs appeared in the Herald’s article about Governor Douglas’ latest anti-working family policy decision. In a nutshell, the Governor is hopelessly committed to keep spending taxpayer money on political/public relations staff while simultaneously cutting badly needed funds to support child safety/daycare help for working Vermonters balancing the burdens of family responsibility and working long hours during a Republican recession. See article. 

The Rutland Herald refers dismissively to Representative Floyd Nease, the Ass’t House Majority Leader, and other “Democrat lawmakers.”  Hmmmm?

Admittedly, this notoriously focus-group tested and Republican marketed type derision, when just a one-off thing, can sometimes be an innocent typo. If the person does it repeatedly, it is hard to see it as anything but a slur.

The Herald article goes pretty far into the muck . . . (more below)

UPDATE:  Rama emailed Peter Hirschfeld regarding his choice of words.  Mr. Hirschfeld tells Rama that:

I had no idea dropping the adjectival suffix was such a faux pas. I'm just a terrible grammarian who thought that if Republicans form the Republican Party, and Progressives form the Progressive Party, then Democrats form the Democrat Party. Kindergarten stuff, I know. It's embarrassing. In any event, my apologies for any perceived slight. I certainly didn't intend to “slur” the Party.

Fair enough & thank you Rama.

Hendrik Hertzberg explained the reasoning behind Republican-American's strategy of demonizing Democrats by their strategy of substituting the noun for the adjectival (Democratic) when refering to a person's or a policy's party affiliation:

    There is no great mystery about the motives behind this deliberate misnaming. “Democrat Party” is a slur, or intended to be—a handy way to express contempt. Aesthetic judgments are subjective, of course, but “Democrat Party” is jarring verging on ugly. It fairly screams “rat.” At a slightly higher level of sophistication, it’s an attempt to deny the enemy the positive connotations of its chosen appellation. During the Cold War, many people bridled at obvious misnomers like “German Democratic Republic,” and perhaps there are some members of the Republican Party (which, come to think of it, has been drifting toward monarchism of late) who genuinely regard the Democratic Party as undemocratic. . . .  And no doubt there are plenty of others who say “Democrat Party” just to needle the other side while signaling solidarity with their own—the partisan equivalent of flashing a gang sign.

    * * *

    In the conservative media, the phenomenon feeds more voraciously the closer you get to the mucky, sludgy bottom. “Democrat Party” is standard jargon on right-wing talk radio and common on winger Web sites like NewsMax*com, . . . William F. Buckley, Jr., the Miss Manners cum Dr. Johnson of modern conservatism, dealt with the question in a 2000 column in National Review, the magazine he had founded forty-five years before. “I have an aversion to ‘Democrat’ as an adjective,” Buckley began. . .

     . . . among those of the Republican persuasion “Democrat Party” is now nearly universal. This is partly the work of Newt Gingrich, the nominal author of the notorious 1990 memo “Language: A Key Mechanism of Control,” and his Contract with America pollster, Frank Luntz, the Johnny Appleseed of such linguistic innovations as “death tax” for estate tax and “personal accounts” for Social Security privatization. Luntz, who road-tested the adjectival use of “Democrat” with a focus group in 2001, has concluded that the only people who really dislike it are highly partisan adherents of the—how you say?—Democratic Party. “Those two letters actually do matter,”  

The first time I see someone write this, it is not necessarily a slur unless the context makes it obviously so. Rather, it is a signal to keep an eye on the reporter/commenter etc. to see whether they are being objective or subversive.

In this particular case, the Herald reporter threw down the sign three times in the article.

This is the effect of “nouning” (if I may take verb privileges) an adjective

This is what the article says:

Efforts to trim $32 million from the state budget turned political Monday when a prominent Democrat lawmaker criticized Gov. James Douglas

AND

The public-relations positions funded via the executive branch budget have come under fire perennially from Democrat lawmakers.

AND Finally

“. . . the administration had already agreed to chop $500,000 in non-union salaries over fiscal years 2008 and 2009, largely in response to Democrat criticism over the number of public relations employees appointed by Douglas . . .”

Rather than use an adjective to describe the type of “criticism” (Democratic criticism) the type of “fire” (Democratic fire) or type of “lawmaker” (Democratic lawmaker), the article uses, one can only surmise deliberately based on the repeated hits, a dismissive slur against Rep. Nease.

At the same time, the Herald gives the Governor’s staff a free shot at Democratic motives for Nease's advocacy of placing a policy priority on maintaining what mild assistance to working families the State already has.  The forum the Herald gives for the Douglas administration to take shots at  Rep. Nease also come at the expense of – and as a substitute for – any visible attempt by the Herald to make the administration justify its spending priorities.  Nice.

Here is another offensive and even more glaring example of a particular noun/adjective slur I’ve heard far too often. It is grossly bigoted as well. Take the following nouns (Democrat, Jew) and the following adjectives (Democratic, Jewish). Now, read the Herald’s dismissive sentences again (substituting a noun for the appropraite adjective) and see how this sounds:

Example 1:

Efforts to trim $32 million from the state budget turned political Monday when a prominent Jew lawmaker criticized Gov. James Douglas

AND

The public-relations positions funded via the executive branch budget have come under fire perennially from Jew lawmakers.

AND Finally

“. . . the administration had already agreed to chop $500,000 in non-union salaries over fiscal years 2008 and 2009, largely in response to Jew criticism over the number of public relations employees appointed by Douglas . . .”

Instead of, for example, “Jewish lawmaker” or “Democratic lawmaker,” the Rutland Herald gives us “[noun: Democrat, noun: Jew] lawmaker,” which reads just like the slur it is intended to be.  

The legacy media have tacked pretty far to the right for well past a generation now. The faux balancing in political reporting is particularly glaring when the “expression of contempt” is so, literally, black and white.