Foot, Meet Mouth

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Whoever said, "Bad press is better than no press", was obviously never a CongressCritter who completely mischaracterized a murder while speaking from the House floor with the murder victim's mother in attendance.  Even in uber-conservative NC-5 (the district in which I reside, BTW) where it's normally safe for a politician to take any anti-gay/lesbian stance, Rep. Foxx clearly stepped over the line when she said what she said on the floor yesterday. She's paying for it in the press and she's also getting smacked around on Twitter.  I don't think this will hurt her in the next election because, first, no one will remember it next year, and second, this is a very conservative district and while most of her constituents may feel she made a mistake they won't think it's that big a mistake.  On the other hand this won't do her much good in building a leadership position for herself in the House.

Lewisville Access Management Ordinance Update

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As I've written before I'm on the Lewisville Planning Board and we've been working on a new access management ordinance for the last couple of months.  We're getting close to being done with it and the proposed ordinance (L-132) has been posted on Lewisville's website.  Actually there's two PDFs you can look at:

  1. A Summary of the Ordinance
  2. The Ordinance Itself 

If you want to get an idea of what the ordinance is about I recommend reading number one.  If you're really into planning or if you're having trouble sleeping I recommend reading number two, otherwise known as "paper Ambien." 

Advice for Republicans

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Over in Guilford County, where I now spend my days toiling, they have some, uh, interesting politics.  That's why it doesn't go un-noticed when the local Democrats or Republicans announce their party leaders, and that's also why I noticed when Fec wrote the following in reference to the Guilford Republicans' choice of Tony Wilkins as their leader: "I particularly like that he isn’t illiterate, pompous and beating us over the head with Jesus."

From Fec's keyboard to the RNC's eyes…if only.

How Sin Taxes Would Work Better in NC

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Some geographers at Kansas State University had a little fun and mapped the Seven Deadly Sins throughout the US.  It appears that we North Carolinians are an envious, lustful, proud, wrathful and gluttonous bunch.  Especially gluttonous.  Maybe instead of increasing taxes on alcohol and tobacco we should look at upping the taxes on guns and BBQ.

Hat tip to Ed Cone for the pointer.

East Meets West Forsyth

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I just came across something way cool that involves my kids' high school but I only heard about it because it showed up in my "forsyth county nc" Google news alert.  From the SECCA blog:

The Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art would like to congratulate all of the students who recently participated in its Inside Out Classroom: Switch Video Project. During this international educational program two groups of students–one from the National Art Honor Society at West Forsyth High School in Clemmons, NC; and one from Lincoln High School in Seoul, South Korea–explored and documented their communities through video and other new media tools. The students maintained an ongoing dialog using Skype™, a web-based videoconferencing software, to discuss the differences and similarities of their cultures with their counterparts. The students then “switched” or traded video footage with their counterparts who edited and finalized each other’s video. To see the students’ final videos click on this linkhttp://iiieyekids.blip.tv/posts?view=archive&nsfw=dc.

Now that's what I call effective use of new technology in education.

Snotsville

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What do you get when you combine a tree pollen count of, like, 80-quadzillion and combine it with a weekend soccer tournament that requires sitting at Sara Lee Park for something like 15 hours in 90 degree heat?  A really hot, sunburned and smelly middle aged guy who can't breathe.  Welcome to my hell, otherwise known as "Snotsville".

Oh, BTW Erin was a guest player for one of her club's sister teams (there are three U-15 girls "Challenge" teams in her club) and they came in second in the U-18 bracket of the Beat the Heat tournament. Okay, there were only three teams in the bracket so they played the other two teams twice, but one of the teams was a very strong U-18 team from West Virginia (they won all four of their games) and our girls managed to hang with them for three out of four halves of soccer that they played.  The other team was a strong U-15 team from Statesville that's given all of our club's U-15 team fits for the last couple of years and our girls managed to win both those games.  Four games in two days in 90+ degree heat is no easy thing and the girls did so and managed to play some great soccer in the process.  I enjoyed watching it despite my massive mucus problems.

Go West!

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West Forsyth High School's girls varsity soccer team, currently ranked 14th in North Carolina, was profiled in the Winston-Salem Journal today.  My daughter plays for the JV team and some of her friends are the freshmen varsity starters that are mentioned in the article.  She already realizes that she's going to have to work very hard to crack the varsity lineup next year, but knowing her she won't shrink from the challenge and if she makes it the reward will be that much greater.

In One Word

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The Sunlight Foundation has released a funny yet meaningless report about CongressCritters' favorite words.  Their Capitol Words project takes speeches recorded in the Congressional Record to calculate the frequency of specific words used by each member of Congress.  When I clicked on North Carolina on their interactive map I found out the following:

  • Over the last year (April 22, 2008 – April 21, 2009) Rep. Virginia Foxx was the biggest chatter box from NC.  She uttered 6,021 words.  Sen. Richard Burr came in second with 3,083 so you can see that Rep. Foxx took the talking title by a mile.  
  • Rep. Foxx's favorite word was "democrats" which she uttered 428 times, followed by "energy" at 373 times, "country" at 316 times and "oil" at 229 times. 
  • Sen. Kay Hagan apparently lost her voice with each only uttering 242 words over the last year.  Well, since she's only been there since January I guess we can cut her some slack.  Or maybe she's just a "walk softly and carry a big stick" kind of gal.

H/T to Ed Cone for the link. 

How’s That Recession Treating You?

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Truliant Federal Credit Union surveyed its members to see how the recession has affected their behavior and over 3,000 shared their thoughts. Some of the results are highlighted in this press release.  Anyone who's seen all the restaurants shuttered recently won't be surprised by this one:

Q: If you have cut back on spending, what areas are most affected? 

73% – Dining Out 
70% – Entertainment 
64% – Travel, vacations 
59% – Clothing 
55% – Home Electronics 
45% – Auto (buying/leasing a new vehicle, repairs) 
35% – Home Appliances 
22% – Cell Phones and/or calling plans 
5% – Other 

From the “other” category, popular items that were mentioned include groceries, medications, food and club memberships. Another trend that the “other” category highlighted is that more of Truliant’s member-owners are starting to purchase generic products to help them save money.