Being funny

I've talked before about my admiration for entertainers, especially comedians. I recently read an amazing article in Smithsonian Magazine about Steve Martin. Absolutely great insight into what it took him to succeed. ...

There was a belief that one appearance on "The Tonight Show" made you a star. But here are the facts. The first time you do the show, nothing. The second time you do the show, nothing. The sixth time you do the show, someone might come up to you and say, "Hi, I think we met at Harry's Christmas party." The tenth time you do the show, you could conceivably be remembered as being seen somewhere on television. The 12th time you do the show, you might hear, "Oh, I know you. You're that guy."

I've always thought Steve Martin was funny. I remember having arguments with a friend about who was more funny, Steve Martin or Bill Cosby. I love them both, but at the time I thought Steve Martin was the best. It's great to see his initial vision of what his comedy should look like and how it evolved, ever so slightly, over time. It's also a great read to remind you that it takes years of work to be an overnight success.

State of The Union 2008

Read on to see the videos of the state of the union address and the Democratic Response. ...

These videos come from cnn.com and more coverage of the State of the Union Address can be found here.

Campaign Withdrawals

I was busy moving this weekend so I missed Dennis Kucinich's withdrawal from the Presidential Race on Friday the 25th. He has decided to focus on keeping his seat in congress. In his speach he also talked about a new organization that will be started called Integrity Now. I don't know what it is but the name sounds good, of course so does No Child Left Behind so take that with a grain of salt. ...

Another withdrawal from the Presidential race, Dr. Jared Ball. This notice is even more belated than the Kucinich posting because I didn't have a good topic to post it. Dr. Ball has decided to throw his support behind Cynthia McKinney. He said as much in his closing arguments at the Green Party Debate on January 13th but made it official later in the week.

I said in my follow up article to the debate that Dr. Ball has the voice of a revolutionary. He could get many people voting that have felt, in the past, that their vote did not count. Keep up the good work Jared.

The National Initiative

In the Democratic debates where I have seen Mike Gravel I never liked him, at least as a presidential candidate. He always seemed too standoffish and too hot headed. However, that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Especially when you are fighting within a system for what you believe in and most other people don't agree with you. In honor of being the possibility of love and being extraordinary in the face of no agreement, I am going to talk about something I had never heard of until today - Mike Gravel's national initiative for democracy. ...

The following video talks about what the national initiative for democracy really is.

Special thanks to my opera member Dakota Jeane for making a post about Mike Gravel and his national initiative for democracy plan.

In case you haven't been paying close enough attention, Mike Gravel is still running for President of the United States of America. Much like Dennis Kucinich, his run isn't necessarily about becoming President, but more about letting everyone know about the important issues of the day. Keep running Senator Gravel, let your voice be heard.

The Case for Being Conscious

I have a great respect for all types of entertainers. It takes a lot of courage to put yourself out there in front of a group of people and entertain. However it also gives you access to your audiences attention. The two groups of entertainers that seem to take advantage of this the best are comedians and magicians. Both comedian's and magician's often say quite a bit without saying anything. They speak by making you think about their act rather than coming out and telling you what to think. The best of these two groups know this and use it to their advantage. ...

Magician's understand human psychology, or at least a subset of it, quite well. Very rarely do they share this knowledge, lest you think too much about the act and thus diminish the entertainment factor of the show( this is how wrestling works too by the way ). A duo that takes a slightly different path, Penn & Teller, often show you just enough to make you think you know what is going on - then they amaze you. It is that very premise that spawned a show I have only seen clips of, called Bullshit!

Below is a perfect example of why it is important to be conscious when people are talking about anything, but especially political matters.

While some conservatives may laugh and think this pertains to only liberals, think again. The point this piece is making is about how important we feel it is to be a part of something and how others can easily use that against us. We all get fed lines, and we all want to be a part of these groups that stand for something. We still need to ask ourselves the important questions.

What do I stand for? What does this group stand for? Are their actions consistent with their words? Who am I listening to? Why?

Those questions are a good place to start for us all. While we shouldn't all stand for the same things, asking the same questions of our own beliefs is probably a descent compromise. Remember, the beauty of democracy is that we don't all believe the same things.

Open Congress

In the past I have posted about a congressional tracking tool called govtrack.us. Recently I came across a new site called OpenCongress.org. It uses data provided by govtrack.us to do something a little different. OpenCongress.org seems better laid out and has more of a social/web 2.0 vibe to it. This social vibe may make it easier to find current hot topics being debated on the hill. Check it out today and see for yourself. It's important that as many citizens as possible know what is going on in our government.

Happy Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day!

Friday Humor with the Ninja

I've been serious all week so I thought I would lighten things up with some humor today. A long time ago I found The Real Ultimate Power. A juvenile yet still very funny site loosely based on ninjas. However, today's post is about some different ninja humor. AskANinja.com has been around for a while but I only just started watching it this week. Oh my how I have missed some good humor. ...

Here at least is some humor on a recent serious( for some ) topic so I don't stray too far from being all respectable and the like:ninja: .

The spoiler question

My posts, as of late, have centered around the recent Green Party Debate in Alameda County, California. One of the questions at the discussion/debate was in regards to the "spoiler" question. Many of the responses reminded me of why I bought the domain name votedifferent.org. This got me thinking, what would my response be to the "spoiler" question? ...

First off, let me give you a little background on what the "spoiler" situation is. In the 2000 election for President, Ralph Nader ran as a Green Party candidate. Some of you may remember that the election was extremely close (537 votes) and came down to a series of recounts in the state of Florida. Many people, especially in the Democratic party, argue that people who voted for Ralph Nader in Florida ( over 93,000 ) would have voted for Al Gore. This same group of people blame Ralph Nader for costing Al Gore the election. So what do I think about the spoiler situation?

The fact that George W. Bush won the 2000 election made you angy. It made me angry too. Democracy is meant to allow the people of this nation to choose what is best for the country. A Democracy is often defined as majority rule. Majority can be defined as the number larger than half the total. In Florida, no candidate had a majority of the votes. George W. Bush had the plurality of votes but over half of that state voted against him. By law he gets to be President but if you believe in Democracy as majority rule you should feel that election law needs to change. You might say, “What other option is there?” You might even come up with the idea of, “Could we not proclaim a winner until someone gets a majority of the votes?” Then fear of the unknown creeps in and you might say, “But we might never choose a President!”

There are options to our electoral system and it comes down to this. In a Democracy where you can’t vote your conscious you might not vote at all. In our Democracy the majority do not vote. In a Democracy people are often willing to have their second choice count as long as their original choice is heard. There is a system that allows people to vote their conscious and ,at the same time, let their second( third, fourth, etc ) choice have weight. It is called runoff voting.

There are many different types of runoff voting systems but the most promising for the United States is instant runoff voting(IRV). Instant runoff voting allows people to rank their candidate preference. The system then takes these rankings into account, removing last place candidates until we finally get to a majority. Rather than explain it with words, here is a video explanation of the system.

If a system like this were in place, even just in the state of Florida, people might be thanking Ralph Nader instead of ostracizing him. They’d be thanking Nader for helping to get more people to vote and getting Al Gore elected. Of course, that would only be the case if indeed Nader candidates second choice would have been Al Gore( which I believe as well ).

More information about instant runoff voting and other election reform can be found at FairVote.org. You can find out what is happening around the country as well as find some ways that you can make a difference in your own community.

For your viewing pleasure, here is a video of the politician who got me excited about grass root politics talking about instant runoff voting.

PS-I just bought the domain name voteEqual.com

Reviewing the Green Party Debate

Last night, I watched the videos that I posted yesterday of the Green Party debate which occurred on Sunday. After watching the debate I agree with what Jared Ball said, it was more of a discussion than a debate. A discussion makes more sense when the Green Party convenes anyway. Below is my review of each of the candidates as well as a couple of my differences with what I heard in the discussion. ...

I will review each candidate as they appeared on stage from right to left, as that was the order they responded to questions. As a non-candidate I will review Ralph Nader last.

Dr. Jared Ball
Dr. Ball did not speak to me, at least not directly, and that was the point. He is working to get the word out to the community about the Green Party through the hip hop movement. I have always said that if you can get the 50%+ of voting aged American's that do not vote into the polls to vote for a cause you could start a revolution. Ladies and gentlemen, Jared Ball could very well be that revolutionary.

Dr. Kent Mesplay
Dr. Mesplay was very intelligent and put thoughts together well. He was very clear on almost all topics presented to him and it was obvious where he stood with each. He was a little subdued throughout the discussion but I did see some fire from him in his closing arguments. He was a great counterpoint to Dr. Jared Ball whose answers he followed in the debate.

Cynthia McKinney
As a six-term former member of Congress from Georgia( the first black congresswoman from that state ), she definately has the most high level political experience in the group of candidates. All of her responses showed that experience as many of the issues she had already dealt with on the congressional floor and in committee. I don't really need to say much about her as she speaks for herself, and quite well.

Kat Swift
What were you doing ( or are planning to do ) when you were 34? Were you running for President of the United States of America? The fact that she is running for President speaks volumes to her courage. Unfortunately she had to follow Cynthia McKinney for most question all night and that had a spotlight on her inexperience in high level politics. However, she did make a run for mayor as a Green Party candidate in the state of Texas and received 30% of the vote with 1/20th of the budget. Perhaps her strategy of speak the truth and people will vote for it works.

Jesse Johnson
Technically he is not a candidate, as he stated in his opening statement. That is based on the fact that he is the chair of the West Virginia Mountain party and is not allowed to hold or seek political office. That is really not important, as he was a great speaker to have at this event. His acting experience combined with his passion give his words a tremendous amount of power. He has presence.

Ralph Nader
While it is very clear that Ralph Nader isn't a candidate at this point, it was important that he was at this event. His opening statement was a powerhouse. In many ways it reminded me of the way Bill Clinton speaks. He doesn't tell you what to think directly but rather inspires you to think about what he is saying. It even had a dash of humor that garnered some laughs with the line, "there are people who really get angry about that." It is obvious why the Green Party wants to draft Nader as a Presidential nominee.

My Arguments
While I can agree with almost everything I have 2 points of contention with statements made last night.

1. Be a politician
I heard a few of them say that they were not politicians and I can understand why. The word politician has some nasty stuff associated with it, but that is not what it means at its core. I liken it to when I was in sales. At first I hated being called a salesman because of the negative connotations associated with the word, and I did poorly. At some point I saw that it was possible to be a salesperson and hold on to my personal values and take care of the customer the way I wanted. When I accepted the fact that I was a salesperson and sold to people based on my personal values I excelled as a salesperson. We must accept that it is possible to be a politician who acts from their personal values. Be the shining example of what is possible. Be the reason people need to wake up and start voting for Green Party( or any third party ) candidate. You aren't business as usual. You aren't a Democrat. You aren't a Republican. You are a Green Party politician and you don't act like the politicians people are used to.

2. Make distinctions between the office and the office holder
Language is a powerful thing and with great power comes great responsibility. The office of The President of the United States should talked about with respect in all cases, even when the person holding the office is not held in high regard. When you speak down about the office holder it needs to be clear that you are talking about the individual and not "The President." The main reason is that when you finally achieve that position, you do not want people to mistrust you just because you have the position you spoke so poorly of. This goes for all political positions that Green Party members are striving for.

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Daryl Joseph Ducharme is a proud member of the North Carolina Green Party

Green Party Debate Videos

I promised I post the Green Party debate videos once they were available to my blog. I had to create a playlist to manage the videos, but that also makes it easier to traverse the debate. I haven't watched it yet, but I am looking forward to seeing a different kind of debate. ...