Slog
News & ArtsWednesday, June 20, 2012
Tech / Election There's an App for That
Posted by Goldy on Wed, Jun 20, 2012 at 3:54 PM
- Darcy Burner
While her opponents attempt to manufacture controversy over her call for progressives to stand with women who are willing to publicly acknowledge their abortions, 1st Congressional District candidate Darcy Burner continues to draw more positive attention over her June 8 keynote address at Netroots Nation, including this bit of coverage in Forbes of all places, highlighting her idea for a smartphone app that helps progressives shop more responsibly:
At her recent Netroots Nation keynote address, Burner pitched her plan of action to an audience of progressive bloggers: a smartphone app allowing shoppers to swipe bar codes to check whether the Kochs, or other right-wing supporters, are behind a product on the shelves.
[...] She put her expertise to use designing a mock interface for the app (above, right). Now she’s just waiting on the right team to build the back end.
Since her Netroots speech, she’s had some phone calls from developers hoping to step in and create the app. (“I’ve found that if you pitch an idea in front of 2400 very smart bloggers, usually they’ll make it happen,” she said.)
Yeah, I know, "Darcy's a loser," blah, blah, blah... "Darcy's too liberal for her district," blah, blah, blah... "Darcy should be ringing doorbells in Skagit County instead of delivering speeches in Providence, RI, because candidates never go anywhere outside their district or do anything but campaign anytime ever," blah, blah, blah. Whatever. It was a great speech, and the audience (Joel Connelly excluded) loved it.
2
"There's An App For That" - In which Goldy once again displays his crass immaturity.
Grow up, Goldy. You don't have to have everyone agree with you to be right, so just stop wanting that, okay? (And don't bother denying that. People who don't care don't keep revisiting arguments where their position proved to be unpopular, at least not when those arguments were trivial, which is the case with Burner's Providence speech.)
Grow up, Goldy. You don't have to have everyone agree with you to be right, so just stop wanting that, okay? (And don't bother denying that. People who don't care don't keep revisiting arguments where their position proved to be unpopular, at least not when those arguments were trivial, which is the case with Burner's Providence speech.)
4
Goldy, you are really trying my patience not merely with your unreasoning expectations for the electoral prospects of Darcy Burner but with your wholly unreasonable demonization of her detractors. I would go so far as to call it dishonest.
This goes back to your previous post, which you helpfully hyperlinked. In that post, you linked to a post by The Stranger's Dominic Holden, and in your link you used the word "hectoring", which Dominic had used - and which only Dominic had used. It didn't appear in the post Dominic linked to and talked about - but it was useful for you to quote that word, because it helped you to claim that people skeptical of running Ms. Burner for a third time after she lost the first time and then underperformed disastrously the second time were sexist neanderthals committed to portraying Ms. Burner as a screeching termagent.
Similarly, in this post you claim that "her opponents attempt to manufacture controversy over her call for progressives to stand with women". Again, few things could be farther from the truth. Nobody (worth listening to) in the comment threads either here at Slog or in the original linked post at Balloon Juice made a criticism remotely like this. People criticized Ms. Burner's oratorical skills, asked whether she was selecting the most politically effective subjects to emphasize and policies to promote, pointed out her disappointing track record as a candidate, and asked why given all of this she receives such huge amounts of attention and displays of affection from a large part of the national progressive movement that seems determined to disappear up its own fundament. But no-one (of significance) questioned for a moment the rightness as a policy of standing with women, on abortion or on any other issue.
When faced with progressives who happen to agree with you (and, indeed, with Ms. Burner) substantively but happen not to believe Ms. Burner is a promising candidate for elected office ready to face the voters, you have launched a seemingly unrelenting campaign to portray these people as being woman-hating fiends determined to drag us back to the twelfth century. Frankly, by doing so, all you accomplish is to embarrass yourself and decrease your credibility.
More...
This goes back to your previous post, which you helpfully hyperlinked. In that post, you linked to a post by The Stranger's Dominic Holden, and in your link you used the word "hectoring", which Dominic had used - and which only Dominic had used. It didn't appear in the post Dominic linked to and talked about - but it was useful for you to quote that word, because it helped you to claim that people skeptical of running Ms. Burner for a third time after she lost the first time and then underperformed disastrously the second time were sexist neanderthals committed to portraying Ms. Burner as a screeching termagent.
Similarly, in this post you claim that "her opponents attempt to manufacture controversy over her call for progressives to stand with women". Again, few things could be farther from the truth. Nobody (worth listening to) in the comment threads either here at Slog or in the original linked post at Balloon Juice made a criticism remotely like this. People criticized Ms. Burner's oratorical skills, asked whether she was selecting the most politically effective subjects to emphasize and policies to promote, pointed out her disappointing track record as a candidate, and asked why given all of this she receives such huge amounts of attention and displays of affection from a large part of the national progressive movement that seems determined to disappear up its own fundament. But no-one (of significance) questioned for a moment the rightness as a policy of standing with women, on abortion or on any other issue.
When faced with progressives who happen to agree with you (and, indeed, with Ms. Burner) substantively but happen not to believe Ms. Burner is a promising candidate for elected office ready to face the voters, you have launched a seemingly unrelenting campaign to portray these people as being woman-hating fiends determined to drag us back to the twelfth century. Frankly, by doing so, all you accomplish is to embarrass yourself and decrease your credibility.
5
@4 - piling on, Goldy it's really sleazy how you keep on insinuating that her primary opponents are attacking Darcy on her RI presentation. If they are, show some evidence but knock it off with the whole "her opponents are saying" nonsense without naming names.
6
Oh, and by the way, with respect to the "Koch-detector app", it's not a novel idea. When Color Of Change was organizing a boycott of Glenn Beck's advertisers, back when he was on the TV, there was plenty of discussion of just such an App. Heck, with a quick Google I can find proposals to create an iPhone App to help target and boycott Koch Brothers products from almost eighteen months ago. I don't know if it any of these propose Apps went beyond the discussion phase - but neither has Ms. Burner's App gone beyond the discussion stage, whatever fancy graphics she may have stuck onto the bare bones of this idea. And given that the idea is all she was demonstrating, the fact that the idea wasn't new seems to matter.
An you might find this amusing as an Apple fan, Goldy: when there were discussions of a Boycott Glen Beck iPhone App, one of the concerns was that Apple was extremely unlikely to allow it into the App Store.
An you might find this amusing as an Apple fan, Goldy: when there were discussions of a Boycott Glen Beck iPhone App, one of the concerns was that Apple was extremely unlikely to allow it into the App Store.
7
Thanks Goldy, I love Darcy Burner and her speech at NN was great. I wish I lived in her district so I could vote for her.
8
Ex Seattlite (and ex Seattle mayoral candidate) Scott Kennedy is behind OpenLabel. It's an App that's similar to Darcy's yet broader.
http://theopenlabel.com/
http://theopenlabel.com/
9
So, Goldy, what has to happen before you begin to possibly entertain the formation of the rough concept of the idea that Burner may not be the best candidate material? What's the magic number of defeats?
Again, she is a good organizer, but she needs some, any elective experience. She is starting off as usual.
Again, she is a good organizer, but she needs some, any elective experience. She is starting off as usual.
10
@9:
Three.
I'd say if she's loses this time around, she probably shouldn't run again.
That said, if she does make it through the primary to the general election, I want to make it clear that it won't be because she cheated. It won't be because she outspent her opponents. And it won't because the powers that be paved the way for her. It will be because she got more primary votes than her Democratic opponents.
So should she be the Democratic nominee, I hope the Democratic Darcy haters are ready to swallow their pride and do what's best for the party, the district, and the nation, and get behind her like they would have their preferred candidate, rather than sabotaging her for the sake of a hearty "I told you so."
What's the magic number of defeats?
Three.
I'd say if she's loses this time around, she probably shouldn't run again.
That said, if she does make it through the primary to the general election, I want to make it clear that it won't be because she cheated. It won't be because she outspent her opponents. And it won't because the powers that be paved the way for her. It will be because she got more primary votes than her Democratic opponents.
So should she be the Democratic nominee, I hope the Democratic Darcy haters are ready to swallow their pride and do what's best for the party, the district, and the nation, and get behind her like they would have their preferred candidate, rather than sabotaging her for the sake of a hearty "I told you so."
11
So should she be the Democratic nominee, I hope the Democratic Darcy haters are ready to swallow their pride and do what's best for the party, the district, and the nation, and get behind her like they would have their preferred candidate, rather than sabotaging her for the sake of a hearty "I told you so."I agree! However, it's not the Democrats that she needs to worry about, and it's not the 30% that will never vote Democratic even if one of Hitler's clones is the Republican. It's that squishy 40% in the middle that will make the different win or lose, and it's how her appearance in Rhode Island will play out with those folks. That may not be "fair", but it's the difference between a campaigner and an also-ran in a swing district.
12
Well, obviously - but have you considered whether baselessly accusing those who are not currently rooting for her of sexist motives helps to make this happen?
For that matter, where the heck do you get off imputing intentions of sabotage? That's quite a charge to make with nothing to back it up. And, again, making it for no good reason just adds to bitterness, and has the potential to make it harder for people to come together after the primaries according to your (and my) desires.
So should she be the Democratic nominee, I hope the Democratic Darcy haters are ready to swallow their pride and do what's best for the party, the district, and the nation, and get behind her like they would have their preferred candidate, rather than sabotaging her for the sake of a hearty "I told you so."
Well, obviously - but have you considered whether baselessly accusing those who are not currently rooting for her of sexist motives helps to make this happen?
For that matter, where the heck do you get off imputing intentions of sabotage? That's quite a charge to make with nothing to back it up. And, again, making it for no good reason just adds to bitterness, and has the potential to make it harder for people to come together after the primaries according to your (and my) desires.
13
@12, you just wait. Goldy has a strategy for winning over doubting voters: belittle us. It's working, too. I feel smaller already.
14
That has got to be the best idea I've heard from Democrats re: a long term strategy to cripple the GOP, in basically forever.
Of course, you'd have to stop buying gasoline and all other petroleum based products, and give up banking altogether (especially now that hedge funds have moved all their support from the DNP to the GOP), but still, it's an absolutely great idea.
I hope they make that app. I'd at least get it for entertainment value.
Of course, you'd have to stop buying gasoline and all other petroleum based products, and give up banking altogether (especially now that hedge funds have moved all their support from the DNP to the GOP), but still, it's an absolutely great idea.
I hope they make that app. I'd at least get it for entertainment value.
15
^^you'd have to give those things up to do any real financial damage to that party --> is what I meant to say.
16
is There no irony of using an ap on a device made by slave/unfair labor to find out which american company's product to 'not buy' ?
17
@11, "it's not the Democrats that she needs to worry about, [...] It's that squishy 40% in the middle that will make the different win or lose, and it's how her appearance in Rhode Island will play out with those folks. "
There is no squishy middle between Rs and establishment Ds.
There is no squishy middle between Rs and establishment Ds.
18
@12: Um, when did I accuse anybody of being sexist? And I'm not imputing intentions of sabotage. I'm an imputing a fear/hatred/ridicule/whatever of Darcy that is out of proportion to anything she has ever said or done.
She ran twice against a popular incumbent alleged serial-killer-catcher in a district Democrats have never won, when no other Dem had the balls, and is despised for losing (even as one of her opponents, who also lost to Reichert, is embraced as the party favorite). And the policies and values she unabashedly embraces are the policies and values of the Democratic Party as a whole. There is absolutely nothing radical about her.
And yet there are people here in this thread and within the party hierarchy who would have you believe Darcy is some kind of fringe lunatic.
What I am saying is that if Darcy makes it through the primary it will be because she managed to connect with Democratic primary voters better than her opponents. But given the angry rhetoric spewed at her, I wonder if some people can accept that?
She ran twice against a popular incumbent alleged serial-killer-catcher in a district Democrats have never won, when no other Dem had the balls, and is despised for losing (even as one of her opponents, who also lost to Reichert, is embraced as the party favorite). And the policies and values she unabashedly embraces are the policies and values of the Democratic Party as a whole. There is absolutely nothing radical about her.
And yet there are people here in this thread and within the party hierarchy who would have you believe Darcy is some kind of fringe lunatic.
What I am saying is that if Darcy makes it through the primary it will be because she managed to connect with Democratic primary voters better than her opponents. But given the angry rhetoric spewed at her, I wonder if some people can accept that?
19
@11: Well, that's the "electability" argument some of her opponents make, almost to the exclusion of all else. I'd respond that in 2010 it wasn't the progressive caucus that took substantial loses to Tea Partiers. It was the Blue Dogs and New Dems, the folks running toward those swing voters instead of rallying the support of the base.
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