Tag Archives: news

On Sheriffs, Counties and Connecticut

law, Politics, , , , , ,

In regards to this October 2023 post from Democracy Docket about the non-necessity of elected sheriffs, I looked up which states abolished the role of sheriff. Turns out that there are few, but notable, examples:

  • Only Alaska and Connecticut lack an office of sheriff
  • Alaska does not have county governments.
  • Connecticut voters moved to abolish the office of sheriff in 2000, replacing the elected office with both state marshals and judicial marshals, which are both non-elected contractors.

But also, who runs the jails if not a sheriff?

Connecticut seems to be far ahead of most states on the question of the relevance of sheriffs, as well as the role of counties, to modern-day government and corrections. This also eliminates the nonsense of “constitutional sheriffs”, and the corruption and feudalism inherent to the office itself.

Imagine such abolition taking place in larger states. How much efficiency would this allow to state government when it comes to zoning, housing, infrastructure, and more?

Georgia Democrats Qualify for a Variety of Seats in a Presidential Year

Politics, , , , , , , ,

Qualifying for the May 21 Democratic primary and nonpartisan election ended last Friday at noon.

House seats being competed for by Democrats in November 2024. Districts in yellow are Biden-voting or slightly-Trump-favoring districts according to 2020 data.
Senate seats being competed for by Democrats in November 2024.

Statewide:

  • John Barrow is running for Andrew Pinson’s seat on the Supreme Court. This is the first likely-substantial contest against an incumbent justice in years. This “nonpartisan” election is on May 21.
  • There will be a “nonpartisan” contest for an open seat on the State Court of Appeals. Attorney Jeff Davis will face off against Cobb County Magistrate Judge Tabitha Ponder. This “nonpartisan” election is on May 21.
  • The Public Service Commission elections have been cancelled again, and the current commissioners will remain on the ballot for the next two years. It’s likely that we will be voting on all five commissioners in 2026.
  • We are now running for 38 seats (2/3rds) in the Senate and 135 seats (3/4) in the House. To compare, since 1992, we’ve ran for at least 75% of the House in 1992, 1994, 1996 and 2020. 
  • We are running for District Attorney positions in 14 circuits. There will be Republican challengers in three circuits: Atlanta, Chattahoochee and Eastern.
  • Democrats are running for all 14 congressional districts. There will be Republican challengers in all but GA13.
  • At the end of qualifying, we left HD104, a Biden district in Gwinnett County, HD151, a slightly-Trump voting district in Southwest GA, and SD4, a Biden district near Savannah, on the table. 

And now for local elections around Columbus:

  • We will have a Democrat, Carl Sprayberry, for HD139 (open).
  • We will have a Democrat, Ellen Wright, for SD29. 
  • Debbie Buckner in HD137 will have a primary challenge from Carlton Mahone Jr and a Republican challenger. 
  • Teddy Reese in HD140 will have a Democratic challenger in Alyssa Nia Williams. 
  • There will be a Democratic primary for the open seat in deep-red GA03. Val Almonord, who was the Democratic nominee in 2020 and 2022, will have a challenge
  • There will be a Republican challenger for GA02. 
  • We now have a Democrat running for District Attorney in Chattahoochee Circuit: criminal defense attorney Anthony L. Johnson. He has no primary opposition, and will be on the ballot in November against Republican and acting DA Don Kelly. We are also challenging a Republican for DA in Eastern Circuit as well. 
  • Our incumbent Sheriff Greg Countryman is running for re-election as a Democrat. He will be opposed in November by Republican Mark LaJoye.
  • Our incumbent state court solicitor Suzanne Goddard, who previously held office as a Democrat, is running for re-election as a Republican. We have a Democratic challenger in Shevon Sutcliffe Thomas. 
  • Buddy Bryan is running for re-election as Coroner as a Democrat. He will be opposed in the May primary by Royal Anderson. No Republican is running in November. 
  • Lula Lunsford Huff is not running for re-election as Tax Commissioner. David Britt is running as a Democrat for the position and is unopposed in May and November. 
  • We will likely not have a challenger to Gary Allen for Council District 6. A potential candidate fell through. I am sad about this as well since I live here.
  • Toyia Tucker will have a challenge in Council District 4. This “nonpartisan” election is on May 21.
  • There will be a four-way race for Council At-Large 10. This “nonpartisan” election is on May 21.
  • There will be a contest for Board of Education District 7, with Lakeitha Ashe challenging incumbent Pat Frey. This “nonpartisan” election is on May 21.
  • Incumbents unopposed in May and November: Danielle Forte (D) for Superior Court Clerk, Reginald Thompson (D) for Clerk of Municipal Court, Marc D’Antonio (D) for Judge of Probate Court. 
  • No contests for HD138 (Vance Smith (R)), HD141 (Carolyn Hugley (D)), City Council Districts 2, 6 or 8, Board of Education District 1, 3, 5, or At-Large 9, nor State Court Judge (Temesgen). 
  • In addition, there may be some party primary advisory ballot questions. 

Retirements:

  • Both Senate Minority Leader Gloria Butler (SD55) and House Minority Leader James Beverly (HD142) are not running for re-election to either house.
  • Other Senate Democratic retirements: Valencia Seay (SD34) and Horacena Tate (SD38).
  • Other House Democratic retirements: Doug Stoner (HD42), Roger Bruce (HD61), Mandisha Thomas (HD65), Pedro Marin (HD96), Gregg Kennard (HD107), Gloria Frazier (HD126), Patty Bentley (HD150).

Idea: Remote state residency

Ideas, Politics, , , , , , , ,

As more people move out of (or are displaced from) California, maybe the state government should consider a type of state residency which can be exercised from other states.

Idea: a remote state residency.

  • Would allow for the following to apply as remote residents of the state without physical, permanent domicile in the state:
    • Non-residents
    • former residents
    • prospective transplants from other states
    • those born in the state of California 
    • Non-residents who apply for any state volunteer program
    • Non-residents who apply to study remotely or in-person at any California public college or university
  • Would allow for participation in in certain, but not all, activities and services accessible to active California residents
    • Would issue remote residency cards to successful applicants
    • Easier process for applying to CSU, UC and CCC colleges for remote study
    • Easier, discounted process for applying online to California-based public libraries for digital assets
    • Easier process for applying to California Virtual Academies (or state-operated online K-12 public school)
    • Invitations to voluntary programs
      • California State Guard (CSG)
        • Maritime Component
        • Army Component
        • Air Component
      • Programs of the Chief State Officer
        • College Corps
        • California Climate Action Corps
        • Youth Jobs Corps
        • AmeriCorps California
        • Disaster Volunteer Management
        • Alumni Network
    • Automatic application to remote residency for non-residents who volunteer for the above
    • Easier remote company formation, banking, payment processing, and taxation
    • Zoom marriages certified and officiated by California county clerks
  • Must be renewed every five years
  • Why:
    • Many people are driven out of California by the housing crisis
    • Many are hoping to leave other current states of residency due to policy
    • No state services are afforded to those who study online in CSU, UC or CCC systems
    • No state services are afforded to those who work remotely for California-based businesses and organizations
    • Remote work and service is an increasing reality, as is the growing interconnectedness of communications
    • The e-residency programs in Estonia and Lithuania offer a forward-looking attempt to extend the concept of citizenship to those who wish to do business in either country
    • This remote residency program would empower many more people to empower California, and would be an investment in our own future as a state

Thoughts on video editing

Tech, To Export 2, Uncategorized, , , ,

When I started my Journalism class this Spring semester, I did not anticipate the complexities, or the range of emotions which one can feel when creating and perfecting a video project.

It was not easy, as I had to learn the operation of a video camera for the first time. I also learned (the hard way) that I should be prepared with at least 120 minutes of tape.

When I had to edit the video in iMovie, I initially had to read Apple’s tutorials and ask questions from other colleagues in order to get a grasp of the software (and work around its limitations, which became more apparent as time moved forward).

All of this was done by myself, as my partner had to withdraw from the class due to scheduling conflicts (a necessary thing for any student to do).

However, through the course of the semester and a number of mistakes, I gradually became acclimated towards the process. I took inspiration from years of viewing the cutaway and editing styles of cable/satellite news television programs, but I also managed to work around flaws in my raw footage in order to make sure that the footage tells a story to the viewer, or puts the viewer into the recorded event for however long a duration I can manage.

It’s an exercise which I would encourage a lot of people to at least try once in their lifetimes. Multimedia narratology is a trying but worthwhile process which tests one’s capacity to portray a story for other people to view and forward to others.

You can see my videos for MSC-TV in my portfolio section.

From media personality to editor-in-chief

Tech, To Export 2, Uncategorized,

It was announced Thursday on RollingStone.com that Jay-Z launched a new news website, Life + Times, with himself as Editor-in-Chief. The post also compared this new enterprise by the emcee to actress Gwyneth Paltrow’s news website GOOP, except that the former is already doing better at launch with readers than the latter.

Both are, of course, lifestyle-oriented news sites, except that GOOP (launched in 2007) advertises itself as a weekly newsletter rather than a blog, and the website of the same also possesses a supremely spartan interface. The content of the newsletter was also scathingly reviewed by such outlets as the Daily Mirror, Vanity Fair, The Independent and E-Online.

Life + Times, on the other hand, has an interface which is much closer to the average online portfolio blog than a full-blown news website. One can only tell that the website, designed by Area 17,  is not a personal portfolio or musician promotion page if the page is scrolled downward to the view of the footer.

The interface for Life + Times may very well change afterward in the coming year or so in response to user demand, but it is yet another example of a media personality who is seeking to expand his or her creative pursuits into web news publication.

It is not a new phenomenon, as we have seen Glenn Beck’s The Blaze, Tucker Carlson’s Daily Caller, Dan Abrams’ Mediaite, Alex Jones’ Infowars and PrisonPlanet and Will Ferrell’s Funny or Die. All five editors-in-chief had previously cultivated their careers in either talk radio, broadcast journalism or comedy, but had realized the capability of the Web to allow them to grow beyond their current fan groupings into full-on content management enterprises with paid, regular contributors and correspondents. All five editors are hugely successful with their core readerships and may or may not also have simultaneous presences on television, film or radio.

What ties all of these individuals – from Jay-Z to Glenn Beck to Will Ferrell to Kevin Rose to Leo Laporte – together, in my opinion, is that they were already well-established faces and voices on other media – television, film and radio – before they launched these websites, before they began to employ regular contributors and staff in order to keep a steady flow of traffic, gain an audience of avid readers and try their hands at the managing of popular opinion.

One could say that this is a sign of the Web’s arrival as a premiere medium of mass (and interpersonal) communication. Someone else could say that this is an example of “Too Many Sheriffs” who are competing with each other for avid consumers of their presentation of information.

But all such signs are partially attributable to the comparatively-decentralized nature of the Web as a publishing and broadcasting medium, the tools of which have become increasingly user-friendly to erstwhile and aspiring writers, presenters and other artisans who may not be as skilled in the art of news publication as, say, the journalists who supply content to print and television journalism outlets.

Thus, even as such personalities as Glenn Beck and Tucker Carlson have departed or are about to depart from regular residency in the “TV-land” populated by eyeballs and impressionable minds, they both will likely see much activity with their own news websites for some time to come, as may other personalities.

IdeaTorrent

Uncategorized,

IdeaTorrent, the server software which runs Ubuntu Brainstorm, may be the best user-generated approval and discussion system that I’ve seen since Digg was launched some years back. Instead of the initial post link being the only thing (besides comments) upon which users can submit single votes of approval (or, since Reddit, downvotes of disapproval), users can now submit and vote upon proposed "solutions" which are listed under an initial post, in addition to providing comments (I don’t think comments are voted upon in IdeaTorrent’s system). 

I would describe IdeaTorrent’s approach as a sort of user-driven vote-based survey forum, in which questions or concerns are voiced (once, preferably) and users submit and vote upon answers or solutions for such concerns before they offer their comments and reactions.

I think that this could be used by user-driven news-discussion/news-vetting forums which are often solicited for answers or solutions, such as Care2, GreenChange, and Reddit. It could help users focus less upon the popularity or awareness of a recent issue or information (as in how many votes have been recorded, how many comments have been submitted, how long the story stays on the front page), and more upon what solutions or responses are most ideal or popular. 

Furthermore, this may be a further elaboration upon the separation of reactions from comments which I’ve come to favor in newer user-ranking news discussion forums. IdeaTorrent’s model is, overall, a step in the right direction.