2011 Goal - Full fledged political blog

Here's one of my main goals for 2011 - go ahead and set up a full fledged political domain/blog, self-hosted and built on wordpress platform. I've been writing on blogger using a blogspot address for far far too long. All the newbies have passed me by, I'm still encouraging people to write on an old beat up platform.

Time for change, time for Hope, time for new ideas ... ooops went into political stuff there didn't I?

I control a bunch of blogs, none of which anyone actually reads except for the biggie Northwest Indiana Politics (originally Porter County Politics) I used to write on many of them every day, and then I started handling social media for fee for clients and had to use most of my writing time and energy for them. I'd like to write more free-form long posts in the coming year.

See Nexus Companies - Consulting for a Faced Paced Thinking Organization

Young Republicans - Dan Coats is a tough sell

Not my words, but I have to agree with the concept. Let Hoosiers choose their own Senator.

clipped from rtv6blogs.com For young Republicans, Coats a tough sell For the 40 and under crowd, the name Dan Coats carries with it little more than inherited admiration borrowed from those who recall his nearly two decades of public service.  I respect Dan Coats because people who I respect, respect him.  But at a time when the Republican Party is reinventing itself and ushering in fresh candidates who bring new energy and ideas, the hopes for a successful Coats campaign rest with a generation of voters on Medicare.  That’s not exactly the post-Bayh future I was hoping for and it’s hard to see how Coats can effectively attract broad support and turn it into electoral success. Republicans needed Coats to raise the profile of this race and put it in the national spotlight against a political giant.  Now an open seat, it is among Republican’s top targets.  Coats had his time, and I’m told he served his state well.  Let’s thank him for his service and move on.

Conservative Cafe in Crown Point

Perhaps you've visited this restaurant in historic Crown Point, Indiana ... but they are looking to raise funding to go national with franchises

clipped from www.inc.com Elevator Pitch: Conservative Café Wants to Take Coffee Back from Liberals LOCATION: Crown Point, Indiana The Pitch: "Coffeehouses have always leaned to the left. We give conservatives a place to feel comfortable and rally around their values. We have got TVs tuned to Fox News. Our four blends are Liberal, Moderate, Conservative, and Radical Right. Conservative is our top seller, but Liberal, a decaf blend, is popular, too. We serve food and sell T-shirts with slogans like 'Peace Through Superior Firepower.' We are looking to raise capital to begin franchising and bring on an experienced partner. We have received more than 50 requests from prospective franchisees. We would like to start with four stores in 2009, then open 10 more in 2010." FUNDING SOUGHT: $1 million

Conservatives move on Digg

Although dominated by liberals, conservatives today announced a major development in taking on Digg

clipped from www.techpresident.com Digging Conservatism: Some of the digs against Digg, the community-ranking site, is that it's biased against women and weighted in favor of liberals. On the latter, enter #diggcons, an effort under the banner of the conservative #dontgo movement that aims to aggregate the weight of the right-leaning to promote their preferred content on not only Digg, but StumbleUpon as well. Twitter messages marked with the diggcons hashtag will sound the alarm on stories that could use a thumbs up. Will even the amassed voting power of online conservatives be enough to lift conservative content out of the ever-churning cauldron of Digg content? We'll see. But along with Top Conservatives on Twitter, it's another smart attempt to conquer social media from the right -- efforts largely unmatched on the left.

Real Estate Recovery predicted for 2009

Watch for a massive and rapid recovery in housing and real estate in 2009 according to blogger (me) Steve Dalton and a list of Carnival writers

clipped from synergyhomes.blogspot.com RE.covery Carnival of Real Estate clipped from exitrealestate540.com I LOVE A PARADE - Especially a PARADE of REAL ESTATE POSTS about a RECOVERY! THE 2009 REAL ESTATE RECOVERY ... RE.COVERY Real Estate Recovery in 2009 from The Real Estate Bloggers has the Governor of California predicting that 2009 will see the real estate recovery. I for one agree. This post wasn't submitted but I took some liberty and included it to start things off.

#TCOT targets Pigs wanting gov't cash

GM, Chrysler and UAW still want cash handouts even though Ford says it can make it thru 2009

clipped from michellemalkin.com Operation Three Little Piggies Top Conservatives on Twitter have launched a new action project targeting the “three little piggies” — UAW President Ron Gettelfinger, GM CEO Rick Wagoner, and Chrysler CEO Robert Nardelli. I know I’ve got a lot of fabulous Photoshoppers out there. This one sounds fun. So go and check out Operation Three Little Piggies here. And if you haven’t opened a Twitter account (or haven’t figured it out yet), make sure to join TCOT.

Lessons from Campaign 2008

McCain campaign staffer Ben Porritt on what happened and what worked, and of course what didn't work in the campaign

clipped from chrisfaulkner.wordpress.com Lessons from the 2008 trenches, Part 1 As promised I am bringing you part 1 of our series on Lessons from the 2008 trenches. Our first contributor is Ben Porritt. Ben served as  the national spokesman for the McCain-Palin campaign and a co-founder of Outside Eyes strategy group in Southern California. CF What campaign on the GOP side had the most effective use of New Media? Chris Faulkner