Blogger Shopping List

So if I’m going to become a dedicated Blogger/Vlogger/Political Groupie, I need to do this right, right? So this is what I think I need:

Cannon FS22 Camcorder $600
Clamp-on Tripod $10
Extra Camera Batteries $40
Shure XLR Adapter $130
Digital Voice Recorder $50
XLR to Mini-Jack Adapter $20
XLR Lapel Mic $80
Hand held XLR Mic $100
XLR Cable $50
Duct Tape $10
Carrying Case $50
Extra Memory Card (still camera) $80
Business Cards  $20
“My Company” Press Pass $20

… and a Laptop  $2,000

Improving Camcorder Audio

Video:
Improve the sound of your camcorder video

Articles:
Improve your audio
Better audio

Press Pass

From Citizen Journalism 101

1. Present Yourself as a Professional – Make yourself a press badge with your name, photo and blog name.  Be prepared to describe your blog, your target audience and what you’d like to cover at the event.
2. Obtain Press Contact Information – Make contact with the event planners or the venue and inquire about media contact information.
3. Ask for Credentials (Press Pass) – Use your prepared talking points, and don’t let a rejection discourage you from trying again in the future.

Example of credential requirements: Applicant organizations for the State Blogger Corps need to have blogs at least six months old, and have at least 120 politically related blog posts. They will be asked to submit daily audience numbers, Technorati stats, and anything that makes their blogs, “stand out as being an effective organizing tool and/or agent of change.”  Link How many independent bloggers are ultimately credentialed will be determined by several factors – including interest; space available; the reach and influence of a particular blog; the amount of original content the blog typically generates; and other factors.  Link Ref for next year: CPAC announced credentialed bloggers  Link

GOP Blogging & Video Plans

I’ve just returned from the Virginia Republican Convention, held at the Coliseum in Richmond VA.  WOW, what an event!  Let me just say that this was not last year’s convention – not by a long-shot.

I sensed that it was going to be big, since almost everyone in my Republican women’s group was attending, and fact, over 10,000 Virginians signed up to be delegates this year, even though we “only” had one contested race – that of Attorney General, all three of whom were perfectly good candidates — but something has been brewing.  It seemed to begin CPAC 09, holding on through the Mark Levin book signings, through to the Tea Parties, and now to the RPV convention.

For me, as a 48-yr old, married woman with grown children, this is all new.  Although I spent a half decade in the political state of New Hampshire, I’ve never been involved in politics other than casting a vote.  When Rudy Guiliani entered the presidential race, however, the time was right.  I began collecting petition signatures to get Rudy on the Virginia ballot, and soon met Suzanne, and since the two of us didn’t work outside the home, we began partnering up for signature gathering and sign posting – until our Rudy dropped out, even before we could vote for him in the Virginia primary.    I’d made a good friend, so all was not lost, but I assumed that my political groupie days were over.  Suzanne, however was hooked, and talked me into continuing the quest, now focused on our Republican candidate for congress – and so it began.  Throughout the past couple years, I’ve attended conventions, meetings, fundraisers, rallys, dinners, book signings, canvassed neighborhoods, filmed and posted many events to YouTube — well, you get the idea.  I met, and keep meeting lots of great politicians and supporters, and have had lots of fun, although I’ve felt that I hadn’t quite found my niche.

Now, however, after returning from the extremely inspiring Republican Convention in Virginia, and reading blogger’s row and press events – I think I’ve finally figured out my angle, so from here forward, I am going to use this blog to document all the information I’ll need to know about how to do just that.  I’m not sure that the term blogger fits the job description exactly, but it seems to be understandable at least.  But I’ll need to purchase some equipment, and learn how to use some software and recording equipment.  I’m sure I’ll still manage to slip in a political post along the way, but stay tuned for articles about capturing the pool audio, equipment for audio archiving, podcasting, digital cameras, camcorders, blogger ediquette, rules of the road, how to obtain a press pass, and a lot of other stuff that I don’t even know I need to know at the moment.

The Republican party needs all of us, contributing in any way you can, to the best of our abilities, so let’s help each other out, and keep the momentum going!

CPAC Thoughts

There was so much to take away from the three days I spent at CPAC that it’s hard to know where to start, but one of the main points that I got out of the experience is that a Republican and a Conservative are not one and the same. CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Group, does not contain GOP, Republican, or RNC in their name, and probably for good reason. It allows a base of non-politicians to meet and discuss the core of our beliefs that aren’t necessarily being addressed by the political leaders in the Republican party.

Until now, I had been focused primarily with helping everyone with an elephant stamped on their forehead to get elected, from the school board to the president.  Now I cam going to re-think that. It might just be time to spend my energy on supporting causes that I believe in, such as the Fair Tax.

There’s a lot to think about and process, and I’ve set up a site to help me do that: http://vitalfinds.ning.com/. Feel free to join and participate!

Congratulations Michael Steele!

From Michael Brennan:

Congratulations to Mr. Michael Steele our new RNC Chairman! Now we can look ahead knowing a conservative leads our party.

But more important, we need to get working as of three weeks ago. Obama has declared war on anyone opposing him declaring that those who voted against the stimulus package will pay a dear price (even though it still passed overwhelmingly). In the stimulus the democrats ended welfare reform with 5 words and now can increase spending and eliminate any welfare regulations, especially for illegals. Also in the stimulus is at least $200 Billion in pork designed to increase liberal voter actions and limit their opponents ability to counter them. Folks, those who know me know I am not a conspiracy theorist and have a level head and a good heart, believe me when I tell you this, Obama has declared war on America and he is aiming at US with the intent of doing EVERYTHING he can to eliminate our voices politically. We need to come together, drop the libertarian/constitutional party/neo-con/ GOP arguments and become one as conservatives. Palin is a Presidential candidate for 2012 and they are already lying about her intelligence and capabilities, folks it will not matter who we run, they are out to kill anyone’s reputation and life who oppose them. I say get on board with ALL and force them to fight their war but on their turf instead of ours. You cannot win wars by always defending, we need to go on offense. I for one am declaring war on Mr. Barack Obama.

New Media & Other Tools

The Barack Obama campaign team mastered the art of every technology available, from text messages on cell phones, to Facebook and beyond. We Republicans are way behind the curve, so the first thing we need to do is to learn how to use some of these tools. So with that in mind, here are some quick online tutorials that give a brief introduction to some of our future tools of the trade:

Web Search Strategies
Social Media
Social Networking
Podcasting
Web Blogs
Online Photo Sharing
Twitter in Plain English
Social Bookmarking
Wikis in Plain English
Google Reader
RSS Feeds
Text Messages from E-mail
Flip Cam Tutorial
Google Calendar
CamStudio
Google Analytics
Basic HTML

Electing a President

Screw the Platform

I remember being in Massachusetts as a young man, just a bit to young to vote but very interested in politics. Reagan was speaking and everything he said hit my heart and I just ate it up. Jack Kemp spoke also and he too touched a political nerve in me that awoken me.

Now Reagan did not pursue the women’s vote, the black vote, the Jewish vote, the gay vote or the blue collar under $50,000 a year salaried vote as well as he did not pursue the military vote. Do you know what vote he did pursue? Yours and mine as a whole. He talked to you as if you were the only one in the room, not a group of people with a singular issue to base your vote upon. He did not charge $2,500.00 per plate dinner speeches that lasted 20 minutes and had more rhetoric than a high school debate team. He did not attend the NAACP breakfast just to look sensitive to the needs of minorities. He did not attend NOW or CWA (Concerned Women of America) to be seen as helping women. He did not go and wear a uniform or pose in tanks to prove he had a plan for national defense. All he did was look at you, spoke in a clear calm voice what he “was” going to do, not what he wanted to do.

We are a nation of special interest groups. The blacks, the Jews, the unions, the white collar, the religious, the secular, the conservative and the liberals, etc….. This is what is wrong, no one is running as President of the United States of America, they are running for the President of the Loosly aligned special interest groups working to subjugate America. We need to move from going group to group and become a nation with 1 plan or we become so fragmented that we do not even exist as a nation any longer. Our platform, screw the platform, we need a leader that can just be a “Leader”. Everyone knows what needs to be done without a platform. That is just an excuse, the people need to be united once again and if we do not do it, no one will and nothing we do for a “platform” will mean anything in the future.

– Michael Brennan
http://rebuildtheparty.ning.com/

Political Trivia

I haven’t always been a political news junkie, so when I began to become more informed, I was happy to be able to participate in discussions, in which people were all talking about the same topics.  It seemed like the intellectual thing to do. A conversation that involves something like “he’s up in the Rasmussen poll, but down in the others” felt like the conversation of the truly in-the-know crowd.

Lately though, I’ve wondered about the point of all that. Are we all just replacing politics with the fascination that some people have with Hollywood, or with the intrigue of following a sports team? Is is all political Jeopardy? Blagojevich for $200 please?

I’ve been wondering – is there something better that we could do with our time? Is there some policies that we could focus on, some bills that we could all co-write? It’s so easy to watch politicians and criticize them on their every move, but what’s our agenda? What specifically do we want them to do?

Abolish the Department of Education

I’m not referring to abolishing the Public Education system as a whole, but since we have state-run Departments of Education, then why do we need one at the Federal level as well?  Like Regan, I also think that the Federal Department of Education should be abolished.  These matters of education are best handled closest to the source of the education, which is at the state and local level.  With each layer of government, starting at the school PTA, as you step further away from the community, you have less information on which to tailor a solution in which to educate a child.  The last thing we need in this country are policies procedures, rules, regulations like no child left behind being issued by politicians on Capital Hill at the Federal level.  The Federal department of education is too far removed from the problems.  These issues at K-12 needs to be handled at the state and local level where small groups of individuals tailor educational policies for the unique needs of there community.

My husband speaks about this issue further here.