Names and "blackberries" redacted (EDIT: also can we please talk about how it is redundant to say "please rsvp"--thanks):


Richard,

To answer your question...yes there will be free food at the reception.

Graduate Assistant

Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communication

Franklin Pierce University

Office: (603)

---

From: Richard Amidon
Sent: Tue 4/29/2008 10:48 AM
To:
Subject: RE: An invitation to the Engaging Students: First in the Nation students and staff

Will there be free food?


Ry


-----Original Message-----
From:
Sent: Fri 4/25/2008 4:00 PM
To: Richard Amidon
Cc:
Subject: An invitation to the Engaging Students: First in the Nation students and staff

Hello:



I want to extend a personal invitation to you all to The Fitzwater Center Honors on Monday, May 5, as we recognize Dana Perino for her leadership in the public discourse. As FIN Scholars, you will be recognized in the program and at the event. We will also be honoring an alumnus, a graduating senior and a high school media advisor. It promises to be a great evening, and we hope you can join us.



The event begins at 5 p.m. in Pierce Hall and a public reception follows at 6 p.m.



We will have reserved seating for you, so please rsvp to



Thank you,




The Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communication

Franklin Pierce University

40 University Drive, Rindge, New Hampshire 03461

Office: Blackberry: FAX:



"Educating leaders of conscience

in public communication"

Reading the opinion in Crawford . v. Marion County Election Board

Compare:

The State has identified several state interests that
arguably justify the burdens that SEA 483 imposes on
voters and potential voters. While petitioners argue that
the statute was actually motivated by partisan concerns
and dispute both the significance of the State’s interests
and the magnitude of any real threat to those interests,
they do not question the legitimacy of the interests the
State has identified. Each is unquestionably relevant to
the State’s interest in protecting the integrity and reliability
of the electoral process....



A photo identification requirement imposes some burdens on
voters that other methods of identification do not share.
For example, a voter may lose his photo identification,
may have his wallet stolen on the way to the polls, or may
not resemble the photo in the identification because he
recently grew a beard. Burdens of that sort arising from
life’s vagaries, however, are neither so serious nor so
frequent as to raise any question about the constitutionality
of SEA 483; the availability of the right to cast a provisional
ballot provides an adequate remedy for problems of
that character.

Am I right to see an inconsistency here? That the frequency or magnitude of voter fraud is not relevant in addressing the state's interest in preventing it, but that the frequency or magnitude of burdens on the voter are? I am probably wrong and have mixed feelings about this case and I need to read further.

I love Elizabeth Edwards:

Did you, for example, ever know a single fact about Joe Biden’s health care plan? Anything at all? But let me guess, you know Barack Obama’s bowling score. We are choosing a president, the next leader of the free world. We are not buying soap, and we are not choosing a court clerk with primarily administrative duties.

What’s more, the news media cut candidates like Joe Biden out of the process even before they got started. Just to be clear: I’m not talking about my husband. I’m referring to other worthy Democratic contenders. Few people even had the chance to find out about Joe Biden’s health care plan before he was literally forced from the race by the news blackout that depressed his poll numbers, which in turn depressed his fund-raising.

And it’s not as if people didn’t want this information. In focus groups that I attended or followed after debates, Joe Biden would regularly be the object of praise and interest: “I want to know more about Senator Biden,” participants would say.

But it was not to be. Indeed, the Biden campaign was covered more for its missteps than anything else. Chris Dodd, also a serious candidate with a distinguished record, received much the same treatment. I suspect that there was more coverage of the burglary at his campaign office in Hartford than of any other single event during his run other than his entering and leaving the campaign.

Who is responsible for the veil of silence over Senator Biden? Or Senator Dodd? Or Gov. Tom Vilsack? Or Senator Sam Brownback on the Republican side?

The decision was probably made by the same people who decided that Fred Thompson was a serious candidate. Articles purporting to be news spent thousands upon thousands of words contemplating whether he would enter the race, to the point that before he even entered, he was running second in the national polls for the Republican nomination. Second place! And he had not done or said anything that would allow anyone to conclude he was a serious candidate. A major weekly news magazine put Mr. Thompson on its cover, asking — honestly! — whether the absence of a serious campaign and commitment to raising money or getting his policies out was itself a strategy.

[NYT]

I was looking at this article in the Times magazine and was struck by what seemed to be the proliferation of exclamation points (31). Another piece of comparable length about Chris Matthews from a few weeks ago boasted 4 (three of which were: "Ha!"). So what I am wondering is:

a) how do journalists decide when interviewing/taking notes? where is the line between a period and an exclamation point? this seems like it can drastically alter the meaning of a quote (“The fish is not going to eat itself!” vs. “The fish is not going to eat itself.")

b) what is with all the exclamation points in the gay lifestyle article? are they simply more exclamatory as a group, New York Times Magazine?

A song is up.

I don't care.

Also, I was vaguely considering writing about Pennsylvania but, fuck it.

I'm in a new band. We are called Graph. I think you would like it. We don't have music up yet but we will soon.

Things I learned this morning:

-Vatican City is the only absolute monarchy in Europe and has the highest per capita crime rate on the planet.

-Not eating meat can reduce your carbon footprint up to a quarter.

-Fruit is delicious.