Kate Beaton + Poe = Win

I can never get enough of her web toons

Free stamp too free?

Claus Oldenbur and Coosje van Bruggen created one of Cleveland's most memoriable scultures, the Free Stamp. I couldn't help but notice that this image:


from Cleveland Beer Week's website is basically the same stamp, with Beer instead of Free.  Letting go of the idea of sacrificing freedom for beer, I wonder if the orinal arist approved this use.

Forum post of the week

I realize looking for reasoned, intelligent discourse on national politics on local forums is oft futile but sometimes you find a gem:

<blockquote>I am much more confortable having Half-Breed Obama be president than say a full-white midget like Robert Reich.
- gmlove</blockquote>
<a href="http://lakewoodbuzz.infopop.cc/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/33460472/m/307102103?r=730105203#730105203">source</a>

The 'wingers in that thread are striving to explain how they are not at all racist, bear in mind.

Then there were 6

The Remaining Candidates for the Council at Large in Lakewood, OH.

Ryan Patrick Demro
Brian Powers *
Jared K. Shapiro
Daniel E. Shields
Monique Smith
Nickie J. Antonio *

* = Incumbent

Vanity, thy name in signs

The PeeDee has an article about the raw cost of the stimulus dollars at work signs dotting our fair state. If they were going to end that, though, they'd also want to figure out how much it costs every town in the state to change their "Jane Smith, Mayor" signs at the border of many of our cities. These always seemed to me like pointless excercises in getting name recognition out for the elected for the elections to come. If it didn't work and elections weren't running on the idea of voters who vaguely pay attention to who's running, the signs would not doubt be a great target of effeciency cuts.

Elections and the web

I would say the web had a minimal impact on the Sep 8th primaries here in Lakewood. The person with - in my opinion - the most informative website, Anthony Davis, came in a distant last place, just behind another candidate who had no website at all. The second highest vote getter had no website. Are people just voting for familiar names? The top 6 have the two incumbents, and two people who've either run before for local office or held it in the case of Ryan Demro. The majority of the folks who had websites had fairly generic affairs. Not that I am a political genius myself - my elected history is that of having been vice president of my high school band council. Elections where all we know of is the candidates face, name, and noises about a need to improve our town is a bit familiar and dull. I have to think also that 12,000 people is just a miserable turnout, though I don't have the number of eligibles at hand.

Sep 8th Primary results

Source: Cuyahoga County Board of Elections
http://boe.cuyahogacounty.us/en-US/master-results-list.aspx

Interesting that the bottom four candidates had more all together than the top one...The two incumbents came in first, but there are enough votes that went to the others that if they don't gather enough of them, they might lose.

The top 6 vote-getters move on the real election.