[ Posted Friday, July 29th, 2016 – 00:18 UTC ]
I am an Irish and American woman reporting from the 2016 Democratic Convention in Philadelphia. I say I am Irish and American because I am an Irish citizen who is now an American citizen too. I have noticed a theme in recent blogs posted to the Irish Times' Generation Emigration blog. Many fellow expats are wondering if they are still really Irish, given they have lived outside of Ireland for many years and in some cases longer than they lived in Ireland. I too have been thinking that I am losing my connection to my native land. The recent Irish elections that did not have a clear majority, and then the Brexit results, have opened up even more questions than the votes sought to resolve. I am now trying not to get too excited about the possibility of seeing a united Ireland in my lifetime.
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[ Posted Thursday, July 28th, 2016 – 23:24 UTC ]
After watching Joe Biden's speech last night, one thing seems patently obvious. He should be launched into the highest rank of Hillary Clinton surrogates out on the campaign trail -- and as soon as possible. Furthermore, scheduling his appearances would be a piece of cake, because all Team Clinton would have to do would be to book Biden into every city and town where Donald Trump appears, a day or two afterwards.
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[ Posted Thursday, July 28th, 2016 – 22:55 UTC ]
A quick program note is in order. I just got back from the end of Day Four of the Democratic National Convention. The media tent had no WiFi access at all tonight, so I wasn't able to follow the work schedule I'd set for myself. My personal take is that the routers [...]
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[ Posted Wednesday, July 27th, 2016 – 13:51 UTC ]
Maybe I should have subtitled this "random notes from the whirlwind" -- this is going to be a collection of disjointed observations, at best, so I thought I'd just warn everyone up front not to expect a coherent narrative or anything. What follows are random notes from the Democratic National Convention that I haven't had the time to set down before now. The early portions of tonight's program in the arena are just an affirmation of Tim Kaine's nomination, so I'm going to skip trying to attend (or to even pay attention), as I did for the first day (Bernie supporters challenging rules) or the second day (roll call for presidential nomination). We are now halfway through the convention, after two days and nights. This year is more of a marathon event than the previous convention was in Charlotte, which only lasted three days. So here is everything I've noticed so far, in no particular order.
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[ Posted Tuesday, July 26th, 2016 – 16:46 UTC ]
However, a mild form of chaos has erupted. Almost immediately after Hillary Clinton was officially nominated by Bernie Sanders, at the end of the roll call of the Democratic delegates, hundreds of people streamed into the tent in a coordinated protest. From where I sit -- literally about fifteen feet from the action -- it seems like the aftermath of a major walkout of Bernie Sanders delegates from the floor of the convention.
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[ Posted Tuesday, July 26th, 2016 – 12:25 UTC ]
I conducted the following interview yesterday, before the convention actually started. Denise Merrill is a Connecticut delegate (although not, as she pointed out to me, a superdelegate) and serves Connecticut as their Secretary of State. A recent achievement was the state becoming the first to pass a campaign finance reform law which created a public financing system for elections -- all the other states with such laws created them through ballot initiatives or referenda.
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[ Posted Monday, July 25th, 2016 – 23:37 UTC ]
Day One of the Democratic National Convention is now over, and tonight seemed designed to allow Bernie Sanders supporters to vent their frustrations, given the lineup of speakers. All the most liberal and progressive speakers were lined up for the first night, which only served to concentrate the energy for Bernie Sanders. At first it was announced that Bernie would speak tonight, but not in primetime. Later this was changed to give Bernie the final speaking slot of the night (which was entirely the right move for the convention to make), but instead of getting into all of that I'm just going to jot down my initial reactions to the spectacle of the first night.
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[ Posted Sunday, July 24th, 2016 – 20:48 UTC ]
Greetings from Philadelphia! I have just eaten a Geno's cheesesteak after a busy day getting ready for the Democratic National Convention to start, and I finally have some time to sit down and share a few preliminary thoughts.
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[ Posted Friday, July 22nd, 2016 – 20:42 UTC ]
This brings up a larger program note -- the schedule for next week will be absolutely fluid. Posts may appear at any time, in any order. Guest bloggers will be appearing. Multiple posts per day are possible. I may kick things off with a rare weekend post, on Sunday night. There will be no schedule at all -- it'll all be dependent on what is going on, when I have time to actually type and post, and what parties we'll be invited to (heh). But I'll try to post as frequently as circumstances allow.
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[ Posted Thursday, July 21st, 2016 – 23:05 UTC ]
Donald Trump finally stopped talking, so I can now start writing. His speech went on for almost an hour and a half, which was a bit much for me -- especially after an exhausting week of listening to Republicans talk. But that's the end of the evening, so let's go back to the beginning and see how we got here.
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