Virginia Blogger's Carnival

Welcome, my friend. I'm glad to have you as my guest while we go over the Virginia Blogger's Carnival together. You'll find the hospitality here remarkable, and the conversation is guaranteed to be exhilarating. Pull up a chair, I'll pour you a short glass of an adult beverage, and we'll discuss this week's edition of The Virginia Blogger's Carnival. This week we have 22 contributions from all over the Old Dominion.

Speaking of "adult beverage", J.Sarge at New Dominion ponders the corruption the word adult has suffered in modern times. In this post "Christian Adults" he makes an intriguing comparison.

Tonight is "Oscar Night", and no, I'm not too terribly excited about that. Before you accuse me of being anti-Hollywood, let me say that I do love movies. But I hate to go alone to a crowded theatre. Therefore I have not seen any of this year's contenders. But Rick apparently has seen them all. Check out Rick Sincere's "My Oscar Picks for 2006".

As I said, I seldom go to movies (looking lovingly to my left at my DVD player). But I do keep the TV on, primarily to hear a human voice while I'm otherwise engaged. One of my favorite channels is TVLand. Martin, whose journey that brought him from Australia, to Virginia, via England I would love to hear about, has a blog called Conservative Blog Therapy. In this Carnival submission "TV, Role Models, Morality...Are we looking in the right place?" he laments the lack of quality programming available today. And he highlights an excellent essay by a young lady named Amber Cockrell in Louisville, MO.

The Oscar's doesn't have a real parade, but you could call the red carpet show one, if you stretched it a bit. Virginia Pundette, AKA Kinsey Featherston, one of Virginia's newest bloggers, recently attended a real parade. Her post,"St. Patrick's Day Parade in Alexandria", is an account of her and fellow NOVA bloggers Corey Hernandez, Josh Chernila, and Lowell Feld's day at the parade and the Democratic Party event afterwards. Ben Tribbett also showed up, she says, somewhat surprised.

Yes, it is smooth. It's Bushmills, an Irish Whiskey. And, I'll be glad to refill your glass. Neat, right? No, I didn't go to the St. Patrick's Day stuff in Alexandria, even though I am Irish. But another Irish American, James Webb, did. Part of the St.Patrick day festivities in Alexandria was the Democratic Party event attended by Ms. Featherston. One of two honorees at this event was James Webb, rumored to soon be a Senate Candidate. He has written a book about us Scots-Irish Americans, maybe you've heard of it. It's called "Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish Shaped America". J.C. Wilmore, at his blog The Richmond Democrat has an excellent revue of the book "Required Reading: James Webb's Born Fighting".

Jerry was in NOVA last Thursday, but he didn't stick around for the Parade. No, in this post, "Cigarettes and HOV Lanes", he relates his thoughts as he sat in the notorious I-66 traffic.

Not all conservatives agree on the efficacy of HOV lanes, though. Jay Hughes at Too Conservative has posted "Some Transportation Thoughts" in which he lauds such things.

But here in the Old Dominion there is no shortage of solutions to the traffic problem. Just a shortage of consensus. Adam has developed a transportation proposal completely apart from the world of Republicans and Democrats. (And Jerry and Jay as well.) On his blog Sophistpundit his essay titled "Towards a flexible transportation system" he explains it all.

Lowell Fulk has uncovered some statistics regarding that traffic, indeed, all traffic in Virginia. On his blog Commonwealth Iconoclast he shares it with us in his post "Looming Transportation Showdown..."

Waldo has traffic problems as well, and he lives on top of a mountain at the end of the pavement. There must be something to this transportation problem stuff after all. His essay "SUV vs. lawn. Lawn, SUV win" Waldo learns one of those "life's little lessons" and everyone comes out the hero, well, almost.

Another Virginia Blogger who lives away from the beaten path is David St Lawrence, who lives just up Rt. 8 from me, in Floyd. His blog, Ripples, is a collection of truths learned from life, sometimes the hard way. His Carnival entry, "Country life has a lot to recommend it" describes three of the pleasures of country living.

The problem with experience being the best teacher can be summed up quite simply. You get the test first and the lesson afterwards. Fortunately, most of our learning is somewhat more structured. Doug Mataconis who is the proprietor at Below The Beltway has some fond memories of that structured environment in his post "Here's To The Teachers"

A Virginia blogger who never seems to learn from some of his experiences is Al, from up near Pearisburg. His blog, Al's Rantings, is his release from some of those experiences. Read his story of a trip down to Christiansburg, titled "She Did It Again".

Also having a bad experience with shopping is a relatively new Virginian. His blog, High Desert Wanderer, seems to indicate an origin of Colorado, maybe. I don't know and I've not spent enough time reading his very good writing to discover, yet. I haven't even found his name, so I'll just refer to him as HDW. Welcome, HDW, to the home of the people who founded Texas. In this piece titled "Don't keep your day job" he offers career advice to a kid at the grocery store.

I see your glass is empty, well, so is mine. Let me refill us both before we move on.

Chad, Virginia's "blogfather", (that seems odd for me to write, I'm old enough to be his...older brother) loves baseball. I do too. As an aside Chad, who was the first Pro player from Henry County? Hint, he runs the premier fantasy camp for baseball fans 30 and older and attended Bassett High School with my Dad. Anyway, Chad has apparently been sneaking out of the office early to catch some UVA Wise baseball action. Read all about it in his post "College Baseball"

Chad's new "blog partner" is well known Virginia policy wonk and caption writer Will Vehrs. In his essay "McDonnell: Above the Fold in an Unlikely Place" he looks at Virginia's policy regarding minority contracts, and as usual, makes a lot of sense.

Also in Wise County is Kilo. "...A troubled man, in troubled times. A man with big dreams and high hopes, struggling to make it from day to day." In his story, "Appalachia Voter Fraud" he laments the ethics of some of the politicians in Wise County. Specifically, some in the small town of Appalachia. I know whereof he speaks, as I just recently moved from Buchanan County, where we had to deal with a similar scandal.

Well, old friend, we started this at 7:00pm. It's now almost 10:30. What do you say we finish it over coffee in the morning? Good, I typically get up around 4:15, that is not that far away right now, so I don't think I need another "short glass".

You're up already? I didn't expect that. Let me pour you a cup of coffee. Oh, you say it was the smell of the coffee that woke you. Yes, it is good, isn't it. In Stuart Virginia, of all places,they roast the best coffee in the world. But you don't have to go there to get it. You can order it online from Honduras Coffee Company. Ok, enjoy a cup and we'll continue where we left off last night. No, I'm sorry, but the Roanoke Times is the only paper I have available. I really should be a better host, I suppose.

Where were we...? Oh, I remember, we had just left Wise County. Where shall we go in the Commonwealth next? You're reading about the Ports thing, huh? OK, I've got two Carnival entries that deal with that.

First, Xyba, (just between you and me, I think that's a made-up name) at Once More into the Breach has this little article on that subject. Titled " Israel's Zim Endorses Dubai Port Deal" he tells us that even though Dubai Ports World is an Arab controlled, indeed owned by the Government of UAE (United Arab emirates), company, they get a whole hearted endorsement from the Israeli shipping giant ZIM. Put down that Roanoke Times and read Xyba's story, "Israel's Zim Endorses Dubai Port Deal"

Second, is Adam again. Heh... Trying to sneak in two Carnival submissions, has his thoughts on the deal in "Seeking the facts in the UAE port debacle" Does he really think I'll give him two entries? Silly kid.

Reading about the crime in Roanoke, were you? Well, put that paper away again and read this (or rather these) from Countertop. He has been covering rather well a police shooting. No, not the shooting of a policeman, but the other way around. Check out "Only Cops Should Have Guns part II" and "Only Cops Should Have Guns part II (update)" and "Aaron Brown's Murder". I know that's three posts for one Carnival, but you really need all three to get the gist of the story.

Let's get to the last few submissions to the Carnival. Let me refill your cup and show you to what may turn out to be a controversial entry by Max Power at the Haduken blog. The title "Nigga Please" instantly evokes a negative connotation. The post itself is not so remarkable, but read down to the comments. It turns out to be a quite interesting interaction between friends about words, names, and phrases.

One of the commenters on the previous post, Conaway Haskins, is a Virginia blogger I would like to call friend, but we've never met. I hope to rectify that situation someday. His South of The James blog has recently posted his thoughts on attending the Sorensen Institute for Political Leadership Program and his thoughts regarding fellow Sorensen alumnus Norm Leahy. Read his story titled "Norm!!! University of Virginia's Sorensen Institute Kicks Off 2006 Class"

Let me pour you another cup of this great Stuart Virginia coffee before we get to the last two Carnival posts.

First, let's go to Spank That Donkey and his story about Hillary's new speech writer, "Hillary Hires a "Hawk"".

And finally, J.R. Hoeft, way out east in Hampton Roads is showing off again his and Squeaky's technical expertise and political connectedness (I just love making up words) with another podcast. This time it's an interview with Great Bridge Delegate Del. John Cosgrove (R-78). Tune in here, for the 20 minute interview. Or go here and use J.R.'s Bandwidth as it was originally intended.

Thanks for joining me while I compiled this list of great posts, I've enjoyed your company. Next week you can go visit with Doug at Below The Beltway while hosts the Carnival. If you would like to submit an article for a future Carnival, you can find all the details over at Commonwealth Conservative. That page will also provide you with information detailing how you can host your very own Virginia Blogger's Carnival as well.

You can find this and other Carnivals listed each week at The TTLB ÜberCarnival.