5 years ago.... yesterday

.

Hey, it's not like we wanted to steal anyone else's thunder but it was July 31, 2007 when we kicked off this humble little blog. It was our intent to be primarily a sports blog* but the amnesty throw-down that summer and the brewing campaign for the 2008 presidential election radically altered that.

Below is the text of our first post**. Thanks to all who have read BwD, even if only on occasion and thanks especially to those who have contributed to the dialog by commenting on our posts.

Before I get into what the hell it is that I think I'm doing, let me say a few words about the title of this blog. Months back when ESPN got a slice of the NASCAR T.V. pie, ESPN/ABC named Brent Musberger as its studio host, the man who would guide the World Wide Leader through the uncharted waters of stock car racing. When questioned about his qualifications of being the network's point man in covering NASCAR, Musberger somewhat defensively responded that he has had a lot of contact and interaction already with fans of the sport and in fact, has had ".... beers with that demographic."

Something about that quote cracked me up. Was it the fact that he made it a point that he was gettin' likker'd-up with the rabble of red-staters? Was it the clinical condescension in referring to the people he was trying to get down with as merely a "demographic"? Probably both. I dunno - it was amusing and it appeared to encapsulate (I think) what I want to do. A lot of sports, a little culture and yeah, some politics.

Please bear with me as I figure out this whole blogging thing. Mostly, I'm going to struggle with the choice of content. For example, I've got a lot of friends who love me but hate my politics. If I decide to post about a controversial topic in that realm, do I put up a warning label at the top of my post? Do I start a separate blog: one for sports, one for politics and culture? I have no clue. A few things I do know: There will be no schedule, no regular posting times and hopefully no rhyme or reason to this but I do hope you will enjoy it and that is the bottom line.

A special thank you goes out to my little brother who has been nagging me for over a year now to do something like this. If nothing else, this demonstrates the sadistic bent in the family genes.

Take care.

* Which explains our long-time masthead figure, sports announcer, Brent Musberger.


** In which, spammers wasted no time in pouncing.

Programming reminder

Hey, gang... just a quick update: The San Diego Local Order of Bloggers (the SLOBs) has an aggregator at, get this, the SLOBs. Thanks again, Sir Charles!

Get on over there and "like" us if you will, please. Several other "share" options are available as well.

Obviously, there is a lot going on right now even in these dog days of August so use the SLOBs as a source of info in getting up to speed on the libertarian/conservative perspective of life, culture and politics (and even some sports!) here in San Diego, California, the U.S. and the world at large.


Blogging may be a little light today as Max and I scout out some new breweries for a Hoffer's brewery bus tour, hopefully in September.


Pax.

Link of the day

John over at Truth Before Dishonor is back up and running after some time off. Check out the new look over at his place - we think you will enjoy it.

Hey, looks like our friend Foxie from Head Noises has been doing some guest blogging for him as well.

Follower blog post of the day

Our daily effort to keep up with the blogging of our followers and to spread around a little love.



Les Carpenter of Rational Nation USA just returned from Britain and found out we can learn an awful lot about American exceptionalism from a Brit.

My guess is that, if anything, Obama would verbalize his ideology using the same vocabulary that Eurocrats do. He would say he wants a fairer America, a more tolerant America, a less arrogant America, a more engaged America. When you prize away the cliché, what these phrases amount to are higher taxes, less patriotism, a bigger role for state bureaucracies, and a transfer of sovereignty to global institutions.

Read the entire very worthwhile post here.

Follower blog post of the day

Our somewhat daily opportunity to express our gratitude to the bloggers of the interwebs who have also humbled us by being followers of Beers with Demo as well.


But first, check out this photo from NOAA of the energy unleashed by the quake in Japan.

Tim at Left Coast Rebel owns and operates a tremendous conservative blog site but we're kind of thinking that his first love might just be natural disasters as he has a great round-up of videos from Japan and Hawai'i including this one of the explosion at Japan's Fukushima nuclear power plant that proves it was neither Barack Obama's nor George W. Bush's fault but rather those damn commies!




Karl Marx makes an appearance in the billowing plume just to the left of the center of the picture at 0:58.



Click and scroll at the link above for more great videos and near-Darwin award moments of intrepid(?)
folks capturing the tsunami tides.

Link of the day (UPDATED)

We.... we don't even know what to make of this.

Seriously. Someone please talk us down off this ledge.

(UPDATE #1): Big Sis was on Capitol Hill today fielding questions regarding Project Gunrunner.





We're not sure what's worse: covering up by lying about having no knowledge of this project and her agents being used in it or actually not having any knowledge of this project?

The whistleblowers claim that ATF (Justice Department) coordinated with ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) which falls under Homeland Security. One would think that sort of coorindation for something of this sort would require sign-offs pretty high up the food chain at the DHS.


We're in the very best of hands.

Follower blog post of the day

Our daily endeavor to throw some traffic and show our appreciation to the folks that follow us and blog as well.


KT of The Scratching Post on publicly-funded ventures and the inevitability of cannabalism:

(Yeah, we link to him quite often anyway, but when the guy book marks us with our own nickname (top billing in the Theocracy, no less!), (the) "Monastery of Miscellaneous Musings", he's gonna get some love.)

Not all of these stories are motivated by a desire to make sure the others get cut first, but you can be sure that some are. If I was an activist for the Head Start program and I worked at a newspaper or a TV studio, you can be sure that my ideological allies would be feeding me story leads to make their rivals at the public trough look bad. That's how it works in a society where income is dependent on politics. In addition to hiring lobbyists to influence legislators, you whisper in the news media's ear to get the voters to call their representatives.

Remember, gang, you will not remove money, lobbyists, nor incivility from politics until you remove power from politics by corresponding degrees.

Read the rest of the post, here.

Follower blog post of the day

In an attempt to throw some love our "followers'" way as well as to express our gratitude for their follower-ship, we're instituting a new daily feature to which we hope we can hold.

We believe "Scott" has been one of our longest-tenured followers and his Diplomacy is a weighty and well-written foreign policy blog.

Gangsterism, warlordism, shadowy transnational terrorist networks - these are the principal threats to American interests in the region and so the idea that America can go around the world simply arranging balancing coalitions in some grand eighteenth-century European style is just absurd. The new strategic environment calls for an altogether more nuanced and subtle diplomacy, a different blend of elements, and a different set of capabilities. Quite simple one would think, elementary even, and yet American realism seems institutionally incapable of grasping it.

For our innaugural feature, Scott tackles our competing foreign policy strategies in the Middle East, here. Do check it out.

Thanks, Scott.

We have serious reservations regarding their taste

We noticed that we had one of our top 3 or 4 days, hit-wise, yesterday and a Stat Counter analysis blamed a mighty fine blog Questions and Observations for sending traffic our way. What was the special occasion? Beers with Demo had made Guide to Online School's top fifty political blogs and in an even more exclusive category, top 5 political blogs:

The Top Five Political Blogs

•Barefoot and Progressive: Barefoot and Biting would be another fitting name (or even Barefoot and Snarky, but that's not alliterative). B and P writes a sharp liberal blog with a slight emphasis on Kentucky politics.
•Our Favorite Post: KY GOP Senate Debate Liveblog

•Beers with Demo: A good conservative blog for newcomers, this is, "a blog for people who don't read blogs." Beers with Demo tells the story without letting his opinion crowd out the facts.
•Our Favorite Post: We've Seen This Movie Before

•Think Progress: Think Progress is a liberal blog with multiple, well-informed authors. All authors write in a professional manner about their respective topics, but none are afraid to let their feelings show.
•Our Favorite Post: Pat Robertson's Advice

•Pundit and Pundette: A la the 1940's plucky reporters, Pundit and Pundette laude or rend passing current events. This blog combines typical blog entries with Tumblr style image, video and article sharing.
•Our Favorite Post: When is a Black Hole Not a Black Hole?

•Questions and Observations: Politics from the oft-overlooked libertarian perspective. Q and O holds the guilty accountable and is unafraid to intelligently rip into their opponents.
•Our Favorite Post: Our Whiner-in-Chief

And demonstrating that the folks at Guide to Online Schools do have some taste, We'd also like to note our friends at The Scratching Post, Head Noises and Left Coast Rebel also made the top 50 cut.




Again, thanks to Questions and Observations for spreading the news and sharing the love.

Graphic of the Day

In: Tea Party

Out: Coffee Party

So Out, they're really In: Legal Insurrection


In the Coffee Party's defense, it's really tough to generate any excitement... or actual membership, for that matter, when you are unable to state what your agenda (see: progressive statism) is other than some mindless drivel about "civility".

... and many happy returns.

Fellow Iowahawk admirer and BwD follower, Dr. Dave, is celebrating an anniversary. Go on over to Feed your ADHD and wish him well.

Programming Note

Hey, we noticed we ahem, attracted two “followers” since we last checked. A big “howdy” to Galina and Ida_pai. Thanks for signing up and enjoying the ride with us.

We’re simultaneously stoked and humbled that people would actually sign up to read what we have to say. We can only hope we are worthy of the continued attention and support.

Maybe if we get a couple more, the congregation could be called “the Dirty Dozen”. And trust us, we will!

Just cracking into double-digit territory reminds us of that scene from “This is Spinal Tap” where Rob Reiner’s character asks the band about its declining popularity and smaller crowds. Without much wiggling at all, the band claimed that their fan base had simply become more “selective”.

So, we salute you “selective” ones. Have a great day!

What you are currently reading is so 2004

"Writing a weblog today isn't the bright idea it was four years ago. The
blogosphere, once a freshwater oasis of folksy self-expression and clever
thought, has been flooded by a tsunami of paid bilge. Cut-rate journalists and
underground marketing campaigns now drown out the authentic voices of amateur
wordsmiths. It's almost impossible to get noticed, except by hecklers."

Let’s see. We started this blog back in ’07 so considering 3 years is the shortest amount of time we’ve ever been late to a techno-socio-cultural trend, we will press onward oblivious to the weight of the logic presented above… especially in light of this:

"Bloggers today are expected to write clever, insightful, witty prose to compete with Huffington and The New York Times."

We weren’t sure whether the author’s blogger expectations were such because of the competing cleverness and wit of HuffPo and the NYT or because of the lack of it.

Read more about Twitter being the soul of wit and other such stuff, here.

H/T: InstaGlen

Bloggers hate the state of Utah

CBSSports.com has their Top 25 blog poll out. Results here.

Both Missouri and LSU fell hard after their losses on Saturday to OK St. and Florida, respectively and USC moves up only one spot to #9 after their sloppy win against Arizona St. (it would seem bloggers are as similarly unimpressed with SC as we are given they are #6 in the AP poll). But Utah and BYU both fall several spots after victories this weekend. A little MWC disrespect, here? We would bring up there stellar record against the Pac-10 this year but, sheesh, its only the Pac-10.

Housekeeping

He's been wanting to do it for a few months now but B-Daddy has finally followed through on his threat to start his own blog. He is in beta-testing right now but check it out anyway as his inaugural post is up. And as if that wasn't disincentive enough, he's even asked us to come onboard as a contributor! As you'll see, its a uhhh.. niche blog but, shoot, one never knows.... we thought we were going to be writing primarily about sports.

Congratulations, B-Daddy and welcome to the blogosphere.

Curious yet still completely irrelevant headline of the day

From the renowned blogs of noted blog editor Tony Pierce and the L.A. Times:

IRAQ: Black Iraqis hoping for a Barack Obama win


If Obama wins in November, he's hoping Iraq's leaders will take a closer look at the documents and give some black Iraqis a chance. And if John McCain wins? "It will be a big disappointment," Razzaq says

OK, then.

You’re much-anticipated Accountable America Update.

In the comment section of "When one completely childish, reactionary and amateurish challenge deserves another.", B-Daddy threw down the gauntlet to see who could get their comments posted at Accountable America. They have a moderator so cleverness and bad grammar will be at a premium.

We checked in over there and in the 4 posts they have since starting-up, they have a grand total of one comment. Hey Tom Mattzie, we know how it feels…. Then again, we didn’t get any ink from the Old Gray Lady, either.

What? What’s that you say….? We’re in? Comment posted August 11 @ 8:13 P.M. B-Daddy, you so owe us dinner. Out.

(UPDATE #1): It seems our comment was delted around 1930 PDT. We're shocked and dismayed. It was full of good will, heartfelt thanks and 100% approval of their M.O. Since we compose in Word and then cut'n'paste, our post to Accountable America was as follows:

"Hey guys - thanks for doing this. I've been screaming for years for something like this. It killed me to see a true hero and patriot like John Kerry get dragged through the mud of these repugnicant retards. After all, he was doing what they hate the most: speaking truth to the power. Its time we took off the gloves. The future of this country is far too important to "play fair" or not confront in the most aggressive of manner these treacherous traitors.... even if it means we have to get our hands dirty a little, I'm willing, for the good of the country to go the Stalinist intimidation route. Eff'm, right? They've been doing it to us for years so I figure one good turn deserves another. Let's take America back and return it to the standards of decency that every man, woman and child in this and future generations can respect!

Keep up the good work and keep rockin'."


Evidently, we have failed to rock.

In retrospect... coulda been worse.

Some concluding thoughts on the great Beers with Demo 1-Year Blogoversary Shutdown…

Define Irony: We were notified Thursday evening that we had been shutdown by Blogger as they had suspicions we were a spam blog via an email that showed up in our junk mail folder which is there to shield us from, yep, spam.

But no courtesy email, though, telling us we were back on-line… we just decided to give it a whirl on Saturday morning and see what would happen.

But on Friday, without any “work” to do after work, we took a flyer and asked the cute little red-headed girl that lives down the street out with us to the track and had a great carefree evening…. losing hard-earned scratch on the ponies.

We weren’t the only ones who had been shut down though as BlackFive reported that several milblogs had been served the kibosh at the end of last week by either “glitches” with Google’s spamware or by more mischievous means.

We certainly hope it’s the former. This is a great big ol’ country with a lot of people and just as many points of views, opinions and ideologies for which the internet serves as a marketplace and megaphone. It would be a shame to think there are a few punks out there who can’t stand the fact that there are other people who hold and share opinions and views counter to their own.

If it is the latter then we’ll have ourselves a chuckle while thinking there are people who actually care enough about what we post to have us taken out at the knees. But as we have noted, we are not taking any chances and we will no longer be saying anything derogatory about M.T. Suit… we mean, The Lightworker…. Having a blog is just more important than taking a principled stand.

Or Perhaps its a Lack-of-Readership thing.

We’re trying to work up some angst over this Google-is-shutting-down-anti-Obama sites bit but its kind of difficult when we’re blogging on blogspot and have posted one or two of what could liberally be construed as anti-Obama posts. Then again, we’ve come up with plenty of anti-McCain posts so maybe our overlords at Google think we’re kinda like Fox News in that respect with our completely fair and balanced approach.

At any rate, even if its true, we’re not sure this phenomena constitutes as a banning or squelching of free speech because we are posting this on (Obama drowns little baby kittens) Google turf and they are the sole proprietors of blogspot and the content therein and (Obama sucks eggs) we are not paying one red cent for it.

At any rate, if you believe us to be wrong in our assessment (forget Mrs. O’Leary’s cow… Obama started the Great Chicago Fire…. and caused the Johnstown Flood, too), please let (Muslim? Forget about it. Obama is a Jehovah’s Witness just like… Michael Jackson) us know.

Sincerely,
The Management.

Showing off our Polysyllabics?

We appear to have some folks fooled as this blog requires post-grad level education/intelligence to understand.



Click here to see how yours or your favorite blog fares.

H/T: Information Dissemination