Austin American Statesman Travesty Of An Article On Netroots Nation

I've submitted the following to the Austin American Statesman as a letter to the editor in response to an awful front page article:

I attended the Netroots Nation convention this past weekend and found Austin to be the wonderful place I remembered. Your people and local businesses were welcoming and lived up to the reputation of individuality and excellence.

Where I was disappointed was in the coverage of the conference especially seen in an article on the front page of the Statesman where writer Patrick Beach seems to have forgotten his role as a professional and instead tied together flippant statements that seemed to only serve to entertain the writer and reinforce his already held beliefs.

Under the guise of reporting on Al Gore’s surprise visit to the convention the writer proceeded to indicate that Speaker Pelosi holds communist Chinese views and other equally repulsive characterizations of convention attendees.

As a student of journalism at the University of Southern Mississippi I hope standards haven’t fallen that this kind of “news” is now acceptable.

....


I'll let y'all know if it or anything similar gets published.

Read My Guest Column in the Clarion Ledger

In May I went to Washington as a student advisor for the Y2i program at the University of Southern Mississippi.

I accidently learned (like we didn't know already) the poor state of our current security measures:

The next day, the knife traveled through no fewer than five secure locations. I brought it into the U.S. Mint, the Washington Monument, the Smithsonian's Museum of the American Indian and I later gained admittance to the U.S. Supreme Court building standing feet away from the courtroom.

Most frightening, however, is that I went into the Dirksen Senate building, through its security, and met with U.S. Sen. Thad Cochran, all while I had a knife on my person.

It is with this in mind that I ask citizens to consider the actions of our government recently which it claims will protect us. Laws have been passed allowing government agents to tap into our phone calls, demand our records (without being required to tell those they're targeting), and detain U.S. citizens infinitely.

Read the entire column at the Clarion Ledger.