By Bob Dorn

A snapshot of the news featured by Google, the world’s leading aggregator, and what it left out.

When it’s at its very best, the news industry offers our eyes and ears reason to hope that we can find a voice that speaks like our own.

When I hear a presidential candidate say that half the country is comprised of “moochers” who are “dependent” on government to provide them the basic necessities of life, I should be able to hear or read an alternative position — something like this, for example: Professional politicians now are saying money is the mark of godliness, and the more of it they have the nearer to God (or the presidency, depending on which you think is more important) they become.

Last week, Mitt Romney and some of his supporters gave us the one view; no publication featured in Google News gave us the other.   [Read more…]

Today, during a multi-family garage sale on my street, I met a rather vocal Republican (no shocker there) and his wife. They were taking quite an interest in a painting I had leaning against my car — that is until the man saw my Obama 2012 bumper sticker.

He stood up, pointed at it and grumbled. I asked with a laugh if the bumper sticker was a deterrent to buying the picture and he replied, “Sorta. Yeah, it is.”

He continued, much to his wife’s chagrin: “Just do me a favor. Just watch the movie, and you can see the direction he is trying to take this country.”

The movie I can only imagine he’s referring to is Dreams From My Real Father, an anti-Obama DVD of which 1.5 million copies have reportedly been sent — unsolicited — to voters.   [Read more…]

Daily Kos / By Vita Brevis

I’ve cracked wise before that this is what the American Taliban wants ( sold at WalMart, made in China natch) but we may be closer than you think.

As you know, the He Man Woman Hater’s Club is meeting this weekend although they are calling it the Values Voter’s Summit, and yes my fellow females, we are on the agenda.

In addition to focus on our insides, the self appointed rule makers have decided we, as a gender, are showing too much of our outsides. But fear not, they’ve got us covered. More literally than you might think.   [Read more…]

Craft Beer Debates is a “fun, non-intimidating way to introduce people to local craft beer and local issues in an interactive “house of commons” style format”. The first debate was held Wednesday, September 12 at Slater’s 50/50 in Liberty Station. I’m a huge fan of craft beer, especially craft beer from San Diego breweries, and had seen the debate series mentioned on Twitter numerous times leading up to the event. I decided to go and crossed my fingers that I could finagle a seat despite having failed to sign up in advance.

Thanks to the gracious gatekeeper at the door, I was able to snag a seat in the room, which ended up being nearly at capacity with an estimated 50 people in attendance. The debate panel was comprised of two proponents of a new stadium with some sort of public financing and two opponents to that idea.   [Read more…]