Blog post

March 27, 2007 [LINK / comment]

New Staunton GOP Web site

Why the sparse frequency of blog posts lately? Most of my time over the past few days has been devoted to setting up the new Staunton GOP Web site, which has a number of interactive features such as a Photo gallery in which all the photos can be accessed from a single page. (I learned from my brother Dan that, because of the CSS techniques I used, that page will not work with versions of Microsoft Internet Explorer prior to 7.0; it works fine on Firefox 1.0+, Safari 1.0+, and Netscape 6.0+, however.) This "new" Web site actually replaces the old swacgop.org Web site, which I created four years ago. (The domain name of the latter has been "parked" until such time as the respective units can come to a mutual agreement.) Augusta County withdrew its participation in December, and Waynesboro just did likewise. It's sadly emblematic of general trends within the Republican Party these days. Like the Fleetwood Mac song, "You Can Go Your Own Way"...

The attack ads begin

And speaking of divisions within the Republican Party, there is a new radio ad attacking Sen. Emmett Hanger in a sarcastic, sneering tone that does not exactly appeal to reason. I guess that's what "mobilizing the base" means. Ugh... I learned of it via the VCAP blog. It's one thing to criticize Sen. Hanger for voting to raise taxes in 2004, but lumping him in with the Democrats is just ridiculous. Such fratricide in the most solidly Republican part of the Old Dominion is very troubling, and it raises the question of whether the party can hold together during the fall campaign. The ad does not mention Sen. Hanger's opponent, Scott Sayre, and therefore does not count as a campaign ad for statutory purposes.

And speaking of Mr. Sayre, there is a new collaborative blog, bloggers4sayre, and some of the names on it I recognize.