03.13.08 Briefing • Steve Elliott, Grassfire.org
1. Is McCain really "efforting" for conservative voters?
2. Senators hiding from their earmarks scandal
3. Ramos/Compean appeal decision 100 days pending
4. The future of the Internet from the web's founder
5. Obama changing beyond "change"?
6. On the web today

1. Is McCain "efforting"?

It doesn't seem like John McCain is making a real effort to court conservatives. For example, Sen. Rick Santorum reports on McCain's speech last week before the Council for National Policy -- an exclusive association that consists of the leaders of the conservative and social conservative movement. Santorum points out that McCain picked up "two legs of the Republican stool - spending/taxes and national security. But the third leg - social issues - went unmentioned." Santorum raises questions about McCain's positions on marraige, stem cell researdh, and global warming.

I think there's a fourth leg of the grassroots conservative base -- immigration. And since we know McCain will not really touch that leg, that leaves us with a stool that simply will not stay upright. National Review editors are weighing in on the conservatives' delicate dance with McCain, noting that delegates to the GOP convention have real power to object to, for example, a bad McCain choice for Veep.

2. Senators Try To Hide Earmarks Scandal Once Again
As you know, on Tuesday Grassfire.org delivered over 100,000 petitions to Sen. DeMint (see photos, listen to interview) in a well-attended press event on Capitol Hill to help launch Sen. DeMint's call for a one-year moratorium on earmarks. Well, the dirty tricks started almost immediately.

Yesterday our staff received a communiqué from Senator DeMint's office regarding his earmark moratorium amendment. Sen. DeMint was not allowed to formally offer the amendment. Today, all time for debate will eventually close, but the Senator is committed to offering the amendment. As his staff reiterated: "We will get a vote," but some Senators are working to delay the vote so that the presidential candidates are not on hand and the story is buried in the media.

The earmarking process is inevitably corrupting. Congressmen basically have a built-in incentive to funnel billions of our tax dollars to their pet projects and personal supporters -- all without public debate or even a vote in Congress. Imagine if you could requisition funds for projects at your company without your boss ever having to approve the project, as long as you technically "attached" the funds to some other project your boss already approved. This is a great day to call your two Senators and demand a vote today on the Earmarks moratorium: 202-224-3121.

3. Ramos/Compean decision now 100 days pending
It has been 100 days since the 3-judge panel of the Circuit Court of Appeals heard the appeal of imprisoned border patrol agents Ramos and Compean. As you may recall, during the hearing the judges openly questioned whether the prosecution had "overreached" and the prosecution was forced to admit that the drug smuggler had lied. Ron De Jong and I met with our key contact on Capitol Hill for the latest updates. Essentially, we are in a wait-and-see mode. Three scenarios are all very possible: the ruling could be upheld in full, upheld in part, or a new trial could be ordered. We will keep you updated.

4. The Semantic Web is coming
Tim Berners-Lee -- the inventor of the World Wide Web (1989 for you trivia folks) -- tells the London Times that the future of the Internet will go far beyond Google's linking web pages to a "semantic web" that links individual content items the same way Google links web pages. In essence, the way social net sites like Facebook link together information about people, the semantic web will link together virtually every program and every piece of information in a seamless, searchable, mash-upable web.

You've probably seen this on a micro scale already -- when the location of all Starbucks are plotted on a Google map is an example. The Mac computer's email program does something very semantic. When I receive an email with a date or an address in it, the computer automatically recognizes it as a possible calendar event or contact. All I have to do is mouse over the information in the text of an email and the program asks me if I want to create a contact or calendar event. It seems magical. In a few years, we'll expect all content on the Internet to come alive and be interactive.

6. On the Web Today:
Web traffic up up up!
NYTimes reports on Spitzer's call girl's MySpace page.
Porn maker pushes PPHood teen sex website
Constitution demands Florida Dem primary votes count?
More on CA's homeschooling ban
Gay porn required reading in Illinois high school? Where's the media on this?
LATimes down 20%; SFchron 30%; WPost 13%; NYTimes 7.2%
Groundbreaking civil unions case in Vermont today