Leaving Cameron Village on Saturday we came across a couple of cars with flags following each other.  If you’ve lived in the area for more than fifteen minutes you know this could be sports fans from any one of a number of schools in the area.  On closer inspection I realized they cars were not flying the colors of NCSU, UNC, Duke, Shaw, Meredith or even Peace these cars had the historic Gadsden flag (aka Don’t Tread on Me).  We carefully moved in closer to investigate as they made their way onto Hillsborough Street and saw their web address written on the car window – www.rollingteaparty.com.  Until I saw this I had no idea that the Tea Party crowd had adopted the Gadsden flag and the Navy Jack as their banners of choice.  An interesting pick to say the least and quite honestly an interesting protest.

I’m sure these folks were en route to a larger caravan we saw three of what I have to assume were more but can’t really confirm.  From their website:

Did you come here because you saw the website name on a car today (or recently?) You witnessed a Rolling Tea Party – the goal was to deliver our message via this single website. The hundreds of cars that traveled the streets of Raleigh today, advertising this website, were participating in yet another rally of Americans against yet another abuse of power by government.

Issues listed on their website include – Kill the 1% NC Sales Tax Hike, Don’t “Cap” Our Economy, Immigration and Anchor Babies, Throw the Bums Out, and An Unconstitutional Amendment? All appear to be from the more conservative side of the political arena.  Issues that are all uniquely complex and unfortunately deserve more time and discussion than what they get either in the media or in person.  Most of this small site seems to push forward to a Constitutional Town Hall site which appears to be something of a “hub” for activities like this across the state – if you haven’t seen them yet (and there really are more than the three we saw) expect to see them soon in a town near you across North Carolina.

I am a blogger and a local web designer what does keeping the internet free and open mean to me? Well – at this point everything. Sure I support the big guys – you can easily log into my site with your Facebook account and yes – I am trying to figure out how to capitalize on Twitter and looking for the “next big thing” as well. But I don’t want the big sites to get better quality of service that I get. Granted – at the end of the day I have a long way to go to be mentioned in the same sentence as Facebook or Twitter but that doesn’t mean I don’t want a level playing field – just in case.  It looks like the government is watching out for me on this one – or – at least heading in that direction with www.openinternet.gov and www.broadband.gov.  Here is the latest video release from openinternet.gov:

Now I know what you are thinking… wasn’t there another group dedicated to Net Neutrality that was a lot more fun?

I know some people aren’t going to find this funny and some people are going to be offended. Still more people are going to love the beat, miss the message and go here to download this as an MP3 because it might be the catchiest song of the summer. I know that isn’t exactly what Nick Cannon and Nas wanted when they did this but there is only so much Micheal Jackson you can listen to before anything  sounds good. Actually – message?  I am just putting this here so BobG can snag it and play it during the next Party Gras. Sho is good!

xkcd.com

This happened 29 years ago yesterday. I was in kindergarten. Excuse me now while I pick up my crayons and reflect on how times were simpler and better then.