Michigan Democrats are busy picking delegates to the national convention in August.

There seems to be a grim resolve to try to make the best of a disastrous comedy of errors that has disenfranchised the state’s Democratic voters.

State party leaders are going ahead with the process of picking delegates, bravely maintaining that they’ll eventually be seated at the convention.

But it doesn’t change the fact that the voters got screwed.

Squabbling between state and national party leaders led to a non-election in January. The national party told the candidates to boycott Michigan because it scheduled the state’s primary too early; Barack Obama complied and Hillary Clinton didn’t. So Clinton won the election and most of the delegates, but it wasn’t a fair contest and everyone knows it.

It didn’t matter when it looked like Clinton would easily win the nomination. But when Obama blew past Mrs. Clinton, taking a narrow lead in the number of delegates, the Michigan mess became a national problem, not just a local embarassment.

Now state and national Democratic leaders are trying to work out a compromise to give some of the delegates to each candidate in a negotiated settlement.

But, from the perspective of Michigan voters, that’s simply, well, a pile of crap.

State Democratic leaders shouldn’t have gambled with the integrity of the primary in the first place.

When they saw what a mess they had created, they should have held a second election or statewide caucuses. They had several months to figure out a way to let voters express their will.

Now that it’s too late to do it right, they’re trying to reach a compromise. But it’s too late. Any deal that claims to express the wishes of Michigan’s Democratic voters will be bogus.

We’ve always wanted comments from readers on our news stories.

That’s why we encourage letters to the editor. It’s why reporters’ e-mail addresses are included on most stories. And it’s why we started MonroeTalks.com, which serves as a public discussion site.

But since we launched the modern version of www.monroenews.com two years ago, we’ve struggled with the technology that allows readers to comment at the end of news stories.

Now that feature is working.

Readers can comment at the end of any story on monroenews.com. The launched the feature a couple days ago, and readers already have found it. There are a number of comments already.

This isn’t meant to replace MonroeTalks.com as a place to comment on the news. Both locations - at the end of a story and on MonroeTalks - provide readers with a forum for airing their opinions.

I can imagine, for example, making a specific comment on a news story, then moving over to MonroeTalks.com to start a topic discussing broader issues raised by the story.

This is all part of the Web 2.0 experience sweeping the Internet. People are willing to sit back and let someone else tell them the news any more. They want to provide their own two cents. And in the give and take, a more complete picture of the news can surface - if you’re willing to sort through the chaff to find the wheat.

Within five minutes into my run today, I knew something wasn’t quite right.

I felt tired, lethargic. I wanted to stop.

But I perservered. Anyone who runs knows that sometimes there are days like that. The best thing to do is just keep running; often the feeling goes away and what starts out as a dreadful experience turns into a great one.

But that didn’t happen today. I kept going, completing my 5-mile loop. But it was hard.

Then, as I sat in the kitchen drinking a glass of cranberry juice, it hit me. I gave blood yesterday.

And it wasn’t the normal pint. I did the “double red blood cell” thing. It involves taking about twice as much blood, running it through a centrifuge to separate out the red blood cells, then pumping the plasma back into you.  They don’t allow you to give blood again for twice as long, so I imagine it takes more out of you physically.

I asked the nurse, a tall, strapping guy named Mike, if it was okay to run the next day after giving blood. He said, sure, just to drink plenty of liquids.

Well, he’s right. It didn’t seem to hurt me. But it sure slowed me down.

Other than it’s affect on my next-day run, giving blood was again a great experience.

The Rotary Club sponsored the blood drive at the Monroe YMCA. As a member of the club, I work at the blood drive each year and it’s a real joy. So many people donating a few minutes of their day and a pint of their blood to save someone else’s life. And most do it with a smile and a look of satisfaction. It’s a great room to spend a few hours working in.

Whether volunteering - my job yesterday was helping folks get snacks and a beverage after they donate - or giving  blood, it’s one of those experiences in life that causes you to walk a little lighter the rest of the day (no pun intended), knowing that you’ve done a good thing.

And it’s one of the easiest ways to feel good. You just lay there on a cot for a few minutes, watching the bag slowly fill with blood. You can’t help but imagine where your blood is going, and who will benefit from your donation.

When you give double red blood cells, it’s even more rewarding. You watch the blood fill one bag, then go into the cenrifuge and come out, filling another bag with plasma. After a few minutes, you feel the pump switch, and it begins sending the plasma back into your arm. The tube changes from red to pale white. You feel a little tingle, starting in your arm and spreadng through your body. It’s not a bad feeling; more interesting than anything else.

When the plasma bag is empty, the process reverses again, the tube changes back to red and the blood bag begins to fill. After the plasma bag empties a second time, you’re finished.

And as you step down from the cot, you know that someone, somewhere, may live because they desperately needed a transfusion of red blood cells - and you took a few minutes out of your day to help.

That’s quite a feeling.

There are more than 2,000 registered users of MonroeTalks.com, and about 300 of them are regular talkers on the “Your Talk” forums. About 50 are very frequent talkers.

The leading poster, “cc,” is approaching 5,000 posts since the site was launched last June. (Seems like we should have a party and award a gold watch or something when the milestone is hit.) Four others have more than 4,000 posts, and six others more than 3,000.

In addition to the registered users, there are something approaching 10,000 unique visitors to the site each month. In other words, a few people post most of the content, but many people read it.

Any regular reader of the forum knows many of the regular talkers as if they’re next-door neighbors. Their character comes through in their posts, and many have very entertaining personalities.

There’s a natural curiousity about what they’re “really” like.

That’s one reason I enjoyed very much getting a chance to meet a half-dozen of them Friday morning over coffee at Cafe Classics. Another reason is that all were just as interesting in person as on-line.

In some ways, the MonroeTalks experience will never be the same - now that I know what they really look like, I’ll see a real face in my mind when I read their posts, instead of that imaginary image.

Several of the talkers who joined me for coffee Friday said the same thing. The experience changed dramatically for them when they met many of their fellow talkers at a MonroeTalks gathering.

We talked briefly at the coffee shop about why MonroeTalks.com is so successful. Someone - I don’t remember who it was - gave the most obvious answer. It’s because of the people.

Because the talkers are characters, real-life personalities with the full range of human traits, from wit and charm to anger and jealousy, the content of MonroeTalks is fascinating.

Some of it is thoughtful and articulate. Much is inane and just plain silly. But it’s all real. Except the part that is fake. And there is no way to tell the difference, just as in real life.

I’m doing some research on parenting Web sites, and that led me to this article on babble.com, a national parenting site, on exactly how detailed we should be in our parenting.

We’re planning a major makeover for our MonroeParent.com Web site and its companion print product, Monroe Parent. That’s what led me to look around other parenting sites.

The article mentioned above, by Katie Allison Granju, explores whether today’s parents have become too involved in every detail of their childrens’ lives.

She started the article talking about how our mothers lived in a world that “had become so narrowly focused on one facet of their lives — homemaking — that all the joy had been sucked right out of them.”

She goes on to wonder whether today’s mothers aren’t living in a world that is just as stressful, but for different reasons.

“We may no longer be “professional homemakers,” but whether we stay home with our kids, or work outside the home, we’ve turned parenting into its own, highly stressful, endlessly demanding, often joyless undertaking. In fact, a recent study by research group Public Agenda found that seventy-six percent of American parents describe raising kids today as “much harder” than it was during their own childhoods.

But are we making it a lot harder than it has to be? I think so.”

I agree.

One of the most important skills that parents needed in yesteryear and still need today is knowing when it’s okay to leave children alone to learn for themselves, to experience life on their own terms, to make mistakes and learn lessons the hard way.

Love them. Support them. Give them every opportunity you can. But let them live their own lives.

But then it’s easy for me to give parenting advice. It’s been seven years since my youngest son graduated from high school.

Footnote: Worse that parents who overmanage their kids are parents who don’t care enough to provide the support, encourgement, education, discipline, etc., that kids need.

For a lot of people, today was the first day of spring.

Not the first day on the calendar, but the first day of springlike weather on a weekend.

For me, it meant the first outside run of the year. I’ve been enduring the treadmill for months, and it was great to feel real asphalt under my running shoes.

I noticed lots of other runners enjoying the 60-degree temperature, and as I passed homes along the road I also saw plenty of people in their yards, beginning the spring gardening.

When I got home, my wife was in the yard, clipping off old growth and tidying up flower beds. It’s only a matter of days before the daffodils will be blooming.

It’s too early to plant much, but it’s still great to be outside. I enjoy helping with the garden much more in the spring - when it’s a nice change from being inside and when the temperature’s still cool - than summer when the weeds are growing fast and the sun it hot.

The spring weather has me inspired. I hope this is the year I manage to keep running on a regular schedule through the summer, maybe competing in some 10Ks before the season is over. I’ve been saying that for 10 years, but it seems like I always run out of time, miss a few days, and fall off the training schedule. And once you’ve fallen out of shape, running isn’t much fun.

I started today with a slow 45-minute run - probably about five miles, since it felt like about a 9-minute mile pace. I was happy that I made it without any trouble. I’ve been doing 45 minutes on the treadmill, but it’s not the same.

My goal is to run 45 minutes three times a week, slowly picking up the speed, and to do a longer run, slowly picking up the distance, once a week. Four times a week is about all I can hope to find the time for - and in the past it has worked well for me.

I used that schedule the year I ran a marathon, about 10 years ago. I don’t have any plans like that this year, but I do want to get to the point where I can run 8-10 miles comfortably.

So, wish me luck sticking to it - and lots of beautiful spring days for running.

If you have a running schedule you like, share it.

I’m a coffeeholic. I know I drink waaaay too much. But I can’t stop myself.

What’s that have to do with tea in China? Nothing.

But it does relate to a post over on Paula Wethington’s blog, Monroe on a Budget.

Monroe on a Budget is the most recent of the blogs at Blogsmonroe.com to get a facelift. We’re slowly, one at a time, switching from the original Wordpress blog template (which you see here) to more customized versions for each blog.

Other recent makeovers were on The Erie Hiker and What is Normal, two of our most popular blogs.

Anyway, one of Paula’s most recent posts was about coffee makers. She made the point that when you’re the only one in the family to drink coffee, traditional makers are impractical.

 Here’s the best coffee maker I’ve ever found for making a single cup.

A few years ago, our son studied for a semester in Costa Rica. When he returned, he brought me a coffee maker he purchased in a public market for a quarter - or the Costa Rican equivalent.

It was a simple wood frame, abouty six inches tall, with a cloth sack hanging from a hole in the top. There was room for one cup under the sack. You filled the cloth sack with the right amount of freshly ground coffee, poured hot water through it, and let it steep for a few  minutes.

Voila! A great cup of coffee. No hassle. No electricity (except maybe to heat the water). The only problem was that the cloth wore out after a couple years and I was too lazy to find a replacement and too inept to figure out how to connect it.

But it would make a great cottage industry for someone to make similar handmade coffee makers and sell them at farmers’ markets, craft shows, etc. Maybe I’ll save the idea for retirement income.

We posted new “terms of service” this week for MonroeTalks.com, our social networking Web site.
They aren’t much different from the original terms, which have been used since the site debuted last June. The biggest difference is that they’re shorter and easier to read — more written for regular folks than for lawyers.
Our basic principle remains the same: This is the community’s Web site, and we want the users to moderate themselves.
There are now more than 2,000 people registered to use MonroeTalks.com, and about 500 of them are regular talkers. In addition, thousands more visit the site every day to check out the conversation — totaling more than 1 million page views a month.
We’ve had exceptional good luck for the first nine months of MonroeTalks.com. Use of the site has grown dramatically and continues on a steady upward curve. And while there have been a few incidents, for the most part the users have been responsible in their posts on the site.
Before rewriting the terms of service, we asked users of MonroeTalks.com for their suggestions. There were many good comments and several were used in the final version.
Most of the discussion involved how aggressively we should moderate the forums.
As on all Internet talk forums, it’s easy for discussions to veer off the topic. One person changes the subject, or flirts a little, or gets personal in an attack on another user. Before you know it, there have been pages of comments that don’t resemble the original topic.
The problem is obvious. If you were drawn to a topic such as “Should Michigan have another primary,” or “What can I do to fight the gas prices,” you don’t want to have to dig through Sam and Suzie flirting online or Joe and Pete insulting each other to get to the next serious post.
On the other hand, that’s part of what an open discussion forum is all about. It’s a lot like the talk at dinner during the holidays, when there are lots of cousins and nieces and uncles gathered around the table. Good luck trying to keep the conversation on track.
We did decide to add a rule that says, “Try to keep your posts on topic as much as possible.” But you can’t make a rule against twists and turns in a conversation. Sometimes one thing makes you think of another, and then another, and the new direction may be better than the old one.
Others wanted us to get more specific in defining what is in good taste and what violates community standards of decency.
Sorry, but it’s not possible to provide a distinct definition. The Supreme Court can’t do it; what makes folks think we can. This is how the rule reads, and it’s the best we can do:
“Please be responsible. Self-moderate, remembering that this is a family Web site. Don’t post content you wouldn’t want your 13-year-old child or your mother to view. That includes profanity, nudity and lewdness.”
Some people wanted us to add a chat room, or a separate category for socializing. We considered it. But it seemed obvious that wouldn’t stop people from socializing while commenting on any topic. And that’s part of the value of an open community forum — everyone can join in the fun.
There seemed to be a clear majority who like MonroeTalks.com basically the way it is. We agree. That’s why the changes are more in readability than in substance.
My favorite line on the MonroeTalks.com conversation came from “the nosh.” His suggestion: “Dan, go back to your desk…” In other words, leave us alone to moderate ourselves.
Nosh, that’s my preference, too. I hope the new terms of service will help.

—–

Here are the rules for posting, taken from the terms of service:

• Please be responsible. Self-moderate, remembering that this is a family Web site. Don’t post content you wouldn’t want your 13-year-old child or your mother to view. That includes profanity, nudity and lewdness.
• Any content you post on MonroeTalks.com must be your original work, or you must have authorization from the copyright owner. Do not attempt to impersonate another individual.
• Do not post content that defames or invades the privacy of an individual. Keep your disagreements civil. No harassing or intimidating others. Disagree with another person’s views – don’t attack the person.
• Keep your ranting to a minimum. Take a deep breath, count to 10.
• Try to keep your posts on topic as much as possible.
• Content that promotes racism, bigotry, homophobia, hatred or physical harm to any group or individual will not be tolerated.

It’s amazing how far you can travel in a day.

My wife and I left Monroe County Friday afternoon just as the snow was starting to fall. We arrived in Brooklyn (as in the borough of New York) at about 11:30 p.m., to spend Easter weekend with our son’s family.

It comes as no surprise to anyone that Monroe and  Brooklyn are miles apart - figuratively as well as literally.

Some of the differences we noted this weekend:

- We took our 2-year-old granddaughter to an Easter Egg hunt at a nice little park right under the Brooklyn Bridge with a commanding view of the Wall Street skyline across the East River. Only one problem - several thousands kids stood in line longer than us, so the 50,000 eggs were gone long before we reached the park. With more than 2.5 million people, Brooklyn would be the fourth largest city in America if it wasn’t part of New York City. They needed a lot more than 50,000 eggs Saturday morning. 

- On a walk in Prospect Park, near our son’s home, we noticed a bag with a sign on the outside - free dog toys. Would you see that in Monroe? Here in Michigan, we have garage sales. In Brooklyn, they just put anything they don’t want out on the sidewalk. It’s picked up within hours. That’s how our son furnished his apartment. It’s recycling elevated to an art form.

- We attended Easter services at a Methodist Church just a short walk from our son’s apartment. They started the Lord’s Prayer with, “Our mother and father who art in heaven…” Makes perfect sense to me, but I have a feeling there are some folks in Monroe who would have trouble getting their heads around that.

- On a similar note, there were anti-war or anti-Bush signs in many windows on our son’s street. I don’t know about the rest of Brooklyn, but there’s not much doubt about the politics of that neighborhood.

- On a lighter note: Daffodils, crocuses and hyacinths were blooming in almost every front yard in the neighborhood. As mentioned earlier, we left Monroe County in a snowstorm.  

We’re glad to be home, despite the snow on the ground. There are 35,000 people per square mile in Brooklyn; 2,400 per square mile in the city of Monroe. And we live outside the city because we don’t like crowds.

Whatever you thought of Barack Obama before his Philadelphia speech on race, you’ve probably changed your mind at least somewhat.

I’ve interviewed a lot of politicians, from county commissioners to senators, from township clerks to governors. I’ve heard a lot of speeches.

One of the rarest commodities - even among the very best public servants - is courage.

I don’t mean the courage to sling mud at your opponents, or to lambast the media. There’s lots of that kind of courage in politics.

I mean the courage to really say what you believe, even if it’s not popular. The courage to take a stand on a tough issue that people really don’t want to talk about, even if it means alienating voters on both sides.

Obama’s speech was elegantly written and delivered. That’s what we would expect. That’s what got him this far.

What was unexpected was the candor, the honesty, the willingness to say things that both radical blacks and middle class whites didn’t want to hear. There still is racism in this country. But it’s an amazing country that has made incredible progress in civil rights, and that can make even more progress if we work harder at it. Both points are true.

Obama undoubtedly lost votes at both extremes. But he made me sit up and take notice, and apparently I’m not alone.

Most political candidates, when facing election or re-election, try to figure out what voters want to hear - they go to great lengths and expense to get it right - then feed it back to them.

Telling what they don’t want to hear is very rare.

My wife and I watched the speech together, on YouTube.  As it ended, she said, “What’s the big deal. He just said the truth.”

Sometimes she can be so exasperating. She was right.

But it is a big deal. He said the truth, on an issue where few Americans want to hear the truth.