The Rooney Report

Let's Have A Party

Republicans have their Tea Party. What about one for Democrats? 

My name is Paula Rooney and I am a 45-year-old woman, partner, mother and resident of Scituate, Mass. I think it's high time we form a united front against the Republican machine -- a citizens group to counter the Tea Party.

Member count? So far, one -- me. 

That makes it an authentic grassroots movement. 

What does that mean? 

It means I am not quietly funded by a slick, Rove-like Washington-based political consultancy for Democrats -- though at times I do wish one existed. 

A citizens group may be helped by the Democratic Party -- but not run by it.  Our main objective would be to promote our values and the ideals of the Democratic Party --you know -- silly little things like supporting the US Constitution and Bill of Rights. 

Another important objective would be to help and support good Democratic candidates and elected officials facing character assassination by the Republican operatives, and their deep pocketed corporate backers. Let's make them accountable for a change.

Why? There are millions of people like me in Massachusetts and beyond who are frustrated and concerned about the dangers to Democracy posed by the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and their listeners -- many of whom belong to right wing Republican groups like FreedomWorks and the Tea Party. 

I believe that those are fringe groups and that people like us vastly outnumber people like them. Yet we must acknowledge that the Republican party has been far more effective at rallying and unifying those people into a powerful group.  

We have all silently stood by and witnessed the devastation visited on our nation by the Republican agenda.  And this week, we looked upon with horror the victory of the Republican machine -- well oiled with tons of corporate funding -- in our hallowed state. Perhaps Martha Coakley did not campaign enough. But her record is unblemished and accomplishments for the state of Massachusetts are too numerous to name. 

The Republican machine's ability to step in to Massachusetts at the last minute, trash such a worthy public servant, and take a no-name superficial pinup boy from virtual obscurity to stardom overnight makes that clear. Massachusetts is the ground zero of liberty and democracy. If they can do it here, they can do it anywhere. And they plan to -- starting with Indiana. Will we sit idly by again?

I, for one, will not. I have a 2 1/2 year old daughter and I will not stand and watch the Republican machine, its allied corporate cartels and mob mentality stomp on the ideals of democracy and reduce us to a second class nation.  Bush has done enough damage. Let's try to stop what we can from this day forward.

Democrats tend to be sensible, logical and reasonable people. And too nice. It's time to fight fire with fire. 

Forget about reaching across the aisle. Let's get our agenda done. 

How? We need a new umbrella organization that unifies like minded citizens. MoveOn.org is great. But the Democratic Party has not been able to unify its diverse constituency in a  way that translates well for the camera.  

Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann are terrific, but they can't fight this powerful army alone. We are an intelligent, progressive, dynamic, hip and happening force whose collective intelligence can be tapped to expose the hollow positions of the Tea Party and bring the Republican machine to its knees. 

Let's unify and fight. Let's show up for our brothers and sisters in Indiana and elsewhere. 

We have the right to peacefully assemble and we should. Why not protest? Why not hold signs with our messages?  George Bush popularized stupidity. Let's kill it -- with words, with firmness, with conviction, and with class. We need large numbers of people to show up. Large numbers bring cameras. Large numbers change public opinion. 

The Republicans may try to block us, but let's have our lawyers ready to file challenges. Let's get the Student Democratic Society chapters going strong again. Let's do it peacefully. Let's give our children a better world to live in than the one Republicans envision. 

Let's get this party rolling.  On Boston Common?  Where and when? Please let me know what you think!

Microsoft's Investment in Facebook A Good Business Risk

Microsoft and Facebook have expanded their exclusive partnership to grow more online advertising revenue globally and counter the Google-MySpace threat. It’s a good move for both companies.

On Wednesday, the Redmond, Wash. software giant announced a $240 million investment in the social networking site as well as an expansion of the companies’ exclusive online advertising partnership globally, mimicing the same deal signed between the two companies in the US market 14 months ago.

Microsoft’s investment in Facebook’s latest round of funding was more modest than what pundits predicted, and represents only a small fraction of the $15 billion valuation of the social networking site.

Still, it gives Microsoft’s slow growing AdCenter a larger, and necessary, footprint into an online advertising market dominated by Google -- without breaking the bank.

If social networking ends up in the technological heap, Microsoft will have risked little to get a hand in the game. Had the company been more aggressive earlier in the online search front, it would not be so far behind Google today.

And though Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer is said to be disappointed with its Facebook pact in the U.S. to date, it is imperative that the company expand its stake in a hot Web 2.0 property that is gaining 200,000 eyeballs per day and that now employs more than 700 people in Palo Alto, Calif.

Executives from Microsoft and Facebook declined to discuss specifics of the partnership, such as the level of technical collaboration that will occur between the two companies and the extent to which Microsoft will exercise control over what Facebook users see and consume.

No doubt, Microsoft will have access to Facebook’s profile data in order to provide “highly relevant” and context-driven user ads. Why else would Microsoft write a $240 million check? Nothing wrong with that.

This investment, signaling Microsoft's more serious Web 2.0 efforts, helped Facebook make the decision to align globally.

“AdCenter is a big platform with massive scale and they do targeting on many sites across the web and leveraging that scale is core to our strategy," the Facebook exec said during a conference call on the investment on Wednesday.

Microsoft may fall behind on the technology front but don't count the company out when it comes to marketing and advertising, dollars and cents.

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Owen Van Natta, vice president of operations and chief revenue officer at Facebook, said this gives Microsoft‘s exclusive rights to sell ads for the web property but insisted that existing third-party advertisers will be grandfathered into the deal.

Aside from the capital injection, Facebook is getting Microsoft’s large online presence and increasingly sophisticated online advertising platform. In August, for example, the software giant completed its acquisition of aQuantive Inc and its high end advertising platform across devices and media.