With the exception of some goofy poll votes and my usual tactless comments, I have for the most part stayed out of the VP frenzy.

It's not because I didn't have my own theories about who the pick would be or what Obama was up to. I stayed out of it for one simple reason:

It's only the vice presidential pick. It doesn't matter.

Originally I was not going to go.  It is near the end of the school year.  And I looked at the sponsorship and the keynote speaker and thought it really was not worth it.  But then yesterday I got a personal invitation which referred to here, telling me

Your experience mobilizing interest at the grassroots through Daily Kos is an invaluable contribution to this forum.

It is a bloggers' summit on Education, lead by Strong American Schools, which upperates under the banner "ED in '08" (yeah, I know, I see "ED" and I start thinking of ads for male enhancement products).  

So let me explain why at first I was not going to go, and why, under pressure from my wife, I have decided I should.  And remember, because you read what I write on education, I get to thank (or blame) you!

I have been a member of this community for sometime now, and I have watched the discussions on various diaries closely. I have even contributed on a number of ocassions. Like many, what piqued my interest in discussions in here was the marvel of coming in touch with so many people, with so many different talents, and with varying viewpoints, trying to engage in the kind of democratic exchange that is so sorely missing in the mainstream media.

For me, amidst all the suffocating noise that the MSM has become adept at producing, the kind of space that dailykos provides is a dream return to a concept of the public, a post-Habermasian field of possibilties for encouraging real democratic discourse.

But it's not been all fun. There have been those moments that we all could do without; those comments built on the very foundations of insensitivity, outright bigotry, and sheer ignorance. One such example is the current furore over Obama's pastor, and the offshoot diaries it has generated.