(final podcast link)

Thank you everybody for being such a great audience and an even better source of learning over the years. I fully intend for this to be the final post on the Arizona Growler. Hey, if professional athletes can call a long hiatus “retirement,” so can I. Therefore, I “retire” from politics.

Jeff Rutledge continues to pursue his degree in media arts and general business administration. Trevor Smith is graduating with a B.A. in political science and will be working in Washington (that’s all he let me say). Ratman continues to wreak common-sensical havoc upon liberal public schools in southwestern Arizona.

I was going to announce my specific career plans on this blog, but recent events have led me to handle this a little more securely. If you’d like to know, and if I know you (having only met on the Internet still counts), you can feel free to shoot me an email at gpohara at gmail dot com, and I’ll be more than willing to let you in on the secret.

On a podcast-related note, you might recall some legal research back on the “O’Hara Factor” where I determined that getting the Arizona Board of Regents to turn its current weapons policy around would be sufficient to restore gun rights on Arizona’s university campuses. I hope that helps anybody who decides to make a political push.

The Arizona blogosphere meanwhile looks as healthy and vibrant as ever. I only hope that more people pay attention as blogs become the norm as opposed to a niche. Thank you everybody for the good times. Please know full well that I’m leaving on a better note than what the podcast might imply. It’s a challenge that I hope will be taken up soon.

Best Regards,
G. P. O’Hara

Norm Seeley over at NormRadio has just tagged me. I will therefore continue to pretend to be studying for tomorrow’s sociology test in favor of posting some random facts about my birthday.

When tagged, you have to take your birthday date and find out some things about it. You have to find, events, other people who were born on the same day, deaths and a holiday.

First off, in case you couldn’t tell, my noting of Justice Antonin Scalia’s birthday is my usual method of announcing that it’s my birthday. Other birthdays on March 11 include Rupert Murdoch (1931), Sam Donaldson (1934), Gale Norton (1954), Jesse Jackson Jr. (1965), and Bobby Abreu (1974). Deaths include Johnny Appleseed (1847), Charles Sumner (1874), Oscar Mayer (1955), and Slobodan Milošević (2006). Major events include the election of Pope Leo X (1513), the adoption of the Confederate Constitution (1861), Emperor Meiji’s annexation of Okinawa (1872), and the Madrid Train Bombings (2004). Holidays include Johnny Appleseed day, Lithuania’s reestablishment of independence, Lesotho’s Moshoeshoe Day, and Zambia’s Youth Day.

Sonoran Alliance and Lighthouse Blog, you are tagged.

The UA Society of Professional Journalists will be hosting a panel Monday night at 6pm in the SUMC Kiva Room to talk about the Josh Wolf issue and blog journalism issues in general.

Panelists will include:

• Dr. Kevin Kemper, UA journalism law professor
• Allison Winters, UA student researching journalism and blogging
• Robert Leger, Assistant editorial page editor for the Arizona Republic, Co-vice chair of the national SPJ Freedom of Information committee
• Yours truly.

I suppose the panel may mark an end to the political side of my life, as my choice of career has other things in mind for me. All politics on the Growler (unless something really unusual occurs) will cease April 11th. Either on or after this date, I will be announcing my career plans and transitioning the blog to a close.

(I was going to try to put out a podcast relaying this as a “phased withdrawal from politics,” but I figured that would go too far.)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ANTONIN SCALIA!!

In case you couldn’t tell, I’m taking a break from blogging for a while. This day also officially marks having two months left before I retire from blogging. More on that later.

Front page.

Booyah.

I’ve been named a finalist in the Scholarships Around the US Political Blogging Scholarship. They say that voting will begin shortly, so stand by for a link. I bid good luck to my competition: Democrat Jerid Kurtz and Republican Denis Ambrose. I myself am running “non-affiliated.”

Update: VOTE HERE!

Because of this blog having reached newspaper-mentioned status early in its life, Google had never placed this blog at the top of the search page for “Arizona Growler” until now. That’s good news considering some of the search terms that have been leading here, not the oddest of which has been “sexist jobs“. Moreover, the ASUA elections are just around the corner, and people will undoubtedly be searching just like last year (minus the sex scandal).

Sonoran Alliance wants more bloggers. I, of course, am immediately disqualified by virtue of refusing to register Republican. Nonetheless, I’ve been looking for new bloggers for a while now, so let me know if you’re interested.

1. You must be a pro-life, born-again evangelical Christian. I’m not being judgmental here, but this is the one area where I insist upon a unified voice.
2. Being somewhere around my political point of view (”conservolibertarian“?) is preferred, but not entirely necessary. I even asked a McCain supporter once, so don’t be too paranoid about this one.
3. Unless cleared by me, all posts must be cited with publicly-accessible sources (either for the UA community or the public at large).
4. You must be a current or former student of the University of Arizona. All applicants from that other school will be publicly ridiculed and told to start their own ASU blog to which I can link, as I haven’t found any good ones ever since Eric Spratling left.
5. I have the final call.

This is in no way intended to steal potential bloggers from Sonoran Alliance. Because most of the people reading this on Cactus Alliance aren’t UA-affiliated anyhow, I foresee most of them heading to Sonoran Alliance anyway. If you’re looking to cover UA stuff though, this is the place to be.

As of 8:15 am, I saw no Justice for All exhibit where it was supposed to be, so I don’t think it’s happening it today. I’ll post here if find out about any updates.

Update (5:35 p.m.):It happened, but the display came up later than expected. Expect setup to start at 7 a.m. tomorrow.

No kidding.  Snow in Tucson.  Justice for All asked us this afternoon to pray that it doesn’t rain.  I think He answered the prayer.

Update (22 JAN): Stefan Koski has pictures and video.

I just received an email supposedly from egreetings.com which contains a link to "postcard.exe", which I scanned with AVG.  The file according to AVG is "IRC/Backdoor.flood".  It was sent to my email.arizona.edu account, so I suspect I’m not the only UA student to receive it.

This is the source code for what I received.  Moreover, you can also read the warning from one of the online businesses with which the email claims to be affiliated.

The basic gist is that if you receive an email claiming to be sending you a postcard from "a family member", don’t click it. 

If you see the same thing and you’re UA affiliated, be sure to notify CCIT.

Update: Looks like BYU got it, too.

The announcement on the right concerning the abortion dialogue seminar isn’t an isolated thing, this according to the UA College Republicans’ listserv.  Rather, it’s preparation for the Justice for All exhibit (GRAPHIC IMAGE WARNING) happening this week on the UA campus.

Please pray that hearts and minds may be changed.  Even if only one heart or mind is changed, we will not have wasted our time. 

Taylor House / Arizona Daily Wildcat

The University of Arizona mall now features four-square, played Tuesdays and Thursdays at 1 p.m.  Today’s Wildcat has a good article concerning the growing phenomenon.  Students may find it refreshing that the Alumni Plaza is being used for something other than Brother Jed.

The Growler looks forward to Mr. Rutledge making a post, as he happens to hold author account number three.

The Wildcat has been really boring as of late.  Much petty bickering about nothing.  At least I have something to make fun of when they’re hyper-stupid.  Now I’m bored.

Let’s hope the following events relieve me of said boredom!

• University president Robert Shelton will discuss how minorities apparently can’t make friends if there’s too many white people on campus in Gallagher Theater from noon until 12:50 tomorrow.  This won’t relieve my boredom, as I have a class I can’t skip with those exact times.

• The UA Voter Block Party is on Main Gate Square (University between Park and Euclid) starting at 5:00pm.   This is the event still known to the ASUA Calendar as the Rock the Vote Concert.  Earlier I posted and wrote a letter to the Wildcat concerning this, and ASUA President Erin Hertzog has tried to alleviate my fears both via a response letter to the Wildcat and email.  I appreciate the replies, but only my attendance and observation will be the correct measure of whether they’ve done it right.  Expect a podcast.  At minimum, I intend to grill Gabrielle Giffords on her integrity.
• There will be a gubernatorial debate in the Student Union Ballroom starting at 7:00pm on Tuesday, October 10.  Napolitano was a no show in Show Low, but I suppose college students in Tucson are easier to appease on illegal immigration and disgracing 9/11 victims than rural Arizonans are.

Many of you coming here today probably came as a result of seeing ads placed on Facebook.  So basically, I’m going to give you a quick lowdown on exactly what this blog is and how to get the most out of it.

• I built this with the intent of making it a group blog.  If you’re interested in becoming an author or simply want to know the story a little better, see the about page so you know where I’m coming from.  Note that you don’t have to be political to join up.  Theology, student life, etc., are all welcome topics.  You don’t even have to know HTML; I’ll help you with that.
   
• Not immediately apparent from the home page is that there’s a podcast associated with the blog.  You have the choice of viewing the podcast archives, subscribing using iTunes or another podcatcher, or if you understand how to use RSS best just take the direct podcast-only feed link and go from there.  I’m planning on doing more serious stuff with the podcast in the near future, so again, if you want to join up, hit up the about page.
   
• Comments are open to the public.  Unless you’re spamming or degrading another individual, I welcome all viewpoints in the comments.
   
• Finally, the Arizona Daily Wildcat and ASUA are not "the enemy."  I know I mentioned the whole toilet paper thing in the ad, but we’re here to productively discuss issues and promote positive change in policy and thought.

Thanks for reading the Arizona Growler.  Enjoy yourself.

Best Regards,
Garrett O’Hara