Former Congressman Bob Livingston (R-LA) yesterday joined the growing list of Republicans asking the Republican National Committee to free the presidential debates. In a letter to RNC Chairman Mel Martinez, Livingston writes:

The process of selecting our representative government is perhaps the most important function we, as Americans, carry out in our democracy. It is imperative that the process to do so is as public, and as transparent as possible.

Following on the heels of this week’s Republican debate in South Carolina, I am writing to urge you to give new consideration to the bi-partisan request you have received requesting access to the debates. I believe this effort is important to our democracy, and I am reaching across the partisan divide to join Senators Obama and Dodd, and former Senator Edwards in asking the parties to assist in opening the process to the people.

Livingston recently became involved with a project called the Capitol Hill Broadcasting Network – sort of a YouTube specifically for political content. He and his son David, who runs the CHBN, have added their names as signatories to Larry Lessig’s effort to encourage the Republican and Democratic National Committees to ask networks airing Presidential debates to place the footage in the public domain, or at the very least allow anyone to use it with attribution.

I’m pleased to see more Republicans joining the effort. If you are interested in joining the cause, you can reach me using the “contact” option at the top of this page.

Full text of the Livingston letter is available after the jump…

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I’ve been withholding comment on RedState’s crusade against Ken Calvert. I’ve done so not because I disagree with Erick, but primarily because I seem to be constantly bitching about the party. Frankly, it’s gotten kind of old and I really would rather have something positive to say.

However, I’ve argued that the state of the GOP online was going to remain largely stagnant until a) we had a common boogey man to work against, or b) we followed the path of the lefty blogoshpere and focused our attention on problems at home.

The RedState effort indicates to me that the former is starting to happen.

The Democratic Party apparatus didn’t spontaneously embrace bloggers. For those who argue that the left is far ahead, you really need to parse your terms and argue that the online activists on the left are far ahead, while the party machinery is barely ahead of the GOP. The reason is fairly simple, the party activists seized the power. As an activist bloc, the bloggers and their readers began to demand changes in the way the party works, who it supports, and who it cuts loose.

Those changes have been slow to arrive. Pelosi and her crew are still doling out favors to corrupt Democrats and turning a blind eye to the promises of reform they made only a few months ago. Their online base seems to have accepted this hypocrisy as long as they continue the pressure on Bush to exit Iraq. It really is a poor strategy. The Kos/Stoller/Atrios/Armstrong contingent really should have kept the pressure on their leaders to actually enact the ideas on which they campaigned. The fact that the lefty blogosphere has caved threatens to marginalize them.

On the right, however, the blogs appear to be picking up steam. We have the same dynamic at work (the ideologically corrupt rewarding the morally corrupt) and the base has finally had enough. Regardless of leadership claims that they learned the lesson of 2006, it is clear they haven’t. The base must now hold them accountable.

In doing so, I think we are beginning to see the rise of the online community. By keeping the heat on this issue, even if it runs the risk of more bad press for the GOP, the party’s activist wing can stake their claim.

We cannot advance the conservative ideology of smaller, effective, responsible government if we condone the actions of Republicans who grow government at every turn, waste our tax dollars on frivolous projects to reward themselves and their donors, and run roughshod over the laws they enact. It is hypocrisy of the worst form.

There’s been a lot of chatter about Google’s ever expanding array of services. Things like Google Analytics and Google Groups made sense for an Internet operation. More and more often, however, I am seeing Google pop up in places I would never expect them.

A few weeks ago, I attended the National Association of Broadcasters annual show to serve on a panel about Internet politics with Joe Trippi, Jeff Jarvis, Hugh Hewitt, and others. While I was there, I took some time to wander through their exhibit hall.

As I round a corner in the “radio automation” section of the massive exhibit space, I spy a booth with the familiar blue, red, green and yellow logo. I step up, and am immediately rushed. The booth, it appears, is there to push the SS32 radio automation system. What does Google have to do with radio? Got me. Is this all part of their plan for world domination? Possibly, but who knows.

I had a sudden image of the praetorians chasing Sandra Bullock after she discovered the little pi symbol on the otherwise innocuous Mozart’s Ghost. I figured it was best to leave the other questions unasked…

The Cable Show in Vegas last week had some interesting surprises, as these conferences often do. You never know which panel or exhibitor will have a new perspective, new gadget, or new service that gets you thinking. One of the surprises for me this year was an art exhibit. It’s part of an annual competition that comes out of the gaming world. Into the Pixel invites game artists to submit their original concept art for judging.

Some if the winners are truly breathtaking. The fact that most are produced without paints or canvas, but purely through software, is remarkable. The picture to the left, from Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath, was created using Adobe Photoshop. I’ve worked with Photoshop a lot, and consider myself fairly proficient, but would have no idea how to even begin something like this.

If you have some time, and want to be impressed by some electronic art, take a trip through the winners from years past. The 2007 winners be unveiled July 11.

I’m back from the annual Cable Show in Vegas where Comcast CEO Brian Roberts rolled out the next generation of broadband technologies. Demonstrating the new DOCSIS 3.0 standard for broadband over hybrid coax-fiber networks, Roberts moved a 4GB file in just over 3 minutes.

The DOCSIS 3.0 standard gets its juice from “channel bonding” technology. The modem bonds the equivalent of 4 channels of television (which would each be the equivalent of 40mbps), allowing speeds in the range of 160 mbps downstream. The upstream rate would increase as well. While the demo didn’t address upstream speeds, I was able to confirm with DOCSIS modem vendors that the upstream speed would likely increase to the 10-20 mbps range.

That may still seem small compared to the downstream, but is a dramatic increase over the 1mpbs we currently receive.

The vendors also told me that the downstream speed isn’t capped at 160, but actually scales up dramatically. The DOCSIS 3.0 standard allows for up to 32 bound channels – meaning the maximum downstream speed for the standard is 1280 mbps, or just over 1gbps.

At 160 mbps, the new standard puts cable modems far ahead of the current fiber optic offerings (which top out in the 30mbps range). The new standard is expected to reach consumers by this time next year. The interesting effect of all this, I believe, will be the creation of a bandwidth arms race between cable and the telcos. For those who have been concerned with the relative low speeds of US broadband compared to other countries, this should ease that pain.

An arms race between access providers will also limit the possibility of “net neutrality” violations. If customers are continually seeing improvements in throughput and have one significant reason to switch providers, it’s unlikely the ISP would give them another reason by limiting content.