I have two sites, Reclaim Conservatism and The Regiment, that have been around for a while, but pretty much neglected. The ideas for both are similar with just slight differences. The main difference is this, Reclaim Conservatism is meant to be a group blog — several writers contributing on a single blog. The Regiment, instead of being a group blog, is intended to be a group of blogs — each writer on their own with some common connections and functionality.

Both ideas have merit, but which one deserves my primary attention? While you’re thinking about that, let me tell you what I’ve done at Reclaim Conservatism.

I had to blow it up, haul off the ruble, sweep up the dust, and rebuild it from the ground up. A nasty combination of neglect and spammers had trashed things so badly that I had no other choice. I spent several hours over two or three days trying to repair things. I just didn’t work. I’ve spent several more days rebuilding the site. The bad news is that I lost hundreds of posts, and had to dump all the authors. I may be able to recover some, but that’s going to take even more time.

Please note that part of the remodeling involved moving the address. Please update your links to http://reclaimconservatism.com the old site added “/blog” to point to a subdirectory.

All of that being said, I kind of like the way the changes have turned out. And speaking of changes, when I first started writing this post on Tuesday my thoughts were more along the lines of asking which one I should pursue. As I’ve worked on Reclaim Conservatism I’ve decided to place some new effort there. First, I’ll be reaching out to the original contributors — Douglas Ross, Doug Welch, Texas Fred, Dana, GM Roper, as well as those who had signed on to contribute, but never got around to posting anything (Fausta, Obis Sister, Kate, Sam Pierce).

I would also ask other conservative writers to contribute as well. If you would be interested, please let me know. Send an email to lakelandjim at gmail dot com. At least go by and take a look, and send a bit of linky-love our way. Hope to see and hear from you soon.

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Want to follow me on Twitter? There’s more involved than you might think. I have multiple twitter accounts for the various blogs. Here they are:

• bRight & Early — @brightandearly
• Reclaim Conservatism — @ReclaimCons
• Blog News Co-op — @blognewscoop
• FloridImagine — @FloridImagine
• The Regiment — @Marblehead_Reg

While you’re out and about on the inter tubes, please go over and sign up at The Regiment. My goal is to have people from all 50 states actively involved in the first half of 2010. Just 48 to go!

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I’ll be talking about The Regiment on tonight’s episode of bRight@Night. The show starts in less than 15 minutes. You can participate by calling in: (718) 664-9725 or going to the show page and clicking on push to talk. The chat room will be open in just a minute. Join me!

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Back during the 2008 primaries I started a site called The Marblehead Regiment. It was originally intended as a site to support Fred Thompson’s primary run. With the end of that run the site sat dormant for the most part. Well, I’ve decided to revive it. The idea lives on.

Most of us will never be in a position to directly effect public policy, such as being an elected official. We can, and will, be more effective by our ability to “pull the oars.”

Please, go and visit the site. If your interested (or just interested in helping my set things up and test them out) register for an account, join a group, set up a blog. In general give things a work out. We’ll go from there.

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WordPress 2.6.1 was released the other day with some minor fixes from the 2.6 release. When upgrading I realized just how many sites I contribute to or oversee. Here they are:

Blogs.4Bauer.com – We are waiting for the two hour movie that will air in November and the start of season 7 next year.
Reclaim Conservatism – Stix has been doing a great job of keeping things going over there. Check it out, and don’t forget to add us to your blogrolls.
Blog News Co-op – I haven’t promoted this nearly enough. BNC is intended to be a repository for original reporting for bloggers and by bloggers. I would love to hear your thoughts on this idea.
Floridimagine Blog
Marblehead Regiment – This was created when Fred Thompson was still in the race. Any thoughts about what to do with it?
and, of course, here.

I also help Wyatt out at Support Your Local Gunfighter. In fact, I’m supposed to be over there guest posting right now. At least I got his site upgraded.

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Not so much reinventing as refocusing. The Marblehead Regiment was started as a way to support the candidacy of Fred Thompson. Behind that support was the belief that Thompson was committed to true conservative values. Just because Sen. Thompson is out of the race it doesn’t stop the need to work for those values.

It is clear that the president we elect in November will be less conservative than many of us would like – either somewhat or extremely less depending on the eventual winner and issue. At this point that can’t be changed.

Where we can still have an impact is in Congress. All 435 House seats will be decided along with 35 in the Senate. It is my intention to turn The Marblehead Regiment into a resource to help elect the most conservative congress possible.

I’d love to hear from those who were a part of the Marblehead Regiment. Let me know what you think and what ideas you have for accomplishing such a goal.

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You can discuss the SC results as they come in at The Marblehead Regiment Forums.

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You can see what I have to say about sending Fred to the “Next Dance” here.

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But I didn’t. I’ve been busy.

I’ll explain shortly. Right now I’ve got a bunch of catching up to do. Those interested in the Marblehead Regiment and Fred Heads everywhere should just check out the link above.

UPDATE: Ok. I’m back.

Here’s what I’ve been doing for a good part of the past 36 hours, in fact since about the time I finished this post. I would like to build on the positives of the recent blogburst for Fred Thompson, and continue the momentum. As I mentioned in that post, I created the blogroll for The Marblehead Regiment, but that was just the start.

After that I registered and set up MarbleheadRegiment.com Granted, the welcome page isn’t much. I hope to improve that soon. I mostly just threw that together to be an entrance page for the other parts of the site.

The first thing I set up (which took for-ev-er) was WordPress µ a multi-user WordPress blog platform. What that means is anyone who wants to blog about Fred Thompson’s candidacy can start their own blog there. You can check it out here. I am anxious for someone to start their blog and let me know how the process went. There are about 80 templates for users to choose from, by the way. The blog urls will be in the form of marbleheadregiment.com/blogs/the_name_you_create/

Just to make it clear, these will be blogs supporting Fred Thompson. I paid for the site, I set it up, I control it. I’m reasonable, but it’s my rules. Capiche?

After that I added the Marblehead Regiment Forum using bbPress. Even if you don’t want to start your own blog, you can jump on the forum and discuss FDT all you want.

So, while there’s plenty more to do, and I am way behind here, things are ready to go. Take a look and let me know what you think. I am sure that there are still issues. WordPress µ is much more difficult (for the admin) than a regular WordPress blog. I may be asking for some help.

Enjoy.

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The recent success of the Blogburst for Fred Thompson as inspired me to help keep things going. The impetus for the blogburst came from Rick Moran at Right Wing Nut House. He wrote a post titled BLOGBURST FOR FRED: JOIN THE MARBLEHEADERS that included this on the Marblehead Regiment:

Better known to us as “The Marblehead Regiment,” these were the hard cases of the American army – a group of swaggering, swearing, spitting fishermen and common seamen led by a remarkable Brigadier by the name of John Glover. Under the guns of the British on Long Island, they ferried 10,000 men and horses across the East River in one night and part of a morning (aided by a heavy fog that obscured the retreat from prying British eyes).

[...]

But that Christmas night in 1776, they truly earned their spurs as they tirelessly rowed time and again across the river and back again, making their way through the ice choked waters in the worst conditions imaginable. Rain mixed with sleet and ice later turning to snow, the waves on the Delaware crashing over the bow covering the rowers with a sheet of clinging ice, the gunwales sometimes perilously close to tipping into the water and capsizing the boats – a certain death in a matter of minutes given the temperature of the water.

The fate of American independence rested with those 400 hardy souls who manned the oars that blustery night. And herein lies the reason for my little historical digression and an illustration of why, if you support Fred Thompson for President, this is the time to get the hell off the sidelines and start rowing the damn boat.

As I said, the blogburst was a success, but the race is far from over. Money is only a part of the equation. What really counts are people. Voters who are convinced that Fred Thompson is the clear conservative choice. As we discussed on bRight @ Night last night there appears to be a block of voters who are willing to support Fred if they see that enough others are supporting him too. These are the folks you hear saying, “I like Thompson, I just wish he were doing better.”

As a small effort to help in this area, I’ve created a new blogroll for The Marblehead Regiment, bloggers who are willing and excited to promote the Thompson campaign.

If you’d like to be a part of the blogroll, just send an email to lakelandjim {at} gmail {dot} com with the subject “MARBLEHEAD REGIMENT”. Of course include your blog name and URL. If you would like to add the blogroll to your site, the code below is the way to do it.

<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript" src="http://rpc.blogrolling.com/display.php?r=3d8b142838647f45658fa5da21f424b6"></script>

I’ve also created a few images you can use as well. JPG Format:

PNG Format:

Please save them to your server.

OK Marblehead Regiment, “get the hell off the sidelines and start rowing the damn boat.”

JANUARY 9, 2008 UPDATE — Welcome visitors from Fred08.com
Let me encourage you to look around and invite you to visit The Marblehead Regiment.

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