DCDL

I went to the netroots party tonight and had at least four people mistake me for Zack Exley (photos). While I have nothing against mistaken hugs from attractive young women, I’m wondering why this alleged resemblance didn’t surface when Zack spoke at DCDL a year and a half ago. Maybe we’ve somehow grown more similar over the intervening months.

In any case, the party was fun. I got to meet DavidNYC of Swing State Project, Neil the Ethical Werewolf of Ezra Klein’s blog (who came by Drinking Liberally last week), Ezra himself (who’s spoken at DL), Rep. Brad Miller (D-NC), Rep. Tim Walz (D-MN, newly elected), Donna Edwards (who challenged Rep. Al Wynn in the MD-04 primary and may try again), Teacherken of various blogs (who’s written about the party), and many local grassroots folks that I expect to run into at such things (including people from DC for Democracy). I didn’t run into Zack Exley, though.

Thanks to the New Organizing Institute for the champagne.

Update (17:17): Tracy Russo has a set of photos from the party on Flickr, including a shot of some of us DCDLers as we were coming in.

Rep. Virgil Goode (R-VA) went into a xenophobic frenzy over the news that newly elected Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) would use a Koran at a private swearing-in ceremony after the official swearing-in of the new Congress (at which no religious books are used). Goode has refused to back off his warning that Muslims will be taking over the country if we don’t crack down on immigration. How this relates to Ellison, whose family has been in the country for generations, is unclear.

How will Goode react to the news that Ellison has chosen to use a Koran with a special connection to Virginia?

Yet the holy book at tomorrow’s ceremony has an unassailably all-American provenance. We’ve learned that the new congressman — in a savvy bit of political symbolism — will hold the personal copy once owned by Thomas Jefferson.

“He wanted to use a Koran that was special,” said Mark Dimunation, chief of the rare book and special collections division at the Library of Congress, who was contacted by the Minnesota Dem early in December. Dimunation, who grew up in Ellison’s 5th District, was happy to help.