I'll be attending the 2nd annual Spanish & Portuguese liberal political blogger conference in Spain

I've been invited to do the keynote speech at the 2nd annual Spanish and Portuguese liberal political blogger conference in Cáceres, Spain in early November. The conference, called efindex07, is basically YearlyKos for Spain and Portugal (though there will also be bloggers from Bolivia, Mexico, Argentina, and the Dominican Republic). Apparently there are going to be lots of reporters and politicians attending, so it really is going to be a YearlyKos-o. The conference planners have asked me to help them promo the conference, so here you go.

Kind of fascinating that the blogging phenomenon is taking place across the globe. France, for example, was really behind in terms of Internet connectivity years ago, and now they're the top country in Europe (arguably) in blogging. They have a number of blog-stars, whom I've met, though their top bloggers do a mix of politics and other things (be it culture, technology, etc.). They're also much more into video blogging than we are - yes, we video blog on YouTube and elsewhere, but the top political bloggers don't really do regular video journals (we tried, and felt it was kind of boring).

My speech, in Spanish no less (or at least that's the plan, we'll see how well that goes - I suspect French and Greek are going to keep popping out, along with an Argentine accent) will be about cyber-activism and how citizens can impact the government. Though considering that Spain has already enacted gay marriage, and we can't even get our majority in Congress to blow its nose without first making sure that President 28% won't be mean to them, I'm not sure I have much to teach them. Seriously, though, it should be fascinating.

I'll be spending the night of November 1 in Madrid, then heading to the conference the next morning. So, if any of you are in Madrid that evening, perhaps we should plan an AMERICAblog dinner (or lunch, since I recall the Spanish eat dinner at like 1am). Email me if you're going to be in Madrid and are interested, and I'll figure something out. (And if any of you are in or near Caceres, we'll be there all weekend.)

A final note to Danny at the National Journal: Yes, the conference is paying for my plane ticket and my hotel (but no honorarium, alas), so it's true, in the future I'll never be able to write objectively about those Spanish/Portugueuse liberal blogger political stories.