Publisher: Challenging Orange County's right-wing noise machine

About Us The Liberal Orange County is maintained by a group of OC liberals. We don’t take bullshit from conservatives, or candy from strangers. The information you will find in this blog is focused on the liberal political world of Orange County, and we will spotlight some of the people that are fighting the good fight. TheLiberalOC is an all volunteer effort on the part of our blog team members. As with most things in life, running this blog isn’t free. While we do have occasional advertisers that only covers part of the costs to operate the blog. You can support our efforts to Challenge the Right-Wing Noise Machine in Orange County with a financial contribution. The Liberal Orange County (TheLiberlOC) is owned and operated by Thinking Liberally Media, Inc. The opinions expressed by individual bloggers on this site are theirs alone and individually. They do not necessarily represent the opinions or positions of Thinking Liberally Media, Inc., other individuals, or organizations they are affiliated with. Michael Lawson (Our Founder) – who hates writing in the third person — has a background in news writing and currently works full-time for a non-profit organization. His previous journalistic conquests have included political news writing, humor columns, and feature stories. Mike left Orange County in December 2007 and currently lives in San Francisco, CA.. ChrisPrevattocersChris Prevatt is the CEO of Thinking Liberally Media and publisher of TheLiberalOC.com. Politically active in Orange County for 33 years, Chris was a Republican in the early 80’s changing his political affiliation to Democrat in 1986. His political activities have included statewide advocacy for HIV/AIDS and Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender issues; service as a delegate to the California Democratic Party and the Democratic Party of Orange County Central Committee; delegate to the 2004 and 2008 Democratic National Committee Conventions; volunteer on more than a dozen political campaigns; and leader in two democratic political clubs. In 2000 and 2002 Chris ran unsuccessfully for City Council in Garden Grove, California. Currently employed as a program supervisor at the County of Orange Health Care Agency since 1997, Chris is a labor leader serving on the Board of Directors of the Orange County Employees Association representing more than 18,000 public employees in the county. In addition, he is a delegate to the Orange County Labor Federation an AFL-CIO labor coalition. Chris assumed founder Mike Lawson’s duties as publisher in December 2007. Dan Chmielewski runs a boutique technology PR practice in Irvine. He’s lived in OC since 1997 by way of Boston and Central New York. He has worked in news, marketing, and public relations his entire career. Admittedly to the left of Ted Kennedy, Dan studies conservative media to note and refute their talking points. He views legitimate criticism of liberals and liberal politicians as fair, as long as the same mirror is held up to conservatives and Republicans as well. He scoffs at the notion that the mainstream media has a liberal bias. Joel Smith is relatively new to the world of politics. He grew up in the city of Irvine and went to a conservative college where he was one of a very few number of Democrats. Since graduating he has interned for a Congresswoman, the Democratic Party of Orange County, and worked as a field organizer in Orange County during the 2012 election. He hopes to touch on the growing youth interest and involvement in politics in Orange County. Mike Pouraryan has over 18 years experience in Operations, Finance and Administration for Small to Medium Size Businesses, start-ups and publicly held companies. He has also had the good fortune to be involved in the community in various capacities. He has served as an intern on the Staff of a LA City Councilman, worked as a poll watcher for a Congressional Candidate and served as Vice Chair for the City of Laguna Niguel Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Committee for 2009. In addition to his on-going business interests, he has also served as an Adjunct Professor for a number of years. Mike moderates the following sites focused on US & World Affairs: 1) http://www.outsiderviews.com; 2) http://www.kittenpolitics.com; 3) http://www.smoothpolitical.com. Lou Delgado (Senior Photographer) is a political and entertainment event photographer in Orange County as well as a Democratic Party political activist. His major clients include the Democratic Foundation of Orange County, the Orange County LULAC Foundation, CleanTech OC, National Women’s Political Caucus, L.A. Fashion Week’s Fashion Minga, Newport Beach Film Festival, and a slew of Democratic Party political candidates and elected officials including Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez and Senator Lou Correa. John Christian Hansen (Photographer/Videographer), working on assignment, covers political and social events, protests and conventions for TheLiberalOC both statewide and nationally. A former LGBT and public health lobbyist, as well as a former grant writer and government contracting administrator, Mr. Hansen often provides his expertise in grant making and contracting as a consultant to the nonprofit sector. Though he rarely every writes blog posts, Mr. Hansen and TheLiberalOC’s publisher and senior editor, Chris Prevatt, are collaborating on documentary film and multimedia project to be released on October 11th, 2012. His interest in politics (and social justice) was fostered by his mother who always took him with her to the polls, where she instilled in him a sense of civic responsibility each and every election day. If you are interested in posting here on a regular basis, email Chris. Disclaimer: The comments made on this blog, by featured contributors and/or individual commenter’s, are the sole responsibility of those individual authors. They do not represent the opinions of any other individual(s), any advertiser, or the publisher Thinking Liberally Media, Inc.