Activists find ways to stay involved
"People are getting ready#" to be actively involved in helping to get our nation back on track during these very dark times. Our president-elect has invited this. The official working website of the incoming administration is here: The Obama-Biden Transition Team.
"Grassroots for Obama" was
spawned by his campaign in the blogosphere. Communication on the web is
also done through e-mail. Activists probably receive a lot of e-mails.
I am not even a real "activist," in the classic sense, and still my box
is usually full. These are tough times*
and there are lots of needs. The e-mails, while absolutely legitimate,
are unsolicited. I have no idea how I have gotten on these lists. I
find the range of good causes heartening and interesting, however. A
few examples follow:
- Blago -- Grainger@GraingerTerry.com: Phil Molfese is the contact. The cause is a "citizen group to hold demonstration" outside of Governor Blagojevich's office, 100 W. Randolph St., Friday at noon. They will ask the governor to resign. I will not be attending but you might want to show up.
- Media Bias -- Sarah Coles wanted me to know about "the top 5 trend predictions for political communications and political media under the Obama presidency," via Skewz (www.skewz.com), the first user-driven political media aggregation site for exposing media bias. I joined Skewz, an interesting twist, and intend to post biased pieces as I find them.
If I were a young person I would also find all the the communications perfectly normal, but I am a granny.
Millenials are activists, very involved with each other and with their
communities, their nation and the world. I am by no means a milennial,
but I do get a lot of e-mails from Michelle and Barach, and David
Plouffe at Barack Obama.com, where I have posted just a few times. The Democratic Strategist explains:
. . . there is probably a good reason why Obama has decided to keep his personal organization and its vast electronic relationship with millions of supporters intact instead of disbanding it or folding it into the national or state Democratic parties. This officially nonpartisan network will work overtime to keep the bipartisan grassroots engaged in the struggle in Washington, and deploy pressure accordingly. This formidable organization is a tangible asset that should not be dismissed or minimized.
The range of kinds of potential involvement in Obama's grassroots bipartisanship is wide. The biggest thing right now, of course, is to be one of the ten people selected to attend the Inauguration as the Obamas' guests. The first guest has just been announced. Quoting Michelle's e-mail:
Cynthia Russell from Newberry, Florida, and her guest will attend the welcome ceremony, Barack's swearing-in, the Inaugural Parade, and our Neighborhood Inaugural Ball.Cynthia is a builder and has been feeling the impact of the recent economic crunch. She wrote:
"I'm a single woman who has been building homes for over 18 years. I've supported myself and have been able to help out my mother from time to time. Now I find myself wondering how much longer I can hold on and be able to pay my bills and keep the doors open for business. Barack gives me hope. Hope that 2009 will truly bring change to Americans who find themselves in this mess with me."
Earlier a first set of Obama "house meetings"
focused on getting people to tell President-elect Obama how to fix
health care, is probably the first of many example of many similar
efforts to come in the future. Obama coffee mugs were for sale at Christmas time. Michelle's Christmas card suggested donating to your local food bank or to the USO care package program. Filling out a survey (550,000 participated) prompted this recent interesting information:
. . . your ideas about the future of this organization are taking shape. Here are a few things you shared in the survey:
- House meetings were the primary way supporters got involved in the campaign
- People are excited to volunteer around a number of top issues, including education, the environment, health care, poverty, and the economy
- 86 percent of respondents feel it's important to help Barack's administration pass legislation through grassroots support
- 68 percent feel it's important to help elect state and local candidates who share the same vision for our country
- And a staggering 10 percent of respondents indicated that they would be interested in running for elected office
This feedback is essential to our next steps, because this movement is fueled by your ideas and your passion.
I have registered/joined several activist organizations, though I have not contributed money. They include:
- One.org -- This very active organization looked back at a great 2008. The organization's current effort is a petition drive to ask President-elect Obama to, "In your inaugural address, please make a clear affirmation of your pledge to fight poverty and preventable diseases worldwide, and support that statement with an FY2010 budget request that puts the U.S. on track to meet your historic commitments."
- WEcansolveit.org -- The We Campaign is a project of The Alliance for Climate Protection -- a nonprofit, nonpartisan effort founded by Nobel laureate and former Vice President Al Gore. The goal of the Alliance is to build a movement that creates the political will to solve the climate crisis.
The New Year is a good time get reconnected to your community.
Hat Tip Key: Regular contributors of links to leads are "betmo*" and Jon#.
(Cross-posted at South by Southwest.)
I have always loved your links, Carol. Just signed up at skewz and then had to tell somebody they were wrong. :-)
Took me a few minutes to get back here, but it was worth the trip!
January 8, 2009 9:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
seashell, you are a good soldier for plowing through to any of my links. They are a manifestation of a bit of obsessiveness. Not all the way to OCD, mind you.
I am also grateful for my blog friend, betmo for the links she has sent me for years. And I appreciate the work of my other regular contributor, Jon, who reads but does not blog. As I think about it, we are a community of three producing my little blog posts every day.
Thanks for your kind words.
January 8, 2009 2:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good links. The Community is of such import.
From the bottom up. Collectivism. Joining together.
I get the same emails.
January 8, 2009 10:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
DD -- I have a question for you: Do you seek out writers of a different political stripe, to hear the other side, or do you, like me read mostly the work of like-minded folks? Am I missing something? Could my community have a bit broader base. I sometimes think I am self-limiting in the blogosphere.
Thanks for your comment about e-mails, BTW.
January 8, 2009 3:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
I read the WSJ everyday. Then I have some milk for my heartburn. I attempt to hit ten magazines a week--I skim for good articles and certainly do not consume everything.
I read everybody here. I may not recommend, but I read. I hit the NYT everyday, and I certainly do not agree with everything they say.
I stay away from rightwing blogs, I learn nothing and besides their echoes appear in WSJ and conservative columnists anyway. Oh and it is important to see what National Review is spewing out.
If a group wishes to push some legislation I like, why would I care that they are Roman Catholics? Or Southern Baptists.
We argue here all the time. Mostly left wing here but Jason is not a leftist from my point of view. MCB and others are from the right, so to speak.
And remember, the left argues with itself all the time. Lock step is not in the cards.
Politico goes both ways and pisses a lot of people off here. But that is one reason I read it a lot. You can blog there--double blog--who cares? But you have to develop followings and followers or, like me, nobody will read you.
I am here, as a base, because I get to write everyday and get read. Maybe two comments some days. But I have no power, no money and yet, people will read my stuff. These are my friends. TPM I mean.
I will cross post to Salon but I will only get one or two comments. I am not part of their club and your post only lasts half an hour or less on the front page. They have inside emails like Politics.com and networks must be built and worked on.
I am sorry to ramble but HuffPo is a good place just to hit 5, 10, 15 different blogs. All the bigger sites have so many lists of blogs.
It is just interesting to me that we have hit a strange time. Trillions upon trillions of dollars will be spent in the next four years. It is difficult to see how the lines will be drawn.
George Will cannot just read off Federalist Papers anymore. He can, but I don't care. And most people do not care. Sometimes Mornin Joe, or Jughead as Stewart calls him, will go on and on like he is a liberal. A lot of times he is trying to indicate satire but he is so transparent (in the old sense of the word). Most of the time he will have to get in the fact that he was part of Newt's new wave.
Actually, you really have me thinking here. The times are so exciting and there are so many sources of info and opinion.
Thank you for posting and thank you for getting me to think about this.
January 8, 2009 3:32 PM | Reply | Permalink