An Ordinary Person
So You Want to Change the System? (Part 1)
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For background: read this first [So You Want To Form A New Party? Hmmm, Come With Me]
The blog post above got me thinking about the best way to focus my political energies as someone who is dissatisfied with American politics as it is run by the two major parties. I’ve been a strong critic of the two major parties the past several years in my blogs. The post made me think about what I can do—as in concrete action—about my dissatisfaction with the two major parties.
The Political Outsiders Part II: Progressive Democrats
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I recommend reading a couple of books and a blog post to get a good background on the insurgency within the Democratic Party by Progressive grassroots activists.
Both books make the point that Internet and advances in social media technology have the capacity to empower ordinary people who have felt powerless and shut out of the political process to effective political participation. More than that, they have a potential to and in many cases, have had real impact in challenging and toppling entrenched interests in the Democratic Party and in traditional two-party politics. The blog post provides context on where this Progressive insurgency fits within the various groupings of the Democratic Party.
Analyzing How the Independent Went Left by Going Right
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I just checked out an interesting video at the Independent Voting web site titled “How the Independent Movement Went Left by Going Right.” It is an hour-long documentary of a speech political strategist Jackie Salit gave at the Committee for a Unified Independent Party (CUIP) conference in January 2009.
Tags: Committee for a Unified Independent Party, cuip, Democratic Leadership Council, DLC, Fairvote, Instant Runoff Voting, Jackie Salit, national popular vote, Netroots, Progressive Democrats
Book Review: The Progressive Revolution
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Mike Lux begins his book The Progressive Revolution: How the Best in America Came to Be, with a history lesson of how the struggle between Progressives and Conservatives was evident in the founding of America. Invoking the spirit of Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence through the drafting of the Constitution and defining the Bill of Rights, Lux frames Progressivism as an essentially American idea based on the basic principles in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the revolutionary writings of Paine and other heroes of American history.
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So You Want to Change the System (Part 2)
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This is a list of actions to take and organizations to join if one is interested in transforming American politics from two-party dominance. This list is pretty much one individual’s perspective—mine. I am sure others will have points to disagree with and will have items to add or subtract. I made this list primarily as a mental exercise to help myself think through some of the issues one faces as a citizen interested in participatory democracy and who finds the current political choices in mainstream American politics lacking.
This list is not meant to be exhaustive or comprehensive. It is designed as a starting point for discussion on answering the question “What can an individual DO about it?”
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Tags: cuip, Democrats, Republicans, Democracy for America, Committee for a Unified Independent Party, Working Families Party, Fairvote, MoveOn, Green Party, Libertarian Party, Socialist Party, Democratic Socialists of America, labor unions, AFL-CIO, Change to Win, United Professionals, Working America, Free and Equal Elections, Ballot Access News