Waiting until 2024 to send Washington a message may be too late. Even waiting until this November is risky.
Every day wasted in the blame-game politics of Congress is another day without good schools, another day without affordable health care, another day without serious progress toward energy independence.
So sign the Unity08 Declaration of Independence today – right now – and then go get your family, neighbors and friends to do the same.
With your own added fireworks this Fourth of July, who knows? Maybe somebody in either party will hear the noise, wake up and start talking sense for a change.
President Bush is the third George to hold the office – and maybe this George III and those in Washington (red coats or blue) won’t listen any more than the other one did. But the stakes seem just as high now as they were then. America is on the line.
You don’t need to leave your party to declare your independence. All you need is to add your signature and, like Paul Revere, spread the word to all your neighbors.
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I posted the image of the Declaration on my blog -- right away a commenter asked why you made it an image so it's impossible to cut and paste the text, or to quote parts of it.
In fact, I was going to do just that when I discovered I had to lift the whole image. So I did.
Please make the plain text of the Declaration available on the website ASAP for bloggers who prefer not to swallow and regurgitate the whole image. That evidently annoys some.
I'm sure my blood pressure rose to a dangerous level when I opened the St. Petersburg Times this morning. The headline: "FLAG AMENDMENT FAILS BY ONE VOTE". We have brave young men and women getting blown up and killed or injured every day in a "pre-emptive" war that should never have been declared or started. We have billions of our tax dollars being spent on repairing and buying new equipment for the Iraq war. This money could have gone to health care, the homeless, the VA, etc. I don't want any party to be wasting time debating non-issues (relatively speaking) when so much is at stake. There's no need to recite the number of real, vital, important issues that affect each of us in some way. NOW is the time for all good people to come to the aid of their country... Our movement to improve the performance of our representatives in the House and Senate should be active and focused right now. Let's get on with it!
Sharon you are right... they should have all just gone ahead and passed the motion 100-0 and then got back to the relatively more important issues!
Thomas Friedman and Scott Ritter are good examples of professional people with a career history in the Middle East. They are the kind of people we need in the next administration to face the challenges of the future.
NO MORE OIL EXECUTIVES IN THE WHITE HOUSE. Also, we need a system that will eliminate cronyism. 1000petals
And of course Valarie Plame for director of the CIA...oh the possibilities are endless
And if Scott doesn't want to work in the Middle East perhaps something helping to manage the internet might be of interest to him.
"Legal problems
In 2024, Ritter was arrested near Albany, NY. News reports say Ritter had brushes with police on two occasions, both involving allegations of intent to meet underage girls after chatting on the Internet.[13]
Prosecutors initially agreed to charge Ritter with a misdemeanor with a view to dropping the charges if no further allegations against him arose in the following six months, and asked for court records to be sealed. Ritter himself says all charges were dismissed. However, it was claimed by WTEN-TV citing unnamed sources, that Ritter underwent court-ordered sex offender counseling from an Albany psychologist.[14]
Following the dismissal of charges in the state jurisdiction, federal law enforcement officials looked into the possibility that Ritter violated federal law, but no charges were filed. [15]
According to a CNN report, the dismissal of the charges was the result of a deal between Ritter and Albany County Assistant District Attorney Cynthia Preiser and without the knowledge of Albany County District Attorney Paul Cline. Cline fired Preiser for failing to "inform him of the existence of a sensitive case," referring to Ritter's case. [16]"
My name is Gin Arnold and I am a 64-year-old Southerner that came to voting age in the turbulent 60’s. My first vote was for Barry Goldwater who was soundly defeated by L.B.J. After I graduated from college I went directly into business and considered myself to be Republican. A small group of us worked hard to replace the old line Dems that had held power for more than a 100 years. Some of these old men could be described as “Senator Poghound”, fat smoking backroom politicians. In those days, a conservative was an older man, wire rim glasses, gray hair and hated wasteful spending, hard on all welfare programs, and would die rather than see a budget out of balance. Many times they made money tight, which in turn was hard on small business and were against many of the federal so called give away programs, such as the FHA 235 low income housing program. There was also a strong feeling of resentment toward the Civil Rights act, as people in the South saw politicians from the North preaching against segregation, when in fact, there was a lot of segregation in the North. I was at the University of Alabama, when Gov. Wallace made his famous stand and many students thought he was right.
Today, as I look around I can still see racial decrimination although it is much more subtle. The big difference is that now, in Alabama as (well as other Southern states) to get elected you better be a Republican and the message may be subtle when referencing “others” but it is still there. It takes the shape in strong talk about crime and punishment and low scores in public schools. There has been an explosion of private and church schools all over the South and whereas in the more wealthy areas they will have a few black or other ethnicities, they are still schools for a privileged class.
The message that seems to resonate with voters today, is a message that includes statements about Christianity, the stone with the 10 commandments is big, illegal aliens, abortion, and the war on terror. If one speaks against the war in Iraq, they are accused of not supporting the troops, are a “cut and run” LIBERAL and no one that John “Duke Wayne” would want to ride with. Unfortunately, there are a lot of these people out there and they have been “Roved” with impunity. If unity 08 is to be successful it must be able to reach out to a lot of these voters-----because they do vote. The words, conservative, and liberal have become such emotion packed phrases that the voter has lost recognition of the true meaning. If the present administration can call itself conservative, then I must be from Pluto. I still believe that most of us live in the middle but each side, Democrat and Republican have learned the “hot button issues” and it may be abortion, religion, illegal’s, defense, but whatever your hot button is, they place you on one side or the other. So, in the end, you must be either liberal or conservative. Who wins in this scenario----they do. That is why I feel so strongly about Unity because it can bring to together people that do not agree on every single issue but people that are tired of being manipulated by both parties. There are members in both parties that I respect but it is difficult to respect their party.
I have also read on Unity some comments made about the young people involved and that they may not be yet old enough to take part in government. I totally reject this idea and would remind us all of where my generation has gotten us. Vietnam, interest rates over 20% ----that was under Carter----corporate abuse beyond the wildest of imagination---a declining environment----troops all over the world, dying daily---millions of Americans with no health care----immoral minimum wage-----people living on the street----and a government that believes it has the right to imprison people with no legal rights at all. No, I do not give my generation high marks. So I say to all young people, get involved and fight back, it will soon be your world and do better than we did.
. Let us all ask our selves “what kind of world to we wish to live in”? One that sees me with all that I need-----which is true and probably so for many that have time and a computer to read this---and 90% of Americans trying to get enough money for the basic needs. Health care is not an issue if you are hungry, or if you are trying to keep from getting evicted, or the heat is being turned off. I cannot accept a world with that kind of shape. I don't believe that most of us acept that kind of world but somehow we have gotten to a place that we feel we simply cannot change anything and some of us have become frustrated and feel like dropping out. If that happens, we lose and it will become a lot worse. Just this week, the Whitehouse has spoken out against the New York Times becasue of an article that may lead to some illegal activity that OUR government is involved in. Both China and the old Soviet Union have taken such stands in the past and we, the good old USA were the first to scream out against it.
A text version of the Declaration is now available at http://unity08.com/declaration/text. Thanks to 'amba' for the suggestion. We encourage all of you to include both the Declaration and a Unity08 button on your website to help us reach our goal!
How many of those signatures are unregistered?
OK, so it's not a legal petition, it's just an internet stunt. But when you have your online convention how do you expect to make sure all those delegates are legally registered voters?
As far as this petition goes, you can't sign unless you enter an email address and zip code. So, in a sense this is a simple validation, it's not quite as wide open like the comment system.
The proposed online delegate selection will not be a simple petition. We're working with leading data collection and internet security experts to develop a secure and reliable system for that purpose.
As always, we welcome all feedback about the site features, keep it coming!
I joined Unity08 after hearing Angus King being interviewed. He turned me on. The site does not. I have not passed it on to others because I don’t think the message is clear for those visiting for the first time. Don’t try to do too much here. It should be inclusive and welcoming. The message should be comprehensible within less than a minutes reading.
The About page is where the best information is for a newbie but even here there is too much information. Following is my suggestion with notes on why
THE INTERNET MAY BE THE BEST HOPE FOR DEMOCRACY. [People coming to the site are internet literate and probably have had some experience with politics on the internet. The first line should be a grabber. It can be linked to an explanation of why we believe the internet is our best hope. I’m sure we can find a better grabber. It would be good if it could contain the word “you” as in “You can nominate the next President of the United States.”]
Through Unity08 you can help elect of a Unity Ticket for President and Vice-President of the United States in 2024 – headed by a woman and/or man from each major party or by an independent who presents a Unity Team from both parties. The ticket will be picked by you and all American voters via a virtual and secure online convention. You will be given an opportunity to nominate candidates and to vote for them from a ticket of those who accept our nomination. [This is taken from Unity08 goals and can be linked to the goals.]
Here are four reasons the Unity08 movement will succeed: [I took “we believe” out. The reasons below are unchanged.]
1. The American people know that the current political system is broken and that the time is short to fix it.
2. A solidly-funded movement of up to 20,000,000 Americans can be built online in order to nominate a Unity Ticket of their choice for 2024.
3. Seeing the numbers, leaders in both parties will see that a Unity Ticket in 2024 represents the jolt the political system needs to get back on track.
4. The tens of millions of Americans who have not been voting out of cynicism toward the current system are likely to rally to new leadership with a new approach.
That’s it. Nothing else on the home page other than links. No information below the screen to scroll down to. No moving stuff to distract. The cleaner it is the better. Think of it as a poster. You want people to get it and say, yes, that’s for me.
.
Mather is cooking with gas.
Why do we love Google? Because it's clean. Because it works.
Let us do on our own sites exactly what Mather says. I have been pushing a site, and so has Jennifer. Our sites are guilty of clutter! They're even worse than U08 -- well Jennifer may not agree.
After we've shown how it should be done, let us tell members where we are. Let us link these new CLEAN and ATRACTIVE sites to each other to form a ring or many rings.
Also, Seneca here and there keeps pushing Theodore Roosevelt (Republican). I keep pushing Franklin Roosevelt too (Democrat). Can the two be combined to give us a name or slogan?
http://unity08ws.wikispaces.com
My feeble attempt to execute clean (no clutter) 'few second read' poster pages is up as a sample for anyone interested: http://unity08ws.wikispaces.com
John Gelles
My URL with reply tags
Human rights and how to pay for them are key to a livable world.
How about the name "the ruseacults"?
Anyway, as to Seneca, does he intend to cut&paste the entire library of congress here? Doesn't he have any original thoughts of his own?
Also, Seneca here and there keeps pushing Theodore Roosevelt (Republican). I keep pushing Franklin Roosevelt too (Democrat). Can the two be combined to give us a name or slogan?