Unity08. A people's movement to take our country back.

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Please tell us more about the American Agenda initiative.

Craig Simon

Bio:

I earn my living as a freelance database application specialist, and I also have a Ph.D. in International Relations. My current project is ChoiceRanker.com (previously named Indaba.org). It's an experiment in the collaborative expression of converging and diverging opinion. It uses an Instant Runoff Voting styled format to let participants rank not only candidates, but also values and priorities. The technology I've created could be used as a venue through which members of the public could submit questions they want the candidates from ALL PARTIES answer. Participants would then vote to select the top twenty five (or more) from the list of submissions. The candidates would then be able to answer on an equal footing, submitting a text and video response to each of the community's questions. The candidates' responses could then be evaluated individually, ranked within each question/answer category.

Why I joined Unity08:

It seems to me that the American Agenda initiative should be your (our?) first priority, not the third. Develop a better way to have a serious dialogue about issues! Unity08 promoters have been saying that America's current political dilemma stems from a kind of pathological polarization. Their answer is to promote a slate of appealing "non-partisan," "centrist" candidates, while proclaiming disdain for a discussion of difficult "hot-button" values-oriented issues. That's too vague for me. Creating a middle-of-the-road unity party makes no sense if you don't first create a serious mechanism for getting to agreement on our fundamental interests. Frankly, I'm a Democrat who's concerned that Unity08 is more likely to accelerate the fracturing of America than its unification. Any party can aspire to govern from the center. But no one can if we don’t know where the center is. The Unity08 promoters correctly point out how American politicians often play to extremes within their partisan bases by exploiting passions about "wedge" issues. But it seems to me the Unity08 promoters offer the wrong cure. Of course politicians prefer preaching to their loyal choirs. People like singing together. It can be a very healthy thing. But the lyrics are important. The challenge is to write a new hymn book. The bigger problem with politics in the US is this: All too often it devolves to throwing sops to both sides, triangulating, putting off tough questions, and relegating people to a proliferating number of political silos, dividing them so that they are more easily conquered. Can Unity08 offer any leaders who are willing to engage ALL the issues that divide us? Can those leaders address the country in a forthright tone that dares to overturn old thinking and forge a new, enduring consensus? Good government is not just a matter of able, technocratic management, but about articulating the values that can underpin enduring social cohesion. Talk about issues!!

City: Dania

State: FL