Blog Well. Blog Tidwell.

Voter Fraud- There's an App for That?

2010-04-14T09:50:00.000-07:00

The future of political volunteerism launched on April 3, 2010.

I've held off jumping into the iPad fray for the most part, waiting until I can actually buy the 3G version outright before making my own conclusions. But there was always one thing I knew the iPad could truly revolutionize- and it's already in development.

According to Tech President via TechRepublican-

Project Vote, which describes itself as a nonpartisan organization that promotes higher voter registration rates in low-income and minority communities, announced last week that they are working on a mobile-device-friendly voter registration application, according to a press release, that will work on anything from the BlackBerry to the magical iPad.
But a magic wand it ain't: In the release, Project Vote admits that there are only four states (Arizona, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington) that allow electronic voter registration. …
Using a mobile voter registration application, a volunteer canvassing a neighborhood […] is supposed to be able to collect the information of a prospective voter right there on his iPad, then electronically transmit that information along to that state's board of elections, or secretary of state, or whichever group is responsible for administering elections and voter registration.

Pretty impressive, no? This could truly revolutionize the way we think of political volunteerism. This has already been used in small part in several races recently- from the McDonnell to the Scott Brown race- I even was able to use a blackberry in a local special election.

However, while the Project Vote organization calls itself "a nonpartisan organization", when you do more digging you find this little gem-

Working with our field partner, the community organization ACORN, Project Vote in 2007-2008 conducted the largest and most comprehensive voter registration drive in the history of our two organizations, a 21-state community-based operation that succeeded in collecting over 1.3 million voter registration applications.

That's right- the same Acorn that was recently involved in the prostitution scandals, and more importantly, embroiled in the voter fraud scandals over the last few elections. Project Vote claimed responsibility for the surge in support for Obama campaign in the last election, and was also critical in the 1992 election, bringing in more than 150,000 new African American voters. While Politifact says that Project Vote is was directly an arm of ACORN in 1992, their relationship since then has been rather murky, with Project Vote defending accusations against ACORN as "absolutely false"- even as the FBI launched a probe into the allegations of fraud.

The simple truth is that it's just a matter of time before we have an entirely paperless campaign experience. Volunteers might be able to download an application onto their own devices and head out to targeted areas near them via their GPS-enabled Google Maps service. From there, they can go door-to-door, armed with an entire visual interactive experience for constituents. Or perhaps they'll collect names and signatures for ballot initiatives or primary ballots, showing a compelling video that leads directly into a signup form. All of this will come directly from a single paperless device that broadcasts the signature to the database instantaneously.

But what happens when this tool is first used by the same people who infamously enrolled the Dallas Cowboys to vote in Nevada? The potential for abuse is tremendous. This will be something Republicans need to watch carefully, as oversight on matters like this will be hard to scale. As a developer of iPhone applications, the potential excites me- I would love to have a client that would recognize the potential of such a service, but I am also concerned about the potential impact on elections when people attempt to use this for more nefarious purposes. We need to move political volunteerism into the future, but not at the cost of election fraud and manipulation.

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like 2006

2009-12-24T17:51:00.000-08:00

Perhaps a little late as it's now Christmas eve, but I wrote this little diddy inspired by the season and the times, with a little parody thrown in to boot. Feel free to repost with credit.

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like 2006 (sung to the tune of "Its Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas)

Parody by Brad Tidwell, December 2009

Its beginning to look a lot like 2006
Every day some more,
But this time its the Dems you see worried that they will be
Kicked right out the door.

Its beginning to look a lot like 2006
Everywhere you look,
Take a look at the congressmen, shivering once again,
With retirements and presidents called a crook.

A lot of meritless pork and a knife and a fork
Was the desire of Barney (Frank) and Reid
Money for nuts (ACORN) and political ruts
Haunted Pelosi and Dodd
And all of us can hardly wait for polls to open again

Its beginning to look a lot like 2006
Everywhere you go
There's a tension in the air, politicians should beware
The feeling that the Democrats must go

Its beginning to look a lot like 2006
And these polls make news
And the people will vote cause the bills that they wrote
Were what made them lose.

Merry Christmas all!

Obama and International Perception

2009-10-20T09:33:00.000-07:00

On the heels of my last blog based on a facebook conversation I had with a friend, I received this message from a high-school friend who is now living in Brazil-

Hey brad, I have just seen your protesting Obama pictures. I wanna ask you something... here in Brazil, we get the news that America loves Obama, is there just a small group of people that doesn't like him or its a large thing and we get manipulated information?

As I'm continuing to receive messages like this from interested friends, I may just open this up as a future feature. You can feel free to message me at facebook.com/bradtidwell1 with any political questions you may want to ask. But without further ado, this was my reply-

You pretty much always get manipulated information from news sources- actually, even here in America we often get manipulated information!

You can see from national polls that not everyone thinks Obama is doing the best job ever. In fact, many don't approve of his foreign policy- 53% from Gallup- Obama is now less popular than Hillary Clinton!
Internationally, there's a great map of foreign perception of Obama at Gallup- interestingly, while some areas have a more favorable perception of Obama, when you look at the overall picture, worldwide perception is overall negative (Russia in particular has a 20% favorability rating).

We hear from our own press that everyone loves Obama, and when nationally there are protests against the massive spending going through DC, and thousands of people march on the Hill (you can see a picture of the protesters and a video from the NRCC of the march through DC) there was little to no coverage of all of that.

The biggest thing I can say to you to prove that Obama does not have full public support is to say that the much-ballyhooed Health care reform bill has not passed congress yet. When the Democrats control the House, Senate and Executive branches of government as they do now, there should be nothing stopping them from passing something like that, but because they do not have public support, they are not able to pass it. There's even a nice video of all the people rising up against their elected public officials.

So hopefully that gives you a better understanding of where American sentiment truly lies. What is perception like there for the most part? Or do you also get distorted perceptions about your own country's opinions?

To which she replied:

Here we have the same kind of thing. Our president sucks and what we see on tv is that is god on earth.

So for all my friends all over the country who are dispirited about the way our media seems to focus on Obama and his popularity in things like his dog or his wife's wardrobe or him swatting a fly... All these things may make good press, but they aren't doing much for the one number that really matters- his re-electability poll: 43% w0uld re-elect the president according to one recent poll. And that's the one number that really matters.

The Healthcare Debate, Simplified.

2009-10-02T10:26:00.000-07:00

Recently I received a Facebook message from a friend I hadn’t heard from in a while, which started off with “you have to be the most vocal person on my friend list about all things politics.” Intrigued, I read on.

My friend was concerned about the healthcare crisis, and he had a problem I’ve found all-too familiar with other friends I’ve talked to about the issue. There are so many contrary messages being put out by both sides it can be hard to distinguish between them.

The last part of the message read “I just want your opinion and feedback, I don’t keep up with the news or politics too much so I don’t know what details or lies have been proposed by either side.”

As I’ve spent a good amount of time looking into this, I decided to take the time and answer his question in a straightforward manner, with some level of depth, but without the technical language or assumption of shared knowledge/philosophy. After writing it, I felt I should share it with everyone as more people should be able to understand these issues. While it’s different from many of my other posts and has fewer direct links and less in-depth discussion, I feel it fills a need for straightforward talk about the healthcare situation.

So without further ado, my reply.

You’re right in that there do seem to be these two options, one- the nice sounding option where medicare forces the evil insurance companies to finally get rid of their monopoly and unfair pricing, and the other, where the government locks out all other options except from their own governmental Canada-style monopoly. The truth, as always, is in between the two options.

The truth is that the government is aiming to create something like the first option, where they believe that they will provide a lower level of insurance that works as a bare minimum for coverage. This will be heavily subsidized by taxpayer funds, and that money won’t come cheap. According to the think tank Heritage Foundation:

Over the next decade (2009-2018), President Obama will spend $10.3 trillion on welfare programs. This includes cash, food, housing, medical care and targeted social services. Of this spending $7.5 trillion will be federal spending and $2.8 trillion will be state government matching contributions to federal welfare programs.
President Obama will spend more on welfare in a single year (FY2010) than Bush spent on the Iraq war during his entire presidency.
If total welfare spending were divided equally among all poor persons, each would get, on average, $16,800 in welfare benefits.

And that’s not the start of it. The problem is, with spending like this, it comes from somewhere, IE taxes.

Here I articulate the general conservative song and dance, which goes a little something like this…

When government taxes companies, they pass that cost to the customer.
They also might lower the quality of their products, cut more corners, fire more employees, pay existing employees less, cut their benefits…
Thus, the need for government grows on itself because:
the more the government takes from the businesses,
the less the businesses can give their employees,
the more the employees need,
the more the government can says it needs to help the employees,
the more the government needs to tax businesses to pay for the benefits.

So the government grows larger and larger, replacing business benefits with government benefits. What’s the problem with that?

THE PROBLEM:

The government is inefficient. It has no need to watch itself, it has no corners to cut, it has no other burden on it other than to justify its own existence. And it does a great job of that.

Businesses are very efficient. They have a constant need to justify themselves to their customers, to their stockholders, to their own bottom line. Many accuse them of having no long-term vision, but having a long-term vision is in their own interest so they survive for longer. If they don’t have a long-term vision, they don’t survive, and another competitor will step up and take it’s place.

So businesses are always going to do a better job of providing their employees benefits than the government will, because they will be more efficient.

Freddy, Fanny and Healthcare-

Now that’s all fine and good, but what about healthcare? How will the government turn such a well-intentioned idea into a problem?

Here it get’s a little more tricky. We have to think back to what was called one of the biggest failures of the free market in recent history- the housing loan market failure.

People said it was because of government deregulation (which happened under Carter) that so many risky loans were made and justified. Therefore government involvement is good because it might have prevented all these risky loans.

However, what really happened was that the government mandated that there be a secondary system set up, called Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac, which would provide loans for those who would otherwise be ineligible or unable to pay for loans. This was supposed help everybody because these subsidized loans were supposed to encourage the private companies to reduce prices to maintain and gain customers.

Sound familiar?

If you think it sounds like what the government is supposed to be doing with healthcare, you’re completely correct. And of course, if you were following the news in late 2008, you know what happened.

There may have been a margin the private loan companies could have reduced their loans by, but that wasn’t enough for them to survive, thrive and make new customers. Instead, they had to make the risky loans themselves and justify them financially to survive.

This was deregulation- it was how the private companies were able to still compete with the government subsidized loans. They also gave out similarly risky loans to those who couldn’t afford them, but without the government’s seemingly-infinite tax dollars to help them keep paying the loans out, they had to find another way to find the cash, so they made them into increasingly risky toxic assets that were doomed to fail, but in a long time. Normally businesses wouldn’t make such foolish mistakes, but this was a matter of survival or failure.

How does this relate to healthcare? Isn’t it a different kind of system entirely?

Insurance vs. Healthcare

Well, yes and no. With the insurance and loan markets, you have the same kinds of regular payments, same kinds of rotating financial transactions, and the same incentives to stay in the black at the end of the day.

It’s in the differences that we start seeing the real threat in Obama’s public option.

With the loan market, either you keep your house or the bank forecloses. There’s not much of a middle ground with that. With medical coverage, there are a lot more corners to cut. You might pay a doctor less, use less medicine, charge more here, pay less there… ultimately decreasing the quality of healthcare coverage for everyone.

In fact, this already happens with Obama’s “gold standard”- Medicare. When you look at the doctors who cover medicare patients, they are paid much less by the government, and they have to make do. Many times, the waiting lists for surgery are much longer, the treatment is much lower quality, and the doctors covering them are few and far between.

Moreover, as people who could afford regular healthcare migrate to Obama’s plan, as is definitely certain, the existing insurance companies will run shorter and shorter on people to pay into their policies. They’re going to have to cut corners as well, and ultimately, the quality of coverage will drop for everyone. There may be a margin that can be cut, but as the biggest incentive of a private company is for them to survive and hopefully turn a profit to reinvest into their company, that margin will be small.

Again, the government has no such incentive. So their coverage will end up costing everyone more for the same treatment as it has to support the weight of a giant growing bureaucracy.

Ultimately, we may see either another form of “deregulation” which will result in a later crash, or worse, we may see private companies die off one by one and the government rise to take their place. As I said before, the one role of the government is to justify itself- we may not start off with a public option paying out tons of benefits, but when every other company starts dying off and there’s a demand, the government will rise to the occasion and start replacing those benefits.

Don’t believe me? Tom Price M.D., a former physician and US Representative from GA stated:

“When he was pressed on this notion that he says if you like your plan, you can keep it,” said Price. “Well, in fact, that’s not what the bill says that was introduced in the House and that’s not what the president has supported. What he clarified yesterday before the press was that if you like what you have, the government will not move you out, will not force you into another plan.”
“What he didn’t complete that sentence with,” said Price, “was the next clause, which is that the government may institute rules, will institute new rules that will force you out of your plan.”
“The public option in other things, for example, the housing market, the secondary mortgage market looks like Fanny and Freddie,” he said. “That’s a public option. It’s a disaster. That’s what happens when the government gets involved in these kinds of things that the private market can run so much better.”

Hopefully that clarifies a lot of the ongoing debate, and helps people understand the conservative position on healthcare. Feel free to share this with any friends asking the same questions!

Win $100 for Reporting Campus Leftist Abuse!

2009-09-30T14:28:00.000-07:00

As you may know, I’ve been working with CampusReform.org through my job at the Leadership Institute. Since our official launch, we’ve been hard at work, helping conservative organizations across the country network and stay active on their campuses.

Now, we’ve given college students the chance to do something really powerful with the website- report leftist abuses. These can range from radical professors enforcing their views on students to largely leftist speaker programs to categorical denial of equal treatment of conservative organizations. You can find more examples here.

To help promote our new initiative, we’re launching a daily contest for college students exposing these leftist abuses. College students exposing stories of leftist abuse or bias are entered to win a $100 prize which will be given out every day between Tuesday, Sept. 29 and Saturday, Oct. 31, 2009. So now is the time to enter! You can submit your story here.

Make sure you check out the rest of the site as well- we have a number of different activism resources for all students, as well as a site for tracking leftist faculty and even reviewing biased textbooks. You can even start a new conservative group on your campus, by contacting a staff member in your area, and he or she will be glad to help you start a group on your campus. (I’m the DC, Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia area coordinator, so you can contact me here!)

So get to reporting, and remember, as is usually attributed in some form to Edmund Burke, all that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.

Top Tips from the UMD Obama Protest

2009-09-28T08:51:00.000-07:00

In the aftermath of the UMD Conservative Action Coalition's protest against Obama's speech at UMD, there are a few lessons we can all learn from their organization and management. So for future protest organizers, here are a few tips I picked up:

Make sure there are plenty of supplies to go around. This means bringing water, sports drinks, snacks and whatever else may be necessary (it was overcast so we didn't need sunscreen, but it may be helpful elsewhere).
Look for the media angle. Find some major story in the news, and set up talking points and one-liners about that news story to use in discussion with media and sign slogans. Find whatever hot button issues there are, controversial quotes or figures, and find an angle you can use for your group. For our protest, we had signs saying "Joe Wilson was Right", and that immediately attracted the attention of the media.
Bring lots of large, easy to read signs. This is important to set up beforehand, as if additional people come, they can also use the signs. Use the prepared short one-liners, and make sure the words are written in thick lettering so they can be seen from far away. Read more suggestions for signs here.
Be clearly identifiable as a student group. The UMD students all wore red, the college team color, and were easily distinguishable from the other protesters. There were some other individuals present who were intent on making a scene- as we were all wearing red, we were very clearly our own group.
Invite everyone. In almost every event, you'll have less people present than promised to be there. So just invite everyone you possibly can to come, and work with whoever shows up. It takes a lot of guts to stand up and protest, so have your core group of people by you, but definitely invite as many as you can in advance.
Stay in an easily accessible, publicly visible area. We were fortunate enough to have a protest area where we had media access and were close to the line of people waiting to enter the building. If you can, check up with the event organizers and see where the planned protest area will be, and if they have you unreasonably isolated, it may be a good idea to try and negotiate or put out a press release protesting your location.
Prepare some basic talking points for all your members. Make sure all your members are prepared with statements for the media, and ensure they stay on point. Many times, media will only report the most negative or offhand comments, so make sure your members avoid being sidetracked at all costs.
Have promotional material ready. If you have any group information, sign-up lists for potential members, handouts about the club, press releases or other such material, have it ready. As our group was recently started and there was less time to make all of these arrangements, this was an area we could have improved on with more time.
Stay excited! This probably one of the most important, if not the most important things to keep in mind. At the UMD protest, we stayed excited and active throughout the entire protest, despite having all gotten up early in the morning. Keep the mood up, focus on your goals, and stay positive! Just because you're there protesting against something doesn't mean you can't say it with a smile on your face.

As you can see from Mike Ross' post, we got a lot of media attention and great coverage for the group at the event. With proper application, planning and preparation, future protests can use these lessons to great advantage.

Serena, Kanye, Wilson and the GOP's Crisis of Coverage

2009-09-22T09:09:00.000-07:00

Serena Williams lost the tennis match.

But for the most part, unless we had been watching the game, we wouldn’t all know that.

It’s because of the video of her actions afterwards that literally everyone knows about it.

Beyonce did not win the VMA music award for her music video.

But, again, most people not watching wouldn’t have focused on that aspect, or realized the significance.

It’s because of the video of Kanye West’s actions that literally everyone sees that.

Obama lied about the coverage of illegal immigrants in the new healthcare bill.

But if nothing had happened when he said that, few if any major media would have attached any significance to that statement.

It’s because Joe Wilson was on video yelling out “You lie!” from the middle of Congress that any news coverage went to Obama’s false claim.

While generally I won’t post something contrary to another conservative associate, I feel here it’s necessary to give a counterpoint to James Kane’s article over at NextGenGOP about Joe Wilson and the GOP image problem.

I’m not going to suggest that civility is a bad idea, or that we need to all rise up and behave like Code Pink, SEIU, PETA, Acorn, or any of the other countless liberal organizations who consistently drag politics into the sewer.

What I will say is that our biggest problem in the GOP is not that we have some people who make false representations or act uncivilly at speeches. It’s not that we have a bad image, that our numbers are wrong, that we have bad ideas, or that we are somehow wrong for being conservatives. It’s that we have a media problem.

Case in point, the 9-12 march. James has it close, but the biggest error was when pinkelephantpun on twitter relayed something she heard from a FreedomWorks staffer- that ABC News was reporting 2 million people at the march. That immediately caused backlash all over the internet- media outlets from all over were going crazy about the inaccuracy.

As a work associate of Tabitha Hale, I know firsthand of the frustration she went through at being in the center of a firestorm caused from a simple misunderstanding and bad information. She later apologized for her error, but in the minds of countless liberals, she will remain the girl who cried 2 million.

But when you read in between the lines here, you see a bigger story. Nobody knew how many people were actually at the rally! That’s because few if any major news stations actually covered the event! THAT is our problem. That we can have tens if not hundreds of thousands of people arrive for an event in DC and have almost nobody notice. Many of my friends here in DC didn’t even know there was such an event until they saw the news about the false reports of numbers!

If Tabitha hadn’t reported the wrong number, there would have been considerably less splash about this event. It’s like they say, if a tree falls in the forest, and nobody hears it, who cares? Few beyond the thousands who arrived, their immediate friends and those who wanted to come would have actually known about the event.

The same is true for the Joe Wilson story. Where, if anywhere, would the New York Times have put a counterpoint to the speech? What would have the story been- that the President made a great speech, that everyone loved it, and that he said that there would have been no coverage for abortions or illegal immigrants, and that it was an awesome plan?

Instead, they have to run a story ON the counterpoint- that the President’s remarks were so offensive that someone stood up and contradicted him for his bald faced lie. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again- you can take or leave the question of civility, but Joe Wilson was completely correct. We only see this clearly now because someone stood up and said something about it.

My point- we shouldn’t be having a crisis of conscience when we’re having a crisis of coverage.

To those who say the problems in our party come from the people who actually stand for their beliefs, I have just one question- where would the coverage for any of the GOP be if nobody lied, yelled or acted up? Would there even be an image for us to worry about?

The Next Generation of Conservatism is Here- CampusReform.org

2009-09-16T08:37:00.000-07:00

Hey guys,

You may have noticed I’ve been a little absent lately, but rest assured- I’ve been hard at work, helping put together a fantastic resource which could very well revolutionize how conservative college students interact and organize online. CampusReform.org is a comprehensive social networking site for conservative students, with elaborate subsites for every 4-year college in America.

Full disclosure- I work in the Leadership Institute’s Campus Leadership Program, which runs CampusReform.org. We have been operating in beta form for the last 2 weeks, and finally have the official launched and ready for anyone to join. We are looking for college students actively involved in conservative groups on their campuses, connecting them with resources and professional associations advocating for a variety of issues ranging from abortion to gun rights.

We also provide a number of different activism resources for all students, as well as a site for tracking leftist faculty or even reviewing biased textbooks. If you are on a college campus and want to start a new conservative group on your campus, simply head to the Staff page and contact the Campus Services Coordinator in your area, and he or she will be glad to help you start a group on your campus.

In short, we connect active students on college campuses to resources for activism to promote conservative ideals. This is where the future of online organizing is, and we’re finally here. For more information, check out the Campus Reform FAQ-

Q. What is CampusReform.org?
A. CampusReform.org is a one-stop resource, networking, and instruction center for conservative activists to take back their campuses from leftist domination.
Created to give conservatives a powerful new weapon in their fight for the hearts and minds of the next generation of citizens, politicians, and members of government and media, CampusReform.org facilitates the establishment of conservative student groups and supports their development as a powerful voice to fight against leftist abuse and bias on their campuses.
It makes available new opportunities for student groups to interact with alumni, parents, faculty, and other members of the broader community interested in taking a stand for conservatism.
Q. How is CampusReform.org organized?
A. From the main page of our site, visitors can search and find a subsite dedicated to each of the 2,376 four-year colleges in America. There, you can check out conservative groups on campus, or form your own!
Each campus group has its own page, blog, event listing, membership roster of site users, and access to a variety of powerful weapons to identify, expose, and combat leftist abuses on campus. The main page also features a number of tools for effective conservative activism and a national blog and articles to keep you updated on the activities at the front line of the conservative movement.
…
Q. How can CampusReform.org help me?
A. CampusReform.org is the best resource for you if you are interested in founding, maintaining, or assisting a conservative student group on your campus.
Your independent group will receive its own page within your college or university’s subsite on CampusReform.org. There, student group members will be able to post event listings, blog about matters of interest to you, request assistance from the CampusReform community, and network with other groups and members of the conservative community on your campus and around the country.
CampusReform.org also makes it easy for your group to borrow and share activism and fundraising ideas, report leftist abuses on your campus, or rate professors and textbooks for left-wing bias.
Our cutting edge social networking capabilities connect student groups directly to donors and other conservative members of their communities who want to help students take back their campuses.

So that’s it! Meghann Parlett over at TechRepublican has a new post interviewing Adrienne Royer who works directly with the website, and she discusses many of the different features there if you have more questions.

Campus Activism Opportunity- Constitution Day!

2009-09-08T06:27:00.000-07:00

Hey everybody-

Check this out- Adam Kissel from the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education has released this handy guide for people interested in hosting a Constitution Day (Facebook event link) on their campuses! This is a great opportunity for interested students to work with organizations on their campuses, get administration support, and defend one of the great historical traditions and foundations for our nation. Please feel free to pass this along to your friends and other interested college students- get out there and show your support!

Constitution Day on College and University Campuses

Adam Kissel
Director, Individual Rights Defense Program
Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE)

U.S.C. 36, § 106, designates September 17 of each year as “Constitution Day and Citizenship Day,” as follows:

(a) Designation.— September 17 is designated as Constitution Day and Citizenship Day.

(b) Purpose.— Constitution Day and Citizenship Day commemorate the formation and signing on September 17, 1787, of the Constitution and recognize all who, by coming of age or by naturalization, have become citizens.

(c) Proclamation.— The President may issue each year a proclamation calling on United States Government officials to display the flag of the

United States

on all Government buildings on Constitution Day and Citizenship Day and inviting the people of the

United States

to observe Constitution Day and Citizenship Day, in schools and churches, or other suitable places, with appropriate ceremonies.

(d) State and Local Observances.— The civil and educational authorities of States, counties, cities, and towns are urged to make plans for the proper observance of Constitution Day and Citizenship Day and for the complete instruction of citizens in their responsibilities and opportunities as citizens of the United States and of the State and locality in which they reside.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/usc_sec_36_00000106----000-.html

As of Dec. 8, 2004, Public Law 108-447 requires that “Each educational institution that receives Federal funds for a fiscal year shall hold an educational program on the United States Constitution on September 17 of such year for the students served by the educational institution.” http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=108_cong_public_laws&docid=f:publ447.108.

The Department of Education has added that “when September 17 falls on a Saturday, Sunday, or holiday, Constitution Day shall be held during the preceding or following week.” http://www.ed.gov/legislation/FedRegister/other/2005-2/052405b.html.

The Department of Education also notes that the law “does not authorize funds to carry out this requirement” (id.). Any “educational program on the United States Constitution ... for the students” will do.

Student-Led Events on Constitution Day and Citizenship Day

Although the law requires educational institutions to hold these educational programs for their students, the law does not require students to attend. Any institution might, however, choose to make attendance mandatory.

Students remain free, on Constitution Day and Citizenship Day just as on any day, to hold their own events, even at the same time as the official event held by their institution. Student events may be pro-Constitution or anti-Constitution, and they may explicitly dissent from the teachings of the official institutional event.

At all public institutions, and the vast majority of private ones, students should expect full rights of freedom of expression and assembly. Even so, students who organize events must follow the institution’s published rules, normally in a Code of Student Conduct or Student Handbook, regarding the kinds of events they choose to hold. For example, handing out flyers, hosting speakers, and holding rallies involve different exercises of freedom of speech and are regulated differently. Please consult FIRE’s Guide to Free Speech on Campus at http://thefire.org/article/5063.html to help you understand your rights.

A school’s regulations are sometimes unconstitutional, in the case of public colleges and universities, or are violations of schools’ moral and contractual obligations of freedom of speech and assembly, in the case of private colleges and universities. (A very small number of private institutions do not offer freedom of speech and assembly, however, as is their right.) Please consult FIRE’s speech code database at http://thefire.org/spotlight to help determine whether your school is bound to respect freedom of speech and assembly by either the Constitution or its own promises.

One commonly unconstitutional policy is a restriction of certain expressive activity (including protests and rallies) to only one or two specific areas of campus. Such “free speech zone” policies make the rest of campus a “censorship zone.”

If you believe that your event will constitute protected expression, but are concerned that your school’s policies prohibit it, please contact FIRE immediately at fire@thefire.org or 215-717-3473.

On the Day of Your Event: Constitution Day and Citizenship Day

If you are concerned that your institution might try to interfere with your event or force you to move it to a different location, consider following these steps:

(1) Consult your Code of Student Conduct and/or Student Handbook to make sure you know the applicable regulations. Take a copy with you to the event.

(2) Bring a recording device (preferably with video) and be ready to record as soon as you see an administrator or police officer approaching.

(3) The day of an event is usually not the best time to challenge a policy that is unconstitutional or that unduly restricts the expression in which you wish to engage. If it seems to you that your expression is being unduly restricted, try to explain your position to the person who is restricting you, and ask for a few minutes to contact FIRE (215-717-3473). Even if you think you are right, normally you should follow the orders of administrators and police now, then file complaints later. As soon as possible afterward, record in writing the details of exactly what happened and what was said.

(4) Have the numbers of the Dean of Students and the Office of Legal Counsel handy. Sometimes lower-level administrators misinterpret regulations but can be quickly overruled with one phone call.

(5) FIRE cannot provide legal advice, so if you believe you might need the advice of a lawyer, have your lawyer’s phone number handy, and make sure your lawyer will be available to receive your call.

Mention on PoliticsDaily!

2009-08-26T11:49:00.000-07:00

I was mentioned on PoliticsDaily blog- http://bit.ly/AXT9W -
Howard Dean's Town Hall: 'Better Than Jerry Springer'

Annie Lee Moss- Victimization, Bullying and the Press’ Role in the McCarthy Hearings

2009-08-14T13:52:00.000-07:00

And now, my final paper as an undergraduate student (hopefully). The press' coverage of the McCarthy hearings has left an indelible mark on history, forever painting Senator McCarthy as an evil example of fear and anger combined with a government position turned awry. While using the government as a bully pulpit for fear mongering and control is an evil I will decry my entire life, the fact of the matter is that in the case of Joseph McCarthy, the press misused their power and maligned an individual in a most insidious manner which ignored the facts and instead focused on making its own case to its own gain. This is the story of one case in the hearings where the media clearly took sides and ignored facts- for their own advantage, and to the detriment of history and the integrity of our news media.

Annie Lee Moss sits at the bench, being cross examined by Chief Council Roy Cohn as the camera focuses on the spot where Joe McCarthy has just left. Sitting there in a black coat and frayed white gloves, she is a stark contrast to many of the previous defendants who sat in the chair being questioned at McCarthy’s House Un-American Activities Committee.[1] As a small, timid-looking and soft-spoken woman, only recently promoted from working in a cafeteria, Ms. Moss was a far cry from the regular crowd of intellectuals and policy analysts that had been brought in and investigated. When questioned about Karl Marx, she asked “Who’s that?”- provoking laughter in the audience. She claimed that "Never at any time have I been a member of the Communist Party and I have never seen a Communist Party card," and "I didn't subscribe to the Daily Worker and I wouldn't pay for it."[2]

This powerful moment crystallizes much of the media coverage of the Joseph McCarthy hearings, leaving the crucial question- how did the media cover Annie Lee Moss’ testimony, what effect did that coverage have on the public, and where did the media go wrong in their coverage of this event? To answer this, it will be important to look at who Annie Lee Moss was, how the media covered her and the hearing, the effect of the media coverage on the public, and why and how the coverage went wrong.

Annie Lee Moss was a 49 year-old African-American widow at the time of her arrangement, but her story goes beyond her time in front of the committee.[3] She was born in South Carolina in 1905 with a given name of Annie Lee Crawford. She had six siblings, and her father was a tenant farmer. They would later move to North Carolina, where Annie left high school to work as a domestic servant. She would marry Ernest Moss in 1926, and they moved to Durham, North Carolina, where she worked in the tobacco industry.[4] She would later work in the General Accounting Office as a clerk, eventually attaining an Army Signal Corps communications clerk civil service position at the Pentagon. It was the sworn testimony of a female FBI agent that brought her to the committee to testify after she had lost her Army Signal Corps job.[5]

In defense of the media, the hearings themselves did not appear to be going well for McCarthy. Ms. Moss had already testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee in closed session, and had denied that she had ever engaged in espionage or been a member of the Communist party. She also did not code or decode anything, nor did she have access to anything in the code room beyond top-secret scrambled messages. The FBI agent identifying her admitted to never seeing her at any meeting. When Ms. Moss appeared to the committee, McCarthy said "We do have . . . two witnesses who know that she had been . . . a Communist . . . a long time," he said. "[This] witness is of no importance."[6]

The reaction of the court itself gave many cues to informing the coverage by the media as well. After McCarthy left the hearing, leaving Chief Council Cohn in charge, the case against Ms. Moss rapidly degenerated. As Cohn adamantly insisted that there was secret evidence which convicted Ms. Moss that he could not bring forward, Democratic Senator John L. McClellan from Arkansas denounced the proceedings as “convicting people by rumor and hearsay and innuendo.”[7] Other Democratic senators would ask Ms. Moss whether there could be some kind of mix-up whereby she had been implicated, to which she replied that there were three other women with the name Annie Lee Moss living in Washington DC at the time. After her testimony, Democratic Senator Stuart Symington of Missouri cried out “I may be sticking my neck out . . . I think you're telling the truth. If you're not taken back into the Army [job] . . . I am going to see that you get a job.”[8] At this point, the room erupted in spontaneous and prolonged applause.[9]

The media coverage of the event would reflect the attitude of the room, aiming to discredit McCarthy’s hearings as brutal and lacking in credibility. A cameraman from the Edward R Murrow TV show “See It Now” had filmed the proceedings, and his footage would show in the next episode. Murrow had already broadcast the episode “A Report on Senator Joseph R. McCarthy”, and determined that Annie Lee Moss would be the subject of the next episode. He began his show stating that this would be a “little picture about a little woman”, and end it with a speech by former president Dwight Eisenhower where Eisenhower praised the importance of being able to “meet your accuser face to face”.[10]

Prominent newspapers also played a major role in using this hearing to discredit McCarthy. In one of the more famous newspaper quotes regarding the hearings, John Crosby would write in the New York Herald Tribune that “The American People fought a revolution to defend, among other things, the right of Annie Lee Moss to earn a living, and Senator McCarthy now decided she has no such right.”[11] Newspapers far and wide would cover the event with nearly the same vehemence, even newspapers in McCarthy’s home state of Wisconsin. Drew Pearson wrote in his syndicated column that “Wisconsin folks saw her as a nice old colored lady who wasn't harming anyone and they didn't like their senator picking on her.”[12] The key take-away from the news media’s coverage of the event was that it was a general disgrace and that it was McCarthy, and not Annie Lee Moss, who was in the wrong.

This unflattering coverage resulted in a significant shift in perception about Senator McCarthy and the proceedings of the House Un-American Activities Committee. The hearings began in January 1954, when McCarthy had a 50% approval rating. When the hearings concluded in June of that year, those numbers would drop to 34%.[13] This was attributed in large part to Murrow’s coverage of the Annie Lee Moss hearing in his TV show, and the highly favorable responses the show received after the episode was aired.[14] Specifically, from March (the month the hearings were held in) to April 1954, the Gallup poll shows McCarthy’s unfavorable ratings jumping up 10% from 36% to 46%- the largest increase of the year.[15] While it is clear that this was only a single event in a series of events where the media would portray McCarthy as a dangerous bully, it is apparent that this was a key point where the media was able to point out Moss as a vulnerable “victim” suffering under what had been termed McCarthy’s “reign of terror”. [16]

Ultimately, the immediate aftermath of the coverage showed that the news coverage had an impact. After her suspension during the hearing, she was rehired in January 1955 to a non-sensitive position in the Army's Finance and Accounts office. In 1975, at age sixty-nine, she finally retired from her position as Army clerk.[17] Meanwhile, it would not take long before the impact of the media’s coverage of the hearings took its toll on McCarthy. In the immediate aftermath of the hearings, McCarthy was censured by a vote of 67-22, stripped of his power and made into a public disgrace. Three years later, McCarthy would die of liver disease associated with alcoholism- he had not yet reached the age of fifty.[18]

The media failed to pay attention to details which could undermine the political statement it was trying to make. While it had been noted that there were three women with the name of Annie Lee Moss living in Washington DC at the time, one detail that was forgotten was that the female FBI agent had testified to having her address. In 1958, the federal Subversive Activities Control Board reported that “the Communist Party's own records, the authenticity of which the Party has at no time disputed … show that one Annie Lee Moss, 72 R Street SW, Washington DC, was a party member in the mid-1940s.”[19] The media here clearly failed to do their due diligence in reporting the facts, instead choosing to focus on the fact that McCarthy was not present during her questioning.[20]

What is now clear is that Annie Lee Moss lied under oath and perjured herself on the matter of her membership in the Communist Party. In point of fact, Joseph McCarthy was right in his allegation of her guilt, and Annie Lee Moss was wrong- her Communist Party membership had identified her address. Moreover, McCarthy was right on a number of other accounts. Documents discovered later proved that many of McCarthy’s statements were accurate, vindicating many of his accusations during the hearings. According to an article in The New American, “all of his other major cases--such as Army Major Irving Peress, Lauchlin Currie, Gustavo Duran, Theodore Geiger, Mary Jane Keeney, Edward Posniak, Haldore Hanson, and John Carter Vincent--were also later demonstrated to be Communists.”[21] And yet the overarching tone from the print media and television shows was, in the words of Edward R. Murrow’s character from Good Night and Good Luck, that McCarthy was “wrong 100 percent of the time”.[22]

The media is often referred to as the “Fourth Estate”, or the fourth branch of government. As the public, we often confer this power upon the media because of their ability to keep a check on the three main branches of government- the executive, legislative and judicial. However this trust, as with the three other branches, should be lost or reconsidered when self-interest prevents justice from being carried out to the fullest extent. In this case, the media used its power and lens to portray McCarthy as the bully and Ms. Moss as the victim, where the facts unto themselves painted an entirely different scene. What can be seen very clearly now is that there was a kind of “snowball effect” at play, where the press coverage of McCarthy began to take on such a negative tone that true journalism and fact-checking no longer mattered. All that interested the press was how to maintain the same story it had given night after night- that Joseph McCarthy was “wrong 100 percent of the time”- and no fact or discrepancy would stand between them and that message. In fact, the media had become the bully it had made McCarthy out to be. When certain elements of the press become so self-interested that so-called journalistic integrity cannot get in the way of a good story, it is time to reconsider our trust in them as an effective check on government. As the Roman poet Juvenal once wrote, Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? Or, in colloquial English, who watches the watchmen? If it is not the viewing audience, then there are none left.

[1] Time Magazine, 1

[2] Doherty, 181

[3] Time Magazine, 1

[4] Friedman, 446-447

[5] Ibid.

[6] Time Magazine, 1

[7] Time Magazine, 1

[8] Time Magazine, 2

[9] Doherty, 183

[10] Reeves, 569

[11] Herman, 335-336

[12] Doherty, 184

[13] Strietmtter, 171-172

[14] Herman, 335-336

[15] Polsby, 252

[16] Eddlem, 1

[17] Friedman, 467

[18] Streitmatter, 172

[19] Shafer, 1

[20] Reeves, 569

[21] Eddlem, 1

[22] Ibid.

Bibliography

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Doherty, Thomas. Cold War, Cool Medium: Television, McCarthyism, and American Culture (Columbia University Press, 2005)

Eddlem, Thomas R. Good Luck finding the truth here: George Clooney's new movie Good Night and Good Luck continues the smear campaign against Senator Joseph McCarthy and lionizes leftist reporter Edward R. Murrow. Oct 31, 2005 (The New American, 2005) Available online:http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Good+Luck+finding+the+truth+here:+George+Clooney's+new+movie+Good...-a0138271732

Friedman, Andrea. The Strange Career of Annie Lee Moss: Rethinking Race, Gender, and McCarthyism (The Journal of American History, 2007)

Herman, Arthur Joseph. McCarthy: Reexamining the Life and Legacy of America's Most Hated Senator (Free Press, 2000),

Polsby, Nelson W. Towards an Explanation of McCarthyism (Political Studies, October 1962)

Reeves, Thomas C. The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy: A Biography (Madison Books, 1982)

Shafer, Jack Edward R. Movie- Good Night, and Good Luck and bad history Oct. 5, 2005 (Slate Magazine, 2005) Available online:http://www.slate.com/id/2127596/

Streitmatter, Rodger Mightier than the Sword 2^nd Ed. (Westview Press, 2008)

Time Magazine National Affairs: Committee v. Chairman Mar. 22, 1954 (Time Magazine, 1954) Available online:http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,819556-1,00.html

Executive Summary- Successful Online Campaigning

2009-07-29T20:35:00.000-07:00

[ Successful Online Campaigning for National Office: A Focus on the 2008 Presidential Campaign]

{ABSTRACT}

The internet has been an effective tool which has changed every area of the public world, and politics is no exception. In the past 3 decades, there has been a dramatic shift in the way political candidates, particularly presidential candidates, use the internet as a platform for increasing name recognition, gaining political support, fundraising and other purposes. The author proposes that the success of the political website depends on three distinguishing factors- planning, execution and maintenance. The paper begins by tracing the use of political websites in presidential campaigns, starting in 1996, and continuing into the 2008 presidential election. Specifically, the paper will cover the degree to which each website utilized the model of planning, execution and maintenance, and its positive and negative factors which went into the process. It will also go into detail about how branding and graphic design have been incorporated with the recent trend towards social networking, and how that played to Obama’s advantage in the 2008 election.

Introduction and Overview

The greatest goal of democracy is to empower the citizenry to work with its government for the greatest overall good. Until recently, this goal had to be met through the necessary compromise of representative majority, where in many cases; a few would represent many, usually in a manner which was necessarily fitted towards a trustee role rather than a pure delegate format. At bare minimum, there were relatively few instances where the representatives could reliably communicate with their constituents; as with any proportional representation, input would only be as fast as the communication that was available during that time. But now, as with every other area of communication, the face of political communication is changing like never before.

The age of digital instant communication has changed much of our world already, and the time has come where it can begin to modify the processes and structures of democracy as well. We already have a society where 42 percent of voters now look to the Internet for information about candidates- traditional news sources dominate at 88 percent of voters looking at Internet for information, while the actual campaign websites for the candidates garnered only a paltry 30 percent. By creating and utilizing effective websites, policymakers can gain access into a great untapped reserve of previously unreachable constituencies in a way that is truly unprecedented.

This separates itself from generalized public polling because this method allows politicians to get access to these voters in their native environment- engaging interest at the source. Since the first political websites for presidential candidacy were developed for the 1996 election between Clinton and Dole, there have been many marked improvements.

To understand the evolution of presidential online campaigning, it is important to ask- what are the elements of a successful Internet campaign? All of the websites can be described within the framework of a single model, which will serve to describe the function of all political campaign websites. These follow the model of Planning, Execution and Maintenance. Ultimately, the websites which best execute all three stages of the model will have the most success. Success of these websites can be defined in terms of measurable outputs such as funds raised, email lists acquired, meeting groups executed, volunteers enlisted and other nebulous self-reported data. And, as campaigns are necessarily as unique as the candidates they represent, there will be numerous differences between the campaign websites which will make the goal of creating fair comparisons and contrasts significantly harder.

The specific application of this model will be different for each campaign and depend on the technology of the day. However, the model of Planning, Execution and Maintenance allows these websites to be compared fairly in terms of shared components. All of these features can be independently measured separate from the partisan nature of the actual campaigns, a significant feature in that this model as described should be able to identify universally effective techniques for online campaigning as well as partisan techniques which can create an edge for a particular side.

Online campaigning has only recently had the extensive impact we’ve seen in the 2008 election. But by looking at the 2008 election in conjunction with the previous presidential elections which used internet campaigning, one can see a clear method of determining effective strategy. Through looking at the Planning, Execution and Maintenance of the websites, specific strategies emerge. Planning ultimately involves understanding the needs of the campaign, and as 2008 proves, it also involves identifying current trends in the electorate as well. Execution involves not only the adaptability of the website in terms of its ability to put out an effective message, but it also involves the appropriate application of interface design and graphical development which engages users and gets them to interact with the website. Maintenance involves control of the overall message of the campaign, and ensures that there are no distractions from the overall efficacy of the message.

• The Impact of Planning

Planning determines message and theme. However, in the case of the 2008 election in the context of the Barack Obama and John McCain websites, there is a clear case to be made that it involves realizing the current trends in the internet and adapting to them as they develop. Part of a successful strategy must include identifying the needs of the campaign, and we have seen that clearly in the case of websites like John Kerrey’s and George Bush’s. However something that clearly changes the dynamic of the 2008 election versus every other election before that point was the impact of the shift in internet technology. McCain had a late start on Obama’s kind of social networking incorporation for the website. This early disadvantage cost McCain untold volumes of support, as reflected by the fact that so many more young voters voted for Obama over McCain, by a margin of 68 percent to 30 percent. This difference must be attributed to the difference in the design of the website, as the former strategies of John McCain had yielded him considerably more positive responses in 2000, when students and college-age volunteers had made up a large part of his supporters. The major loss can be attributed to the fact that Obama’s campaign was so much more successful at creating a brand for the campaign which was so successful and able to be incorporated into existing social networks and utilized for mobilizing other supporters.

• The Impact of Execution

Execution in the campaigns is largely dependent on the degree to which the website can function as a single place for accessing all necessary information about a candidate from the perspective of the campaign. Towards this end, methods maximizing traffic and increasing page stay time are imperative. Clearly, the best example of effective usage of the internet to maximize these goals has been the campaign work of Barack Obama’s web team. However, this team has built on the successes of other presidential candidate’s websites, which have demonstrated the importance of an effective web format.

Also proven to be crucial has been the impact of an effective web interface and graphic design. Far from 1996 with the “web brochures”, the 2000 election showed the importance of adapting your website to your potential users. With the Gore/Lieberman website, while some of the material was excellent and groundbreaking, the fact that many people couldn’t access it using the most commonly available technology meant that people could be potentially turned off to the entire website.

In the case of the 2008 election, it became abundantly clear that branding and interface design had reached an entirely new level, and that the framework for drawing people in would be substantially changed. Utilizing a framework based on an understanding of social networking and successful graphic approaches, the Barack Obama team created a social networking site, my.barackobama.com which drew people in and made them a part of the movement.

The execution of the Barack Obama theme and message and brand was entirely unprecedented- the ad campaign that put the Obama logo and advertisement all over key social networking sites was entirely crucial to the fact that Obama’s theme was so universally recognized and utilized as a means for attaining support and gaining community. As the message was carried out and put into high-profile areas as well as specifically-targeted communities, supporters could immediately identify themselves with the overall movement and reach out to other people, ultimately yielding a strategy which spread to the communities around them. This would ultimately result in increased recognition as well as more impetuous for a real-world application of support.

• The Impact of Maintenance

One of the most significant findings of the 2008 research was the level of coordination between the campaigns and the social networks and blogs do have an impact on how message is ultimately disseminated. This was clearly demonstrated in the sheer lack of coordination between McCain’s social networking site, My McCain Space, and the McCain Victory 2008 blogroll. Alternative sites must be a help rather than a hindrance to the campaign. Ensuring that proper message control is maintained can make sure that there are no distractions from the key messages of the campaign. Part of this relates back to the planning element, and ensuring that the message of the campaign can be appropriately related through alternative social networking sites can ensure that there are no such issues involved with communicating the needs of the campaign.

• Implications of the Analysis

Future presidential campaigns will certainly benefit from a strong understanding of how the fallout of the 2008 election has changed the dynamics for all future campaigns. In the words of Cyrus Krohn, there will never be another election where there will not be a social networking aspect involved in the campaign somehow. The paradigm shift in this election was clearly captured by the web team employed by Barack Obama, while John McCain’s team was still building mainly off of the previous advancements in technology and capacity from the 2000 and 2004 elections.

Crucial to planning is the branding element, and the creation of a symbol which can be used as a rallying cry for the whole campaign, as well as become a representation of the important things the campaign is fighting for. When used successfully, this can become a significant factor in developing support and cultivating a community of supporters who are not only proud to support their candidate but who also look towards networking with each other to make sure that the goals of the campaign are carried out.

Planning, Execution and Maintenance are the key areas in which a candidate can utilize an overall strategy which works for every future campaign. However, from 2008 and onwards, there must be a recognition of the impact of the social networking elements, where people increasingly identify themselves in groups and associations, and its importance in all future elections. To capture the full use of the internet, it is crucial to capitalize on the recent trends in internet technology and understand the potential impact of message development and branding in reaching out to various different groups of potential constituents and supporters.

A strong original symbol which effectively communicates the message of the campaign is critical in the planning stage, as future supporters will want a symbol to unite them and create a platform from which they can reach out to people around them and have them unify themselves. This creates a basis for supporters to ally together and work on recruitment and other activities. Then, a strong execution maximizing the symbolism and making it more applicable to social networking as well as creating places for supporters to meet and join each other creates a means for collaboration and mutual support makes for a high level of enthusiasm for the candidate and considerably higher participation rates. Then maintenance of the message is considerably enhanced by simultaneously being able to manage the original message through having a scalable and applicable message already in place, and making sure that secondary networks have a strong understanding of the actual message of the campaign.

Conclusion

The progression of internet technology has forever changed the face of politics. Technological advances have led to the point where some argue that there will never be another campaign which does not take the social networking aspect of online campaigning seriously. The consensus is that after 2008, things will never be the same:

Mr. Trippi, who worked for one of Mr. Obama’s rivals in the Democratic primary, former Senator John Edwards, said: “It has all come together for one guy, Barack Obama. But now that it’s happened, it’s a permanent change.”

To be sure, the current advances online would not be possible without the background of previous campaigns. From the very beginning with the very first political sites from Clinton and Dole even without the capacity for growth or expansion, there were definite campaign elements being brought out.

When the Internet was just beginning to become a powerful resource in 2000, the early primary campaigning of John McCain would set major precedents for future races. Bush’s website came to symbolize maintenance with its reformulations and regular updates, and Gore’s website demonstrated the use of interactive and engaging elements. In 2004 there was yet another major evolutionary jump for the internet, along with a corresponding political shift. Howard Dean’s campaign would start many precedents which would be used in many later internet campaigns. With the Bush and Kerrey websites, planned needs of the campaign would turn into the executed purposes of the website. Ultimately the difference in emphasis on the websites would demonstrate the different needs of the campaigns.

In Clinton vs. Dole, the very first political sites competed only on a visual level, and there was not much room for growth or expansion. In the Gore vs. Bush race, the Internet was just beginning to become a powerful resource, and the early primary campaigning of John McCain set major precedents for future races. Bush’s website would eventually become the model for maintenance, with many growing evolutions over time, while Gore’s website executed more interactive and engaging elements. 2004 saw a major evolutionary jump for the internet, and the political world responded- Howard Dean capitalized on this growth significantly. In Bush vs. Kerrey, there was a definite correlation between the planned needs of the campaign and the executed purposes of the website- the difference in emphasis was designed to suit the different needs of the campaigns.

These precedents, combined with the rise in internet use and social networking development over the 2008 election cycle, led to a significant impact in the McCain vs. Obama race, as well as significant impacts in the primary race. Early internet grassroots campaigning helped Obama considerably in his ground game against Hillary Clinton, and would ultimately benefit him in his general election campaigning against John McCain. John McCain’s late start, combined with lack of message cohesion, ultimately created perceptions that haunted the campaign late into the general election campaign. Ultimately, the groundswell of support Obama enjoyed came from a strongly developed planning strategy which incorporated thematic branding and strong message development, an execution strategy which made the symbolism of the rise of Barack Obama that much more powerful and a maintenance operation which maintained the original message and ensured that it was communicated effectively throughout the social networking applications it managed.

For there to be a similar strategy like this in the future, it would need to take full advantage of the lessons of this election and make the planning strategy start with recognition of the importance of social networking. But if 2008 has taught a single lesson, it is that more than any other area, the internet is one where considerable change can happen. If there are significant changes in the way the internet operates in the next 4 years until the next election, an appropriate planning strategy will clearly involve not just the social networks of 2008, but whatever new advancements come next.

Works Cited

CNN “Exit Polls.” Available online: http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#val=USP00p1

Dunham , Richard S. “Campaign 2000: How the Candidates Stack Up -- on the Web.” Business Week, December 31, 1999. Available online: http://www.businessweek.com/ebiz/9912/el1231.htm

Feltz, Renee. Columbia Journalism Review. “Blogged Down in the Past- McCain’s top-down Internet tactics can’t keep up with Obama’s social networking strategy”. Accessible online: http://www.cjr.org/campaign_desk/blogged_down_in_the_past.php

iCrossing. 2007. “How America Searches: Election '08.” iCrossing Digital Marketing Company Accessed 30 April 2008. Available online: http://www.icrossing.com/articles/how_america_searches_election_2008.pdf

Krohn, Cyrus. Director, RNC eCampaign. Personal Interview. 10/15/2008.

Nagourney, Adam. New York Times. “The ’08 Campaign: Sea Change for Politics as We Know It.” Available online: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/04/us/politics/04memo.html?_r=2&hp&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

Obama's '47 Million Uninsured' Claim Is False (NewsMax.com)

2009-07-27T09:08:00.000-07:00

Obama's '47 Million Uninsured' Claim Is False (NewsMax.com) Reposted for public benefit.

President Barack Obama claimed during his Wednesday night press conference that there are 47 million Americans without health insurance.

A simple check with the U.S. Census Bureau would have told him otherwise.

Obama said: "This is not just about the 47 million Americans who have no health insurance."

That assertion conflicts with data in the Census Bureau report "Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2007." The report was issued in August 2008 and contains the most up-to-date official data on the number of uninsured in the U.S.

The report discloses that there were 45.65 million people in the U.S. who did not have health insurance in 2007.

However, it also reveals that there were 9.73 million foreigners foreign-born non-citizens who were in the country in 2007 included in that number. So the number of uninsured Americans was actually 35.92 million.

And of those, "there were also 9.1 million people making more than $75,000 per year who did not choose to purchase health insurance," CNSNews stated in a report based on the Census Bureau data.

That brings the number of Americans who lack health insurance presumably for financial reasons down less than 27 million.

The Census Bureau report also shows that the number of people without insurance actually went down in 2007 compared to the previous year from 47 million to 45.65 million while the number with insurance rose from 249.8 million to 253.4 million.

The next Census Bureau report disclosing health insurance data, with 2008 numbers, is scheduled to be released in August, and could figure in the healthcare reform debate.

Obama's Online Campaign: An In-Depth Report on Successful Social Media

2009-07-14T11:04:00.000-07:00

Another in-depth look at the 2008 election, this time with a specific emphasis on Barack Obama’s social networking campaign online. This research project reflects the historical perspective I included in my previous project, but here, specifically emphasizes on what made Obama’s social network camapaigning so effective. Hopefully we can take these lessons and make the most of them in our future attempts to regain political ground as a party.

In the aftermath of the 2008 election, a few things were immediately clear: Barack Obama was to be the next president of the United States, and we as a nation had just entered a new era of political communication- the online age. Obama has been praised far and wide for his online campaign, which raised over half a billion dollars through the Internet alone (Washington Post, November 2008). Yet, beyond being an extremely effective fundraising tool, it was difficult to measure the impacts of Obama’s Internet campaign and its outreach on social networking websites. To examine this, the question arises- what social networking campaigns were employed by Barack Obama’s campaign, and how can they be most effectively measured to determine their impact? To answer this question, we must look at the campaign’s user targeting, branding and message use, and overall penetration in terms of supporter metrics. This allows a complete perspective of the campaign’s intention and planning, adaptation to the nuances of the candidate, and a measure of effectiveness from immediately available numbers.

INTRODUCTION

When viewing social media it is crucial to first understand the importance of the online market for campaigns. The Internet has become an increasingly important resource in recent years, particularly in the 2008 election. Approximately 74 percent of Internet users went online for information about the 2008 election, representing 55 percent of the entire adult population. These percentages mark the first time more than half of voting-age users went online for election information. When identifying “online political users” in a Pew Research poll, researchers found that 60 percent of Internet users received political news from the Internet, 59 percent used specific tools such as email, Twitter, texting or instant messaging to send or receive political messages, and 38 percent directly interacted with other online users about the election and political issues (Pew Research). In 2008, 88 percent of voters looking to the Internet for information utilized traditional news sources, 42 percent went to “social media” sites, such as Facebook, YouTube and MySpace. the actual campaign websites for the candidates garnered only a paltry 30 percent (iCrossing). Thus, the Internet provided an excellent starting point for getting interested voters involved in the campaign.

Obama and the internet seemed to be a perfect fit as well, which may explain the degree of innovation we have seen in this campaign. One of the advantages Obama clearly enjoyed was a campaign message which inherently motivated people to interact and was also widely popular at the time of the election- these facts must be considered in the evaluation of the campaign’s effectiveness. Obama was also able to motivate the younger voters in the 18-29 year old group, first due to his positions on the Iraq war and second his own personal background, which motivated the younger voters to energize and organize for his campaign from its onset (Hill). This worked well to Obama’s advantage, because the younger age group also was able to drive support early on, due to their comparatively stronger presence online (Pew Research). This created a solid background of Internet support with little overhead and significant advance direction, factors that served to advance Obama aggressively in the general election.

In fact, Obama had a very personal interest in the online campaign itself, which made a significant difference in how the online section was handled. The designer of the campaign’s social network my.barackobama.com, Chris Hughes, is actually a co-founder of Facebook. He left a lucrative position at Facebook to work on the campaign because of Obama’s active stance. “As great as Barack is, if the campaign hadn’t been constituted in this idea of investing in our everyday supporters and helping them organize among themselves, I wouldn’t have been as excited about the job,” he said (Washington Post, August 2008). However, what the campaign did with the message outside of these inherent attentions laid the groundwork for a very successful “viral” campaign through use of targeting, branding, message discipline and social media penetration.

TARGETING

Social media targeting was very effectively managed by the Barack Obama campaign during the 2008 campaign. Expansive outreach to different sites also assisted Obama’s team- according to campaign worker Scott Goodstein, “Some people only go to MySpace. It’s where they’re on all day. Some only go to LinkedIn. Our goal is to make sure that each supporter online, regardless of where they are, has a connection with Obama. Then, as much as we can, we try to drive everyone to our site” (Washington Post, August 2008). Obama’s reach would ultimately extend to over 15 different social networking sites, including less-trafficked social networking sites such as BlackPlanet for African Americans and Eons for Baby Boomers. These allowed him to go directly to people where they were, and direct them toward the campaign website (Washington Post, November 2008). This approach means that the BarackObama.com website was the ultimate destination for every ad and social networking campaign, allowing the campaign to have one main area of focus for getting people directly involved- the website.

Once a user arrived at a campaign website, the targeting became even narrower to get the user involved with the campaign. Specifically, through the use of tracking cookies from the Obama websites, the campaign was allowed to see how users travelled around the Internet and which ads were more enticing to users and which were not. This allowed the campaign to segment its ads, focusing the ads towards older or younger voters based on what would be most effective. This kind of data collection permitted the campaign to see exactly who was on their side, who they could persuade, and who they could get more involved.

According to Andrew Rasiej, founder of the Personal Democracy Forum, the approach simplified the process of gaining volunteers and targeting potential contributors- ‘you can see where you get traction, and then reinvest, based on data’ (Hill). There was also attention to having multiple options available on the my.barackobama.com website, which was the social network for the campaign website. There, users had options for blogging, planning events, fundraising, joining groups and volunteering. The user-type groups on the site range from environmentalists to veterans to women-specific, allowing supporters to interact and engage on areas they agree on, and select their focus to recruit more people who already share their policy interests (Washington Post, August 20).

When tracking Internet usage, one significant detail emerges which seems entirely counter-intuitive. McCain could have had the edge on Obama in terms of online support- McCain’s supporters outnumbered Obama’s supporters in online users by 83 percent to 76 percent. However despite this numerical advantage, built somewhat from the fact that Republicans generally have more income and education than Democrats, Obama supporters significantly outperformed their Republican counterparts in terms of interactivity. Obama supporters shared their message with friends at a rate of 22 percent compared to McCain supporters sharing at 14 percent (Pew Research). This online interactivity meant that at every point, Obama’s messages had a higher chance of being read and sent to a friend rather than being merely discarded. It also meant that the messages were more likely to come from people the recipient would know, and thus make the message more easily received.

Thus the question- how did the Obama campaign motivate people to invest to the point of sharing with others?

BRANDING AND MESSAGE DISCIPLINE

Two factors which seem to be integral to most campaigns, but which are rarely put together in the same precise context, are branding and message discipline. One thing the Obama campaign was able to handle productively was the association of the two- without one or the other, the entire package would have fallen apart. If message discipline is sacrificed, it undercuts the power of the symbol of the campaign. And if the symbol of the campaign does not motivate, the discipline of the message is irrelevant. However, the two seem to be intertwined in the Obama campaign in a way that serves as an example for future online campaigns- a successful campaign cannot happen without synthesizing both .

Branding through the Obama logo, the now-ubiquitous O, followed a very interesting history- the logo design specialist who developed the symbol for the campaign had never worked with political logos before, but he immediately recognized some key elements about the design that would be necessary for the campaign to become as enigmatic as it did. He brought the themes of unity together in the color patterns, looking at the way the colors interacted specifically. From there, there was an emphasis on developing a logo that “had an element that stood separate from the typography”- this would allow for the symbolism of the logo to become as adaptable as it later was. According to the logo designer, Sol Sender, once the logo was launched, “it was really everywhere, very quickly”. From there, designers working with the Obama campaign adapted the logo for a variety of different demographics- for kids, women, Latinos, religious voters and others. The campaign extended the logo to their different social media networks, and it became viral from there, spawning everything from “Yes We Carve” Jack-O-Lanterns to “Pirates for Obama” t-shirts, with the logo turned upside down. According to the designer, “it helped to get his message out there as powerfully as it did” (VSA Partners).

Message discipline worked well with the Obama campaign because, as mentioned before, the messages were already suited for an online interactive audience. However, Obama’s overall media strategy allowed the adaptability to be more than just a logo- the message was unified throughout the different networks, but emphasized different points of the overall message on each different specialized group. As reported by the New York Times- “Obama’s New Way organization was grounded largely on Old School codes — notions of loyalty, aggressiveness and discretion.” There was an early tight-knit leadership team Obama had worked with who kept their campaign decisions close to the vest. This ensured that, while the campaign maintained an open front on the websites, their own voice was unified from the campaign (Leibovich).

This was demonstrated in the way the campaign handled a negative reaction on the website for when Obama compromised on FISA, which granted immunity to telecom industries- a group called “President Obama, Please Get FISA Right” was formed on my.barackobama.com which rapidly became the largest group on the website (Washington Post, August 2008). Ultimately, Obama wrote out a long explanation of his vote on his website, maintaining discipline without compromising. Staffers were assigned to deal with the comments on this section and reply personally to upset supporters. As one observer reported, “[after] a sort of cyber-catharsis of complaints, the controversy died down” (Hill). This example shows how the campaign was able to use the Internet to both reach out to potential supporters as well as take steps to prevent current supporters from using his online presence against him in a negative way.

By way of comparison, there is some evidence that McCain’s campaign was less potent online partly because of its failure to coordinate messages across mediums. The biggest example of this was the McCain Victory 2008 “blogroll”, which was a list of blogs supporting for McCain for President which linked to each other. Essentially, these worked as an “echo chamber”- a top-down system of disseminating talking points about Obama. These sites had no collaboration with the McCain social networking site, which would ultimately mean that there would be less message coordination and create actual message confusion. Ultimately some online sources ended up running messages contrary to the campaign’s message which were interpreted as having come from McCain’s campaign. This eventually led to an overall sense of dissatisfaction with the campaign, as well as confusion. The level of confusion was epitomized when Megan McCain accidentally identified Brad Marston, co-founder of the McCain Victory 2008 blogroll, as the “McCain e-campaign coordinator” on her blog (Feltz).

This lack of message discipline proves how crucial these factors can be in an online campaign where resources can be confused so easily. Combine this report with the fact that McCain never created an identifying symbol as powerful as Obama did, and it becomes more apparent that both branding and message discipline work together. Were the McCain campaign sites distinguished through effective branding, there would be less confusion about whether the other Blogrolls were associated with the campaign or not. And as McCain’s campaign lacked the strong unifying symbols Obama had to bring the message of the campaign together and unify his supporters, there was little enough significant interest in the campaign to make as much of the lack of campaign discipline.

SOCIAL NETWORK PENETRATION

Obama’s emphasis on his Internet presence would net him 2.3 million unique visitors in May, right before the end of the Democratic primary- one measure reported that between Obama’s site and McCain’s site, Obama’s site had 72% of the total traffic (Washington Post, August 2008). On the social networking websites, Obama has over 5 million supporters in all his different social networks. The most popular social networks such as Facebook and MySpace are covered, usually with specific groups representing geographic areas or demographics, allowing more people to get involved and get updates specific to their interest or location (Washington Post, November 2008). This was critical as it went back to the original goal of going to the Internet user were they were and the campaign bringing them in however they could. Then actors such as momentum were allowed to come into play, as well as direct association invitations.

However, what is of more interest is the social network the campaign created and how it used these profiles to drive traffic to my.barackobama.com. Ultimately, 2 million profiles were created on Obama’s social networking site. On that site, 400,000 blog posts were written, 200,000 real-world events were planned and 35,000 volunteer groups were formed. The website also featured a virtual phone-bank, which supporters used to make over 3 million calls in the last four days of the campaign alone. Over $30 million dollars was raised just through the links on the profile pages of individual users (Washington Post, November 2008). These numbers represent more than just a mass of unverifiable users on the Internet- much has been made of the fact that users can maintain multiple profiles and therefore inflate the “crowds” of people online supporting any given cause. However, the proof that the networking strategy worked here is in the phone calls and real-world events that came of the online meetings. Looking at these numbers will give a better sense of the actual impact of the campaign rather than just looking at the number of supporters.

Another key area where Obama was able to drive a lot of traffic was the online video section, as well as his YouTube channel, which allowed his campaign to post thousands of videos without having to pay for overhead to TV stations and the like. According to Joe Trippi, campaign manager for Howard Dean, “The campaign’s official stuff they created for YouTube was watched for 14.5 million hours… to buy 14.5 million hours on broadcast TV is $47 million” (Miller). By August, Obama’s team had shot over 2,000 hours of video, uploading over 1,110 videos online. This was able to get people excited and motivated on local levels because they were able to see other people who were excited about the campaign, and the message spread from there. According to the manager of Obama’s video team, “Here, we don’t worry about how many views our videos get. That’s not the priority. One of our goals is to get people talking about what’s going on in their lives and why they’re supporting Barack — and hopefully not only will they watch the videos but also comment on them and forward them to relatives and friends and co-workers” (Washington Post, August 2008). And yet the numbers for the views on these videos continued to grow, showing the continuing importance and power of incorporating video into the social networks- this allows people to interact with the material on a continual basis and to reinforce the messages and the themes of the campaign without having to expend continual effort.

The branding effect was also apparently powerful in real-world social networking. The iconic O from Obama’s logo was prominently displayed on all of the various social networking sites, and pretty soon users would take the logo and integrate it on their own websites and profiles. The symbol became so ubiquitous that it began to drive sales of real-life merchandise- Obama-themed merchandise would out-sell McCain merchandise by a ratio of 5 to 1. Many observers would attribute this to the symbolism used on the websites of Obama- it had become so ubiquitous online that it had created a demand for the real-world t-shirts and bumper stickers (Popkin).

CONCLUSION

When looking at Obama’s social networking strategy, there are three key areas crucial to understanding and assessing Obama’s social media campaign- targeting, branding and message discipline, and social network penetration. These factors worked together to create an overall cohesive social networking campaign which reached out to voters in different social networks based on their demographics, geography and interest. From there, the campaign brought them into their own social network where they could be more actively engaged and encourage others to be a part. Here, the branding and message discipline worked together to ensure that people had a clear idea of what the campaign was about, as well as creating a common banner and symbolism that people could identify with and identify the campaign with. From there, the social networks maintained themselves, creating increasing support and outreach as the campaign gained momentum. While certain inherent factors such as early demographics and message appeal pushed Obama’s campaign forward with more vigor, it seems that the personal interest of the candidate in the campaign also played a large part in ensuring the social media campaign got the adequate attention it needed to succeed. Throughout these factors, it becomes clear not just that a successful social networking campaign can happen again, but that it will happen again. After this level of involvement, no candidate will be able to run for any position without having some sort of online component.

Welcome to the online age of politics.

Fact Checking the Fact Check

2008-10-03T13:04:00.000-07:00

There are fact checks, and then there are fact checks. Now, with the amount of preparation both parties put into their time before the debates, you think they’d have figured out already that people can go online and figure these things out for themselves, and I think they assume people will. Biden made a lot of statements, and many of those have been identified as completely and blatantly wrong. He stated these with an air of complete authority. This is scary, because people have been so upset with their perceptions that Bush has lied to the American people, and yet Biden blatantly and provably lies with astonishing ease.

Now I’ve seen a number of articles attacking some of Palin’s statements, making it seem like she’s just as guilty as he is, so I decided to go through and assess those claims for myself, and come out with a response. Those who want to attack or defend Biden’s statements are welcome to do so, and I may go over some of Biden’s more blatant violations in another article. But here I’m going through the official AP Fact Check article, and looking at the distortions they claim she made, I can find nothing on the level of what Biden has made, and further, they are as guilty if not more guilty of making the same distortions in their very same article.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081003/ap_on_el_pr/debate_fact_check;_ylt=AqP5Fl.OWm8bCdxOhqRL5U6s0NUE

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PALIN: Said of Democratic presidential candidate Obama: "94 times he voted to increase taxes or not support a tax reduction."

THE FACTS: The dubious count includes repetitive votes as well as votes to cut taxes for the middle class while raising them on the rich. An analysis by factcheck.org found that 23 of the votes were for measures that would have produced no tax increase at all, seven were in favor of measures that would have lowered taxes for many, 11 would have increased taxes on only those making more than $1 million a year.

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Here’s the basis for the 94 votes for tax increases or against tax cuts-

* To Date, Obama Has Voted For A Tax Increase Approximately Once Every Five Days Congress Has Been In Session. (The Library of Congress Website, thomas.loc.gov, Accessed 6/8/08)

Obama Voted At Least 12 Times For Higher Income Taxes.

Obama Voted Against Marriage Penalty Relief At Least Twice.

Obama Voted Against Extending The Expanded Child Tax Credit.

Obama Voted At Least 3 Times Against Repealing The 1993 Income Tax Increase On Social Security Benefits.

Obama Has Voted At Least 5 Times Against Providing Relief From The Alternative Minimum Tax.

Obama Has Voted At Least 7 Times Against Tax Incentives Benefitting Small Business.

Obama Voted Against Capital Gains Tax Cuts At Least 9 Times.

Obama Voted Against Tax Cuts On Dividend Income At Least 9 Times.

http://www.gop.com/news/NewsRead.aspx?Guid=40abb3a8-83c8-4f0f-ae4f-c85162396145

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PALIN: Criticized Obama's "plan to mandate health care coverage and have universal government run program" for health care, and added: "I don't think it's going to be real pleasing for Americans to consider health care being taken over by the Feds."

THE FACTS: Wrong on several counts. Obama's plan does not provide for universal coverage, only mandates insurance for children and doesn't turn the system over to the government. Most people would still get private insurance through their work. Obama proposes that the government subsidize the cost of health coverage for millions who have trouble affording it and he'd set up an exchange to negotiate prices and benefits with private insurers — with one option being a government-run plan.

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From the article, Palin said Obama had a "plan to mandate health care coverage and have universal government run program". From the same article: there is "one option being a government-run plan", and "mandates insurance for children". It doesn't turn over the system to the government, but creates a government system which people are mandated to be a part of if they don't already have a system. That basically means that you have to have health care coverage, and if you don't have it, you get put in a government run system. That's universal coverage, and it is mandated. Its not a mandated universal government run program, but a mandated coverage level and a universal catch-all government run program. This is actually really close to what she said. So at worst, this is an issue of semantics.

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PALIN: "Two years ago, remember, it was John McCain who pushed so hard with the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac reform measures. He sounded that warning bell."

THE FACTS: Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska led an effort in 2005 to tighten regulation on the mortgage underwriters — McCain joined as a co-sponsor a year later. The legislation was never taken up by the full Senate, then under Republican control.

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On McCain's bill that would have created a regulatory agency: "Chris Dodd, then the ranking member of the Banking Committee and now its chair, was in the middle of receiving preferential loan treatment from Countrywide Mortgage, one of the companies gaming the system in the credit crisis." http://hotair.com/archives/2008/09/17/mccains-attempt-to-fix-fannie-mae-freddie-mac-in-2005/ I can actually get records from opensecrets.org to show that he got the most money from them, as well as senate records of who was in charge to show that this was actually something that was stopped by the democrat in charge of the committee. To take a line from the AP story, to say that the congress was run by Republicans is misleading. The person in charge of the committee it never left was a Democrat who was taking cash from, you guessed it, Freddie and Fannie.

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PALIN: Said the United States has reduced its troop level in Iraq to a number below where it was when the troop increase began in early 2007.

THE FACTS: Not correct. The Pentagon says there are currently 152,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, about 17,000 more than there were before the 2007 military buildup began.

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Troop levels are consistently shifting and people are being rotated in and out- when this article was written, there were 150,000 troops. Before that, there were 142,000. Before the surge, one estimate had it at 133,000. Depending on when you're looking at before then, you can find different numbers. It depends on who you ask, and when. But troop levels are, by any account, coming down overall. While her estimate may not have matched the estimates of the journalists writing up "fact check" articles, that does not detract from the fact that they are coming down.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_War_troop_surge_of_2007

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PALIN: Said Alaska is "building a nearly $40 billion natural gas pipeline, which is North America's largest and most expensive infrastructure project ever to flow those sources of energy into hungry markets."

THE FACTS: Not quite. Construction is at least six years away. So far the state has only awarded a license to Trans Canada Corp. that comes with $500 million in seed money in exchange for commitments toward a lengthy and costly process to getting a federal certificate. At an August news conference after the state Legislature approved the license, Palin said, "It's not a done deal."

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By stating that Alaska is "building a nearly $40 billion natural gas pipeline", Palin is obviously implying that it is a work in progress. When you're starting a project, you talk about estimates.

I don't know anyone who says Alaska is "in the process of implementing a natural gas pipeline which has not yet begun work but which has an estimated price of $40 billion dollars, although we have only put $500 million in seed money in at this point". The word "building", which implies "work in progress", is not something I take issue with, but then again, I'm not writing a fact check article.

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PALIN: Said a McCain-Palin administration "will support Israel," including "building our embassy ... in Jerusalem."

THE FACTS: Moving the U.S. Embassy from its present location in Tel Aviv to Jerusalem is a perennial promise of presidential candidates courting the Jewish-American vote. In fact, moving the embassy is actually required by U.S. law. But successive administrations of both parties, including George W. Bush's, have made the same pledge only to find that the realities of Middle East peacemaking have forced them to invoke a waiver to delay it. Jerusalem is claimed as a capital by both Israel and the Palestinians and Israel's occupation of east Jerusalem is not internationally recognized. The city's status is one of the key issues of disagreement in peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.

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And finally, as to the building the embassy in Israel, it is quite clearly a campaign promise, and something they find worth pursuing. Obama has made tons of these, and they would fill many, many pages full of promises that he can't fulfill, but those aren't put into articles about this debate.

Simply because it's complicated and has a history of being hard to do does not mean that the McCain campaign does not intend to pursue it. They may not succeed, but to list it as a distortion that it is something that they want to do is itself a distortion.

In fact, in the speech she made, Palin discussed the recent successes in foreign policy which may make this possible- "...they have a track record of being able to forge these peace agreements. They succeeded with Jordan. They succeeded with Egypt. I'm sure that we're going to see more success there, also." http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/02/debate.transcript/ So this false promise is looking more and more likely, as opposed to Obama's promises of lowering taxes while increasing spending, which seems more and more unlikely even as our economy continues to go south.

An Obama Win a Lose-Lose

2008-09-25T22:00:00.000-07:00

An Obama win would create a lose-lose proposition for the United States. He will go down in history as a major disappointment, regardless of what he does. He has created for himself a situation where he cannot do anything BUT fail, even from the perspective of his supporters. I'll explain that. There are two potential options for where his presidency will lead- if he is effective, he will doom our economy. If he is ineffective, which I will first argue that he will be, he will create an entire generation of disaffected voters which will cast a shadow over his presidency he will probably never live down.

The first, the optimistic Obama supporter opinion, the “hope” that Obama will truly create change in the economy. Obama has promised approximately $292.9 Billion for projects varying from healthcare to infrastructure according to the National Taxpayers Union (http://www.ntu.org/main/page.php?PageID=141 ). This would have to go on top of the 700 Billion dollar bailout (probably more after Obama’s done with it) or whatever costs the current fiasco will leave on the market. So we’re starting off at a cool trillion dollars which will have to go into debt- increasing the already staggering 9.8 Trillion we are already going to be in debt (http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/ ). Of course that’s not adding all the bonuses and earmarks that will doubtless be added… it was McCain, not Obama who proposed that earmarks and pork and projects like the 1.6 Million dollar aquarium Obama got funds for would be cut or vetoed and the savings passed on to the taxpayers. (http://www.cagw.org/site/PageServer?pagename=reports_pigbook2008 )

Here’s an important note- the numbers I mentioned earlier include (in billions) the “savings” Obama would achieve through discontinuing the Iraq war. Now I believe I've heard a million different times that "Oh, the Iraq war is costing so much, we can just use that money for other important issues like healthcare!" Regardless of the fact that Obama’s plan still outspends McCain’s plan by a factor of 3 to 1, I still want to address this statement. First, this reflects a massive misunderstanding of how our US budget works. Defense funding and healthcare funding draw money from two entirely different pots. Second, under Obama, there is absolutely no clear distinction as to where Obama's policy will be any different from McCain’s, specifically, Obama has backed off actively supporting a timeline and has privately asked top Iraqi officials to stop discussion about withdrawal until after the election according to the New York Post- (http://www.nypost.com/seven/09152008/postopinion/opedcolumnists/obama_tried_to_stall_gis_iraq_withdrawal_129150.htm ), while McCain has consistently stated

"I do not want to keep our troops in Iraq a minute longer than necessary to secure our interests there. Our goal is an Iraq that can stand on its own as a democratic ally and a responsible force for peace in its neighborhood. Our goal is an Iraq that no longer needs American troops." (http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/issues/issues.iraq.html )

The major difference is McCain wants victory- a withdrawal from a stable self-governing Iraq, which recent news says is looking more and more likely- we’re facing what’s being called “a new reality in Iraq” where violence is down, casualties are the lowest since the original invasion, the insurgency is being defeated and children are playing in parks (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121617045543756423.html )! While the world was watching Obama’s speech, we turned over the Anbar province (Once the “most intractable region”) to the Iraqi people- a truly amazing and significant feat that received nowhere near the attention it should have (http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/09/01/mideast/iraq.php ). What we cannot account for is the price of defeat- another brutal dictator commanding a majority and oppressing the minority ruthlessly, committing massive human rights violations and creating another situation we may eventually have to step in at some future point and resolve. So an Obama Iraq policy will not create the revenue Obama will need to enact what legislation he wants.

Obama has proposed, simultaneously, amnesty for illegal immigrants and universal healthcare. While I don't claim to be a lifelong expert on either, let me just give you a picture of what a system looks like where a good 18-20 million illegal immigrants do not pay into the system (http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=42216 ). When healthcare providers cannot distinguish between contributors and non-contributors in terms of which services they can provide, ultimately we will see the overall healthcare of our nation decline. Life-saving surgeries, already in high demand, will see even higher demand as those who do not have to pay for the system enter the system and create higher demand. As incentive decreases for the now lower-paying surgeries covered by the government, supply of doctors will decrease. Anyone with an economics background should understand this.

Now the whole issue I have with this view is that it presumes that the presidential power is far beyond what it really is, and really, after so much complaining about Bush and his extent of power, this assumption that presidential power is now a good thing and should be used and encouraged is rather hypocritical. Two people I've talked to have said that the democrats basically want to have a majority because they believe that their majority would create a situation where they could enact legislation which could create major change. This is not likely because Obama’s propositions are going to have to go through congress- this will be a significant problem. Obama’s plan is not likely to happen because of inner divisions within the Democratic Party and a lack of party unity. Even if the gigantic Obama spending bill CAN go through, it will not go through without being changed. Virtually no bills go through congress without being changed, ESPECIALLY massive spending bills.

One thing I'm hearing loud and clear from those who take these statistics and look closely at these things is that it is very dangerous to read a mandate into an election. An example I've seen given was that of the 2006 election, where Democrats ran a lot of conservative Democrats in Republican areas- the Democrats won because, many times, they were more conservative than the Republicans they were running against- “they exchanged moderate Republicans for conservative Democrats” (http://select.nytimes.com/2006/11/09/opinion/09brooks.html?_r=1&hp=&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1163086496-0fW4QzAQpEovRxP6c4OVwA&oref=slogin )! Having won the majority, the Democrats proceeded to run a number of Iraq War Resolutions, all of which Bush proceeded to veto, much to the consternation of Congress, which had hitherto experienced an administration where the veto pen was hardly ever brought out. This disaster is very likely to happen again even if Obama becomes president and the Democrats retain Congress- Democrats were very good at filibustering once, but Republicans have had a lot of practice lately, and are not likely to back down as long as they have the support of their districts.

Regardless of who wins this election, it will be close. The new president will face a divided nation, as did Bush in 2000. I've heard many predictions that we may in fact have another situation where the popular vote goes one way and the electoral vote goes the other. We may have a lot of the same issues in this election. If this is the case, and even if it's not, we are absolutely going to need a leader who can deal with both sides, one who has a clear record of bipartisanship and functional policy. One who has crossed party lines in the past and created policy which spans both sides. This isn't a partisan line; this is an actual need for our government. Without cooperation, our nation fails to operate. And with all the heaping criticism being piled on the Bush administration for its partisanship, we are definitely going to need a leader who can forge a different path- not in terms of policy, but in terms of cooperation. We need a leader who can work with both parties. And no man really fits that description like John McCain.

Believe me, this is painful to say- Republicans have often been the recipient of the compromises McCain has made. It seems McCain won the primary because most of the major party partisans were split between Romney and Huckabee. This quite clearly created a lot of resentment with our candidate, as many people might have voted for one or the other to prevent McCain from getting into office. But that is water under the bridge, we cannot all receive the perfect candidate we want, but as I look at it now, it seems that McCain may not be such a bad choice in terms of creating effective leadership and getting things done. If you're a Republican, regardless of whether you supported Romney, Huckabee, Thomson or someone else, you have to concede that it would be a lot harder for any of them to work with a Democratic-dominated congress like McCain would be able to. But ultimately, that is how things must go for things to happen.

Obama, on the other hand, has the most liberal record in the senate, besting even Hillary Clinton (http://nj.nationaljournal.com/voteratings/ ). When it comes to most significant bipartisan issues, he's been loud when he’s talking about there being no red or blue states, but when it comes to his record, there’s a whole different story (http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0417/p01s07-uspo.html ). Once you take out all those possibilities, all you have left is lofty rhetoric. This may play well in a Hollywood movie, but it does not work with convincing die-hard partisans, who are elected by their communities because of the views they hold, that they should just start playing nice and working with each other. The change Obama wants will not happen under an Obama presidency, if for no better reason than the fact that no presidential advisers in the world can create a record of bipartisanship, nor can they convince people to work together. This will be something Obama will have to work at, and it’s clearly been something he’s had no part in before. He’s going to have to learn this lesson the hard way- true leadership comes from the top, not the bottom, and it comes from actions, not words.

And now I'll explain the other perspective- the cynical Obama supporter stance, which realizes the truth in what I just explained. I ran into this one today for the first time- someone who understood that the presidential power Obama claims he could have would not only be unconstitutional, but quite literally impossible given the divisions in government and the checks and balances put in place to prevent such widespread change. However he still felt that Obama had some potential and that anything Obama did would be beneficial from an overall standpoint.

However that can't account for the fact that there will be countless millions, looking at their elected hero in office, swamped by the quagmire of Washington, who will give up on the politics of hope and will fall into a stunning disillusionment with politics unseen since the Watergate scandals. I cannot tell you how much it scares me that we may have another generation of politically disaffected people.

I'm going to make a stunning confession here. I really love the idea of the politics of hope. I love the idea that one person has the ability to change the world- I strongly believe in that, and have for all of my life. I believe that strength and determination and force of will/can change the course of history. That's the optimist in me. However I also have a cynic in me who says that people are fundamentally evil, or at least only singly self-motivated. I believe in the power of the potential, but I ultimately don't trust it to be realized by everyone. And so, although I believe strongly in that aspect of the Obama message, I believe that it has become so nearsighted in its scope that it cannot see the true problems that lie in front of it.

Now, I find it hard to believe that Obama truly believes that by hoping and wishing, the problems of Washington will vanish like cockroaches in the light of the coming hope and change, but I know for sure that many of his supporters believe that. This is simply not going to be the case, and people need to wake up to that fact. Obama is a politician like any other, his negative advertising alone should prove that. In fact, he has 77% negative ads compared to McCain's 56% of negative ads (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/17/AR2008091703581_pf.html)!

A good number of those who read this (especially in its entirety) will not be the kind of people who blindly believe that Obama can supernaturally overcome the binds of the presidency and become a national superhero who can magically fix every problem in the country. And yet this is the mythology of the man. To those of you who held on to this image, I sincerely hope this gives you pause before you put everything into your support of this man. Strip away his imagery and you have a regular politician with more flash and style than substance. In the final analysis, what our country is going to need is a leader who can truly work with others, who has an actual record of bipartisanship, who can go against his own party when necessary, and who is ready to lead. And that man is John McCain.

Palin I’ll reserve for another article, so hold those comments for that post. Until then, feel free to discuss anything I’ve mentioned here.

-Brad

Update from Hurricane Ike

2008-09-15T17:15:00.000-07:00

For those of you who don't know, my house is right south of Sugarland, which is south of Houston, TX. And as we should all know, a storm the size of Arkansas just swept over the Houston area. So of course, my house got hit. Fortunately, my county didn't have to be evacuated, so my family stayed in the house.

That was the extent of what I knew before the storm hit- that, and the fact that my parents, who both pursued secondary engineering degrees, used ratcheting tie-downs (you know, the things they use to hold down loads on 18 wheelers) to strap down roof panels, as these are generally the first to go in a storm.

Once the storm hit, I couldn’t contact my parents at all, and was rather upset given the fact that all the coverage from the news media showed destroyed houses and destroyed areas I formerly went to for vacations… of course all the cell towers were down and the power was out for about 4 million people, so it was all but impossible to know what was going on. Fortunately I was able to get in touch with my family through text messages- always a good idea for disaster where cell towers may be affected. The messages go through as soon as the cell tower can connect.

There are two sections of my house- one is the original side, pictured here-

And there is the new section of the house, pictured here-

You’ll notice on the new section, there is a second story part, which has a bunch of windows. What you don’t see is the roof section, which is comprised of clear panels, which create a kind of sunroof for the sun room. This was apparently the only casualty on our property was one of the sunroof panels, which blew off in the storm despite the tie-downs. Fortunately, we have another section of paneling we can replace it with easily which otherwise would not have been used, so it’s just a matter of replacing it with what we already have. There was some water damage inside, but nothing too significant was damaged and it should be dried out shortly. I still haven’t actually spoken to my parents, but I’ve gotten to talk to my dad online and they all seem to be okay, besides not being able to call, they’re doing quite well.

Just keep the rest of the people in southern Texas in your prayers. There’s a lot of damage in a lot of areas, and a lot of families are hurting right now. We got really lucky, but a lot of people didn’t get off as easily. I would love to hear about anybody else’s story from the area, feel free to leave comments about how you fared. Also, feel free to share any Gustav stories you may have- I did experience some of the side effects of Hanna, but that really doesn’t count for much- it looked like a minor rainstorm in New Orleans.

Thanks for reading!

By the way, I included the pictures mostly because I wanted to show off the new section of our house, and I made panoramic pictures with Vista and wanted to use them somehow.

Strategy Notes on Palin and Gustav

2008-09-02T23:08:00.000-07:00

From all reliable indications, the expected post-convention Obama bump in the polls has been almost completely mitigated by the recent announcement of the choice of Sarah Palin as Vice President for McCain. The historic 16 point bump Bill Clinton got in the 1992 convention is nowhere to be seen. The sustained coverage and unmitigated attention to the DNC convention and significant emphasis on the Obama speech in the Mile High Stadium in Denver in front of over 80,000 people (not counting television, radio and internet) did not create a lasting increase in poll numbers. Right now the most current polling data shows Obama ahead, but within the margin of error for such polling data, clearly showing that this race is far from over. For a McCain win, focus needs to be put on Hurricane Gustav and Sarah Palin.

The immediate effect of Gustav has been anticipated to be a negative for the RNC Convention, however, it is an opportunity to show strong Republican party leadership. Currently, reports show much less significant damage than from Katrina, and great opportunity to show leadership on the side of the administration. The message from the DNC convention was that McCain is Bush, and Bush is bad. If Bush can effectively manage this situation with poise and polish, the resulting image is fantastic for McCain, and effectively turns the DNC message into a curse for Obama. This also offers a fantastic opportunity to demonstrate state-level Republican competence by spotlighting Bobby Jindal, a strong Republican with a history of competence. This can help re-gain confidence in the Republican Party lost during the DNC convention.

Sarah Palin’s recent announcement that her unwed 17 year old daughter is pregnant was not a surprise to the campaign, and comes in advance of potential scandal allegations. While this is also somewhat interpreted to be a knock against Palin, this is also a very excellent opportunity to gain votes. From most polling data now available, McCain stands to gain the most from former Hillary voters, as well as females. The Palin pick netted more male than female votes, so this news has the opportunity to have the most impact on the former Hillary supporters and females. Recent commentary shows that the news may make Palin considerably more palatable and help female voters identify with her situation.

Sources:

New Palin details may help, not hurt - Charles Mahtesian - Politico.com

Poll shows no convention bounce for Obama -CNN.com

R-igg it up!

2008-07-18T01:58:00.000-07:00

Hey everybody!

I just wanted to let everybody know about a new conservative
news service I’ve been using lately: www.R-igg.com.
Most of my Facebook friends (ok ok, all of them) have gotten an invitation to
their Facebook group, and I’d like to take a moment to describe what it is.
Essentially the creators have taken the web processes of Digg.com and have made
it into a conservative social network, letting the community pick top stories
of the day and letting you stay on top of the latest news and commentary on a
continuing basis. Feel free to give it a try!

And for all my less-conservative friends, I apologize for
any inconvenience the extra 2 seconds to decline the invitation may have
caused. I cannot give you that time back, but I can certainly make you use more
of it to read this blog. If you aren’t reading this, consider the 2 seconds
safely returned.

Thanks for reading!

The Republican Brand is Not Dead

2008-07-17T01:37:00.000-07:00

Today I saw a news article saying that McCain needs to pick Bloomberg because "The Republican Brand is dead". When I read those words, something in me just snapped. The last few months have been full of speculation about November, and there are so many loose ends that have not been brought together, so I decided I'd go out and enlighten some folks about how everything is really going to go down.

First of all, Bush approval levels should be a clear indication that Bush is not a real Republican. Any time an approval rating goes below about 50%, it means people of both parties are having an issue, and truth be told, some of Bush’s greatest opposition comes from those on his right. Most Republicans disagree with a lot of his policies, especially as they are, well, too liberal for them. But the media still seems to have this perception that he represents all Republicans, and that any Republican represents Bush (even as they usually tend to run from him). I don't see the big issue here- Bush is not running for a 3rd term, he's not on the ticket, and I highly doubt McCain would have him as VP. Regardless of what happens this November, we will not have G. W. Bush in the White House any longer.

Of course, a lot of this opinion polling is based on mere public perception; I'd love to see any of those with the public opinions actually doing the job any better than Bush has. I'm sure they'd say they'd change a few things, but being President of the greatest world power is a very serious job, one I believe people don’t take as seriously as they should.

Which is what leads me into my next point- Obama. He has to be the least experienced possible candidate in the whole Democratic Party. I keep getting this mental image that one day, watching CNN or some other "unbiased" station go 5 news cycles bashing Bush, Obama decided that in his limited capacity as community organizer and 1 tem state senator, he could do a better job than Bush could. After all, if Bush really was as inept and incapable as the news media make him out to be, anyone, even Obama, could do the job.

Now here's where I start having to address some real issues. Obama, being the first black (well, honestly, half-black) man to attain all-but presumptive nominee status, has a lot of civil rights activists cheering for the fact that he has gotten this far despite his race (or half-race?). And there is something to be said for the fact that there have been no significant racist comments by any significant commentators. But Obama’s race should have nothing to do with whether people vote for him or not. I can't emphasize that enough. Being black, or being a woman for that matter, should have nothing to do with any decision made for a position that governs all people. It should be strictly decided on the basis of qualification.

It actually says something bad about our society that we have let such an inadequate potential leader continue in his quest for the highest position without greater scrutiny. The fact that Obama has gotten so far shows that we have an even more significant problem- in our postmodern view on race, we let preoccupation with not discriminating because of race so disrupt our judgment that we suspend disbelief and hold back legitimate criticism because we are afraid of being judged ourselves. Race is now more important than ever, and for the worst possible reasons.

In fact, I'm not sure if people realize this, but if Obama is elected as president as a black man rather than as the best individual suited for the job, he becomes the symbol of all black people in high public position. He becomes a historical figure who represents his race in his position. Now think- if we're going to elect the first black president, shouldn't he be a little more competent and experienced? Any rookie mistake he makes will reflect badly on his whole race, not just on himself.

Think that won't happen? Bush, even though he was born in Connecticut, has become a representation of Texas and cowboys, and has essentially branded those people with the same labels the media consistently puts on him. Think of all the televangelists who have “fallen from grace” and consequently cast a negative light on all the beliefs they represent. Of course, we may never find out about Obama's mistakes until it’s too late- he is, after all, a Democrat.

Now do not misconstrue my words. I have no problem voting for a black man or woman. I would vote for Condoleezza Rice or Colin Powell in a heartbeat. They are both experienced people who know the demands of the job and would be well qualified as Commander in Chief. Obama, who refuses to talk to Vietnam Veterans and has barely consulted General Petraeus, might not even know the first thing about how to handle the position. With no true leadership experience, no concrete plan of action and no strong knowledge of exactly how many states there are, I just don't know that he'd make a good president, regardless of his race.

My real concern is with those who believe they must vote for him because being the first minority in a position is more important than having the position run well. I think that is the worst possible thing we could do as a nation. Civil rights are important, but not so important we need to compromise the safety, cohesion and future of our nation. That is not about racism, but about making the right decision.

I’ll talk about McCain later- that’s a story for a whole ‘nother day. But suffice it to say that when we as a party look at the failures of the Bush administration, we can see how seriously we need a new direction in the party. When we look at Obama, we clearly see the threat of inaction, leaving us much more than, well, shortchanged. We have the opportunity now to work together and do something right- hopefully the leadership will take notice (any time now!) and make the Republican Brand strong once again.

Opening the Floodgates- Does Internet News Inform Better Than Print News?

2008-05-30T12:16:00.000-07:00

While I'm in the habit of publishing obnoxiously long papers I've written, I decided I may as well throw this one into the mix- while I'm publishing this as post-dated, its date is about right, so it's all good. Enjoy!

Opening the Floodgates- Does Internet News Inform Better Than Print News?

In the last decade, the internet has brought us more than even Al Gore could have imagined in the early 1960's- our weather, entertainment, business, education and social lives will absolutely never be the same as they were before the explosion in internetusage. Now it is, quite literally, virtually impossible to engage in any kind of communication dialog without at least some mention of the internet- our lives have changed that drastically. However, despite hype about whether it causes psychological damage or disorders, this change is a positive and lasting feature which has still untapped potential, like some final frontier for communication which has yet to be fully explored.

As with the rest of the world, internet communication is changing the way people think about politics, and in a very interesting way. Particularly when it comes to internet communication, the news and information community has come a long way in increasing access to all people at all times. Now, we're beginning to see readership of newspapers declining as people begin to use the internet versions of the same services. And yet as more newspapers become free online, there are more available sources for the same kinds of news. So what process is going on with the readership side of this equation? How has this new availability of information increased the overall education of the public news consumers? Does increased availability increase consumption? Perhaps most interestingly, does increased consumption of internet news lead to an overall increase in voter education about political issues? That is the purpose of this review- to determine what prior evidence surrounds the topic of media consumption, and how to make that relevant.

The Importance of Voter Education

Numerous studies have already been done on the importance of voter education. There are studies already done about the advantages of educated voting. One survey found that when voters are not fully informed, they make “significantly better [choices] than they would by chance, but significantly less well than they would with complete information” (Bartels, 217). This should be a more obvious point, and it also has other effects.

To understand how political knowledge is acquired in the first place, it is important to look at the theories of knowledge accumulation, specifically the rational choice theory of public opinion discussed in Glynn, Herbst, O’Keefe, Shapiro and Lindeman. This economic theory boils need for additional knowledge down to self-interest- at the equilibrium of personal demand and information “supply”, one may find the range of political knowledge. Using this interpretation, there is just enough political knowledge available for people to act within their rational self interest. Voters without enough information may not vote when the relative costs of participation- information acquisition and voting- are too high. In fact, there may be a free-rider effect, where less-educated citizens rely on better informed citizens to vote for them rather than taking in the knowledge as well (Glynn et. al. 270). In fact, the concept that voter turnout may be increased through increased voter education is supported by the findings of Niemi and Weisberg in 2001, where it is shown that less educated citizens are more likely to feel disengaged than citizens with a higher level educational background (25). Abramson, Aldrich and Rohde enforces this point by citing a study which showed the greatest decline in voter turnout coming from the two least educated groups while college graduates maintained a consistent turnout (95).

The Internet as a Service

The internet is an increasingly well-used tool in the 2008 election, and studies show that more people are using electronic media to form opinions on candidates than ever before. 42 percent of voters now look to the internet for information about candidates. Of that percentage, traditional news sources dominate at 88% of voters looking at internet for information, while the actual campaign websites for the candidates garnered only a paltry 30 percent. 42 percent go to what this report calls “social media” sites. As the age group gets lower, more people visit these social media sites. Specifically, 61 percent of 18-24 year olds and 55 percent of 25-34 year olds look for election information on user-driven content sites ranging from YouTube to Wikipedia and various blogs (iCrossing, 2007). 75 percent of college students have a Facebook account and 82 percent had checked that account within 24 hours. (Pew Research Center, 2007). This trend suggests a specific focus for younger voters in greater numbers using social networking to find information about candidates.

Newspapers Online and Print

Studies have been done which show a correlation between online newspapers and real life print media. According to the Pew Research Center in 2006, research shows that while internet news is growing in popularity, only 9% of those polled read internet news for 30 minutes or longer at a sitting. Altogether, internet news readers spent an average of 32 minutes on online news and print media consumers spent an average of 40 minutes reading print newspapers. Print newspapers are visited online in significantly lower margins than websites featuring quick snippets of the news. Younger news readers are more likely to go to online newspapers now because they are listed online, breaking with the overall trend of lower newspaper consumption overall. A generational gap is cited as a reason more of the younger news consumers are looking online for their news, and the medium has a lot to do with this. Those dissatisfied with print news cite time constraints as the reason they read less, while praising internet news for its instant access and availability (Pew Research Center, 2006). This fits a lot of the expectations I had for this kind of study.

Political Knowledge, Then and Now

Studies also show that while there have been across-the-board increases in information access, overall political knowledge has dropped. This survey looks at overall political knowledge over time. Since 1989, name recognition has dropped for the name of the vice president of the US (5%), the state governor (8%), and the president of Russia (11%). The study has some overlapping data with what I am looking for in my study, showing that:

Internet news sources, National Public Radio, news magazines, and Rush Limbaugh's radio show have the best educated audiences, with each of these having at least 36% of their regular readers and listeners having graduated from college. The internet sources along with the comedy news shows attract younger-than-average audiences, though many older Americans regularly get news from these sources as well (Pew Research Center, 2007).

This study also found that news magazine readers were in the “high knowledge group” at 48% and newspaper readers at 43%. Internet news sites such as Google and Yahoo scored at 41%, TV news sites scored 44% and online blog readers scored 37% for regular audiences (Pew Research Center, 2007). These findings do not fully answer the question about relative consumption as it looks at regular audiences rather than consumption over time, but simply generalized about overall audiences. This is important to note, especially as the previously quoted study stated that each has a different overall consumption rate.

Theory and Expectations

Common sense dictates that the more time one spends on reading news articles, the more knowledge one will acquire. For the past generations of voters, there has been a relatively static choice of news media options available for the general public. There would be a local newspaper, the local radio, the evening TV newscast, and perhaps a national subscription to balance things out. Not only were a significant limit on the amount of news the average person was exposed to, but there was also a premium for content- in radio and television, there were entire sections of time that were blocked off, costing the consumer time and interrupting the content. In addition, the material is not always available, and if one misses a news story, there is no guarantee it will be replayed, and definitely not on demand. In newspapers, there was a dollar amount attached to the premium- while the ads may not interrupt the constant flow of information and you could read around them, the content was associated with a real cost in dollars. One of the chief concerns with these mediums is that their content is entirely editorial-driven. While there are some consumer concerns that come into play as these must have ratings to survive, the content is always decided by an editor rather than the consumer, creating an inherent barrier between the editor and the consumer. These premiums created a substantial barrier to entry that made direct consumption and full understanding of electoral processes limited to some, and practically impossible to others. Much of the voter apathy and corresponding drop in turnout may have something to do with the lack of connection many voters feel with their surrounding political environment. Therefore, it will be important to see if there are any differences in voting behavior which can be tracked across the different variables. If internet news is shown to be a predictor of voting behavior, later studies can show how motivation effects can be applied to internet news and similar sources. Political knowledge has already been shown to change per medium, but by looking more directly at the relative consumption, perhaps more accurate assessments can be made as to which is more educational. Given the improvements and increases in accessibility, a given population of consumers of online newspapers should be better informed and more likely to be politically involved than a given population of consumers of print newspapers. In this application, the expectation is that as consumption for print or internet news rises, so will turnout and political knowledge, but for online newspapers, the trend will be at a higher rate than for print media.

Research Design

One of the best ways of gauging general voter political knowledge is to ask political knowledge questions. I feel this provides a somewhat universal predictor of engagement with the media and provides a general idea of how much retention the reader has. It would be ideal to use the findings of the 2006 Pew Research Center study to provide a control for amount of time spent consuming news in print and online, but the closest variable I can find is average days per week spent. Regardless, this variable still looks at the question of consumption with more depth than the earlier 2007 Pew Research Center study. Also, I will look to see whether the 2004 figures fit with the overall trends of political knowledge shown by its data. By looking at figures more related to the actual consumption vs. knowledge, the actual differences can be isolated. Also, as the 2007 study showed similar education background for both internet and print news, there doesn't need to be the same level of control in place. There will be two independent variables- print newspaper consumption and online newspaper consumption. Both will be tracked for the dependent variables of voter turnout and basic political knowledge.

Data

Data was found by using the SDA American National Election Study (ANES) 2004 data sheet. The independent variables looked at were based on the question “How many days in the PAST WEEK did you read a daily newspaper on the Internet (online)?” and “How many days in the PAST WEEK did you read a daily newspaper?” These were both cross-tabulated with questions about turnout and. Figure 1 shows how turnout across the two variables:

Fig. 1- Election Turnout as a result of news media consumption

The political knowledge graphs showed more interesting data, and were gauging questions about political knowledge, specifically name association with office title of three significant political figures- Dick Cheney, William Rehnquist and Tony Blair.

Fig. 2- Name Recognition, Dick Cheney

Fig. 3- Name Recognition, William Rehnquist

Fig. 4- Name Recognition, Tony Blair

Analysis

The data clearly shows that in nearly all cases, there is a higher relationship between internet newspapers and consumer political knowledge than exists with print newspapers and political knowledge. This challenges the earlier findings of the Pew Research Center 2007 study, but it looks to the consumption rather than the aggregate findings. This is relative when looking at the 2006 study which showed the differences between consumption between the two, therefore showing The problem with this data is not that it has outliers, but that it does not conclusively prove that the separation is significant because the increase in political knowledge is not higher to a significant enough degree.

Turnout statistics showed similar results. While still not statistically significant, there seems to be a clear correlation between online news consumption and turnout at a higher rate than with print media. The difficulty with this data is that a lot of the data is predicated on the voter having voted. Out of the whole survey overall, few total survey takers would admit to not having voted. However, the correlation remains, and serves to prove the findings of Abramson et al which showed that as voter education improves, so does participation. The Pew studies cleared the way for looking at the Internet as a source for that education. From there, it will be increasingly important to see where this trend of voter participation goes, and whether the internet continues to exert a force on voter participation well into the next century.

Appendix A – Variables

Independent variables:

How many days in the PAST WEEK did you read a daily newspaper on the Internet (online)?”

“How many days in the PAST WEEK did you read a daily newspaper?”

Dependent variables:

Percentage correct answer

Percentage voted in elections

Appendix B: Tables

Turnout		Print		Internet
0 days	70.6		77.8
1 days	85.5		85.1
2 days	80		93.5
3 days	82.5		90.1
4 days	75.5		77.7
5 days	80.9		100
6 days	88.8		100
Every day	88.7		84.7

Bibliography

Abramson, Paul R., et. al. Change and Continuity in the 2004 and 2006 Elections. Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 2007.

Bartels, Larry M. Uninformed votes: Information Effects in Presidential Elections. American Journal of Political Science: 40 (1996).

Glynn, Carroll J., Herbst, Susan, O’Keefe, Garrett J., Shapiro, Robert Y. & Lindeman, Mark. Public Opinion. 2^nd ed. Cambridge, MA: Westview Press. 2004.

iCrossing. 2007. “How America Searches: Election '08.” iCrossing Digital Marketing Company http://www.icrossing.com/articles/how_america_searches_election_2008.pdf

Lawrence, Christopher N. 2007. Should Voters be Encyclopedias? Measuring the Relative Performance of Sophistication Indicators. New Orleans: Tulane University, 2007.

The Pew Research Center. 2006. “Online Papers Modestly Boost Newspaper Readership.” http://people-press.org/reports/pdf/282.pdf

The Pew Research Center. 2007. “Public Knowledge of Current Affairs Little Changed by News and Information Revolutions - What Americans Know: 1989-2007” http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=319

Niemi, Richard G., and Herbert F. Weisberg. Controversies in Voting Behavior. 4^th Ed. Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 2001.

Survey Documentation and Analysis. Survey Methods Program (CSM), University of California, Berkeley. http://sda.berkeley.edu

Political Campaigning in a Web 2.0 World: Facebook and the Youth Vote

2008-05-05T18:14:00.000-07:00

At the risk of seeming like I only publishing tediously long academic pieces, I will post my paper for Advanced Campaigns and Elections for critique and suggestion, primarily as it has to with online data collection and this kind of thing is ripe for it anyway. I promise I will return to my previous format of random rants regarding Republican realities, but in due time. So now, without further ado, my paper on what I'll be doing during most of next semester in American University. Enjoy!

Political Campaigning in a Web 2.0 World: Facebook and the Youth Vote

Introduction

The greatest goal of democracy is to empower the citizenry to work with its government for the greatest overall good. Until recently, this goal had to be met through the necessary compromise of representative majority, where in many cases, a few would represent many, usually in a manner which was necessarily fitted towards a trustee role rather than a pure delegate format. At bare minimum, there were relatively few instances where the representatives could reliably communicate with their constituents; as with any proportional representation, input would only be as fast as the communication that was available during that time. But now, as with every other area of communication, the face of political communication is changing like never before.

The age of digital instant communication has changed much of our world already, and the time has come where it can begin to modify the processes and structures of democracy as well. By creating and utilizing interactive forums, policymakers can gain access into a great untapped reserve of previously unreachable constituencies in a way that is truly unprecedented. This separates itself from generalized public polling because this method allows politicians to get access to these voters in their native environment- engaging interest at the source. While this potential is still largely untapped by the mainstream political elite, there has been a rise in the political targeting of Web 2.0 platforms, which are basically interactive websites which allow user-driven content distribution through instantaneous communication. This demarcates a clear difference between dynamic websites, like social networks and Wikipedia-like pages, and static websites with set pages and no real interaction. These websites have been used heavily for election campaigning recently, specifically for the 2008 presidential election. Examples of these interactive websites targeted for campaigning are Facebook, MySpace and YouTube, where, while there is little evidence the candidates are making any significant changes due to the input of the content users, content is making headway into the consciousness of these core voters.
It remains to be seen whether these kinds of applications will have any sort of digital “second life” if the candidate they represent actually attains office, and whether they would have any purpose as such. Yet on their face, web campaign applications set a new kind of election precedent; now, more than ever in the history of our democracy, the grassroots support of individuals has a better opportunity to decide who does (and perhaps who does not) make it into the Oval Office.
Research of this nature can be very difficult as it deals with constantly evolving technology; therefore it is rather challenging to build from existing peer-reviewed research, as it would necessarily be outdated by its time of publication. More relevantly, effects of these applications will have to be determined based on measurable outputs, as in many cases there can be significant overlap in involvement by individuals who may even choose to be in online groups solely to antagonize those who agree with the stated purpose of the group. In order to see whether there is any effect of these online and consequently ethereal campaign applications, the involvement must correspond with some real-world variable, in this case, voter turnout. This may work well as an indicator as having an effective online presence may help a candidate capture the recent upward trend in young voters (The Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement [CIRCLE], 2005). By capitalizing on this fledgling trend, candidates can ensure not only a greater visibility to a normally underrepresented and therefore ripe demographic, but also create a solid branding that will encourage the corresponding generation to increase civic engagement and also boost potential for future generations. In this light, the importance of studying the effects of online campaigning cannot be overstated.
By focusing on web applications and their importance to internet social networking in the 18-24 demographic, I can isolate a particular area candidates have campaigned in for the 2008 election and gauge their efficacy through a well-designed pre- and post-election survey. This paper will review literature on traditional and current turnout by this demographic, social networking as an effective campaigning medium, surveying techniques, and finally suggest a research design that will cover potentially instrumental variables in web applications.

Literature Review

In examining the background necessary for conducting research on the 2008 presidential election, it is crucial to understand how voter education can lead to voter participation, the importance of young voter participation, social networking, and historical internet campaigning.

The Importance of Voter Education in Young Voter Participation

When looking at young voter participation, it is important to look at the theories of political knowledge accumulation, specifically the economic theory of public opinion discussed in Glynn, Herbst, O’Keefe, Shapiro and Lindeman. This economic theory reduces demand for additional knowledge down to self-interest- at the equilibrium of personal demand and information “supply”; one may find the range of political knowledge. Using this interpretation, there is just enough political knowledge available for people to act within their rational self interest. Voters without enough information may not vote when the relative costs of participation- information acquisition and voting- are too high. In fact, there may be a free-rider effect, where less-educated citizens rely on better informed citizens to vote for them rather than taking in the knowledge as well (Glynn 2004). In fact, the concept that voter turnout may be increased through increased voter education is supported by the findings of Niemi and Weisberg in 2001, where it is shown that less educated citizens are more likely to feel disengaged than citizens with a higher level of educational background. Abramson, Aldrich and Rohde enforce this point by citing a study which showed the greatest decline in voter turnout coming from the two least educated groups while college graduates (which are at the upper end of the 18-24 age bracket) maintained a consistent turnout (2007). This also matches with what is already being shown in current political participation- as education increases, the possibility one will have watched presidential debates also rises (Pew 2008). Issue specialization leaves significant gaps in overall understanding of the political realm (Niemi and Weisberg, 101). Together with the findings of Glynn et al., there becomes a clear need for a generalized source for political knowledge. Currently, campaigns have left “holes” in issue connection through their campaign websites (iCrossing, 2007). This is crucial in understanding the importance of political knowledge as when voters are not fully informed, they make “significantly better [choices] than they would by chance, but significantly less well than they would with complete information” (Bartels,1996).

The Apathy of Young Voters

The 18-24 year old voting block votes less frequently than the rest of the population. There is also a significant age correlation for political participation: those watching presidential debates- those aged 65+ watched the debates at a 22% higher rate than those in the 18-29 bracket (Pew Research Institute, 2008). This clearly points to an isolation of younger voters in more than just voting, but also in desire for involvement through traditional fields. More recently, there has been an upsurge in these new voters which has been attributed to the new web political presences. There has also been some skepticism about whether that reflects a new trend or whether it is a minor fluke (CIRCLE, 2005).
There have been many new kinds of voting efforts which have tried to reach out to younger voters in new ways, with varying degrees of success. What campaigns have found brings a moderate degree of success is having a separate campaign that specifically targets younger voters with a personal touch. In 2004, there were wide-scale campaigns targeting young voters with personal messages and other advertisements. These resulted in a net increase in turnout of 5%. Partisanship affected the campaigns positively, as did specific targeting. These results show that it is possible to make ground in the electorate, even if moderate, by targeting young voters (Friedrichs, Nickerson, Mervilde and York 2006). Therefore, the crucial ingredient missing is a medium through which voters in the 18-24 year bracket can get political information in a relevant way to their experience.

Involvement in Social Networking, and Potential for Younger Voters

The internet is an increasingly well-used tool in the 2008 election, and studies show that more people are using electronic media to form opinions on candidates than ever before. 42 percent of voters now look to the internet for information about candidates (iCrossing, 2007). Of that percentage, traditional news sources dominate at 88% of voters looking at internet for information, while the actual campaign websites for the candidates garnered only a paltry 30 percent (Ibid). 42 percent go to what this report calls “social media” sites (Ibid). As the age group gets lower, more people visit these social media sites. Specifically, 61 percent of 18-24 year olds and 55 percent of 25-34 year olds look for election information on user-driven content sites ranging from YouTube to Wikipedia and various blogs (Ibid). 75 percent of college students have a Facebook account and 82 percent had checked that account within 24 hours. (Institute of Politics, 2007). This trend suggests a specific focus for younger voters in greater numbers using social networking to find information about candidates. This fits with the data from the Pew Research Center- there has been a steady increase in use of the internet as a resource for political knowledge- the numbers for those who have “regularly learned something from” internet sources has grown from 9% in 2000 to 13% in 2004 to 24% in 2008 (2008). There is also a visible shift from TV and newspaper consumption to internet sources for the source with the “most election news”- between 2004 and 2007 internet jumped from 21 to 46 while TV and Newspaper dropped 15 and 6 points, respectively (Ibid). And while there was a downward trend in younger voters watching televised debates, there is a reverse trend in watching clips of candidates online- on average younger voters are more likely than older voters to have watched online campaign video.

Current and Previous Campaign Internet Involvement

This ongoing 2008 Presidential race represents the largest explosion of political use and popularity of internet applications. However there are some records of prior presidential elections where the internet has played a significant role- 2004 was the year when many fundamental aspects of internet campaigning first made their appearances- ironically through the Democratic candidate of Howard Dean. Cornfield points out 5 areas in which Dean’s campaign “revolutionized online campaigning”- News-based fundraising appeals, internet-arranged local meetings/meet-ups, blogging, internet referenda and group decision (Cornfield, n.d.). Specifically relating to younger voters is the social networking aspects of blogging and interactive content, which were significant in Dean’s campaign. While certainly not new, political blogs were taken to the next level when Dean’s “Blog for America” posted 2,910 entries and received 314,121 comments, one of which started a project resulting in 115,632 handwritten letters sent to Iowa and New Hampshire voters (Ibid). Targeting methods originating in Dean’s campaign were later used in the Bush and Kerry campaigns, where three out of four Kerry campaign emails contained action boxes for money and 78% of Bush campaign emails contained boxes for referring friends to the campaign (Ibid). This is all very ironic because it was the internet that some say brought his campaign to an end- after the now-infamous “Dean Scream”, which has become somewhat of a moniker for highly publicized political blunder spread over the internet, his whole campaign was “brought down with blinding speed” (CBS News, 2006). This is a political lesson which would have been very beneficial for Sen. George Allen to have learned in the 2008 election cycle- according to one source,

As badly as Dean was hurt by the constant… replay of his scream the night of the 2004 Iowa caucuses, it was nothing compared to what happened to… George Allen in his re-election campaign last year, when he was caught on video calling an Asian man "macaca," … a racial slur… The video of Allen went "viral" almost immediately and penetrated the political consciousness so deeply that Allen couldn't recover. (Pierce, 2007).

History’s lessons, it appears, even in the case of very recent history, if not learned, can come back with a vengeance. However, not all of the lessons were negative, and many positive things came from the 2004 elections which are still having influence today. Altogether, the online community represents an opportunity unlike any other in American history- not only because it represents a new avenue for political involvement, but it also increases overall involvement even in other areas of politics-

Each online audience has a larger potential for activism than its offline counterparts simply because it has more communications and persuasion tools to exploit… The more citizens use the internet, the more they might expect from campaigners and political journalists: rapid responses to information searches; a multiplicity of perspectives available on controversies; short and visually arresting promotional messages; drill-down capacities into referenced databases; more transparency from, and access to, institutions and players. Meanwhile, on the supply side of the political equation, candidates, groups, and parties now have models for how to use the internet to raise money, mobilize voters, and create public buzz. The new benchmarks established in 2004 could well be matched and surpassed in 2008. (Cornfield, n.d.).

This neatly represents the expectations for this paper- unfortunately there are no major scholarly peer-reviewed articles pertaining to this particular subject, yet the general consensus seems to be that this election year will surpass every other year.

Theory and Expectations

My primary purpose in this research is to find interesting trends in political Facebook applications. The ultimate goal is to find which methods of increasing participation actually affect turnout.
• Candidate pages with more direct communication to the user will create more user engagement with the campaign. When the application gives the end-user the impression that they have inside knowledge about the campaign, the end-user will feel significantly more engaged with the campaign.
• User-content driven application creates even more engagement. The chief benefit of having interactivity on any level of web design is that it allows the users to feel like they are a part of the process. This allows more issue-based connection with candidates- web applications have an incredible ability to cover issues left unaddressed by campaigns, and therefore may create more connection than the static webpage would (iCrossing, 2007).
• Targeted messaging can be critical in addressing concerns new voters have in voting. Messages targeting the specific concerns about voting for the first time can significantly increase the chances the voter will turn out that day. Research suggests voters in this demographic are on the verge on many issues, and while they do not want a guarantee by the government, some calculated assistance can make the difference in ensuring young voters come out and vote (Graduate School of Political Management, 2004).
• Users may avoid political association because they still support a former candidate. Subscription to a candidate profile may not translate into turnout, especially in the case of those who support candidates who are no longer in the race. A mediating factor will be whether the candidate in question has publically endorsed the party nominee to the satisfaction of the respondent, in which case there may be a mediating effect.
• Users may avoid political association because of potential polarization. Facebook provides a lot of information about its users publically, which is simultaneously a good thing and a bad thing. Many people want to avoid politics, not because they are not interested, but because they do not want to potentially lose friends or make people angry about it. In some cases, there may be a negative stigma associated with being of a particular party or identification- some respondents may still turn out but avoid these applications or pages to avoid making public statements.

Research Design

To gauge the response of voters in the 18-24 year age bracket and particularly to gauge turnout, a survey will need to be conducted. This study will gauge the effect of 2008 presidential online campaigning through Facebook- both campaign pages, which are managed through the campaigns of the candidates, and applications, which are moderated through third parties, will be gauged. In this study, 18-24 year olds will be asked if they have active accounts through Facebook and prior questions about their involvement therein, particularly with political pages and applications, and then about their political involvement through voting behavior.
Facebook was chosen as the social network of choice as candidates have pages already set up and political applications well underway- while MySpace has applications, the organization and development is nowhere near where the point that Facebook is already. Applications are viewed less as a measure of campaigning, but as independent involvement on the part of online supporters. This will be compared against the data involved with the campaign pages. The applications will be gauged on their interaction with the survey respondent- whether the respondent actively sought the application or was invited, how often the respondent uses the application, whether that respondent then invited other people to use the application, basically what kind of impact it is having. The campaign websites will be based on user interaction and recollection of how much interaction the respondent has with the campaign website. As many candidates have kept their Facebook pages running well after their campaign is officially closed, I ask if they continued to remain supporters of the politicians after the election is over. I will also need to find out if there were any notifications sent out supporting the party by the candidates who did not attain the nomination.
As no poll I personally know of currently exists that is conducting this kind of research, I will need to formulate my own. The kind of survey that would be most conducive to this would be an online poll capable of taking data comparable to that of the NES election questionnaires (presumably through the http://www.surveymonkey.com login affiliated through Tulane) which could most directly target the demographic and ask questions about their behavior and interaction with election applications to determine the variables discussed in Appendix A. See Appendix B for the design- loosely modeled after the NES post-election survey, it goes through two main sections- Facebook usage (particularly application usage) and political involvement. From here, the data will be comparing political applications and their use as predictors of political involvement.
For the purposes of attracting users to take this survey, there will be targeted rewards and sweepstakes entries pending completion and as I have available supplies. With luck, I can get grants and scholarships for the sweepstakes- this remains to be seen, but it should not be too difficult. After much consideration, I will only be conducting this survey after the election instead of before and after the election. A pre-election survey would only provide information about whether the earlier intentions of the Facebook users carried out till the election- not as pertinent to the actual study as I had originally supposed. Also, complications from creating follow-up, increased incentive and trackback for the study, while manageable, would have a greater chance to introduce more error into the process.
The preliminary targets for sending the survey data will be drawn from a client list in the age bracket ranging from 18 to 24, presumably purchased from a source like http://www.nrgresearchgroup.com. This will be the primary base for where the population will come from. From here, the sample will be split between Facebook users and non-Facebook users. If this is not a feasible option, Facebook advertisements may substitute for invitations from a list, and then there would have to be adjustments made to the final results to reflect the population and demographics of Facebook application users.
The benefit of this research design is that it lends itself well to many different kinds of findings- here, the final dependent variable is turnout, but different combinations of independent variables serve to explain that turnout and can work together in creating different outcomes while maintaining the theory described earlier. When looking at Appendix A, several key models emerge. The primary findings from this study will be from the first two variables from the Independent variable category. The first is the most obvious- whether increased usage of applications or readership of candidate profile information leads to an increase in turnout. That will prove if a correlation between usage of internet campaigning methods and turnout exists. The second is also important for future study- finding out what aspects of Facebook applications and politician profiles are most attractive to application users will be significantly beneficial to future campaigns so that the most attractive side can be most heavily emphasized.
However, other important findings may be derived from this data set which can enhance the strength of these findings- for the applications section, this could produce data which helps determine whether outside influence or personal initiative determines turnout or involvement, where usage is the dependent variable and initiative vs. invitation is the independent variable. In this case, a non-correlation can be a very positive thing as it means that content drives usage more than individual initiative- essentially that regardless of the “free-rider” friend invitation effect, content is driving usage rather than the other way around.
In the context of the profile pages, understanding the background of a single supporter may provide more predictive context than even the support itself. Other candidates simultaneously supported by the respondent may indicate remaining bitterness about the turnout of the primaries. One thing I have personally noted is that Mike Huckabee, whose page I followed on Facebook, after losing his long-shot bid at the nomination, not only endorsed McCain over traditional media forms, but online and to his Facebook followers as well. This may serve as a predictor of last-minute turnout and may spell out a subtle difference between Republican and Democrat turnout- as the Republicans have had time to rally around McCain and at the publishing of this paper there is no unified Democratic nominee, there may be resounding resentment at the time of the election. These effects can be measured at this critical juncture by inquiring into whether there are other pages the respondent is currently subscribed to which reflect that sort of split background.
Of course, at that juncture it may largely depend on the degree to which other former candidates are willing to rally around their new nominee, which is why the other variable is in place- to determine whether the other groups are being offset by rallying effects. Here, if, say, a disgruntled democratic voter supported a candidate who was not the nominee and was involved to the degree where they would maintain that page out of solidarity with that candidate, were that candidate to give their vocal and undivided support to the party nominee, the disenfranchised democrat would be one of the first to find out through the politician profile. If the respondent does not find out about that endorsement or for some reason that vocal support does not make it onto the Facebook fan page, it would explain a corresponding disenfranchisement and drop in turnout. So here, solidarity and loyalty to the nominee are predictors of turnout, but additional campaign profiles endorsing the nominee can have a reinforcement effect.

(Expected) Results

Respondents with no Facebook account are still asked for their political actions as a group to test against for political participation. The theory is that as this group has the least opportunity to take advantage of the social networking opportunities of Facebook and the corresponding political information which is especially well suited towards their age group, they will be the most politically disaffected of all the respondents, and will show the least amount of political participation. Even though they provide no perspective on effective elements of Facebook applications, their data serves as a baseline for political involvement against which all other data is judged. Independently interesting is the general percentage of 18-24 year olds with Facebook accounts. As this figure is continuously growing, getting a current number on the growth of this community should be independently important to future surveys and studies.
The next highest level of political participation will be expected from those who have a Facebook account, but neither adds political applications nor supports any presidential candidates. My theory is that their involvement will be necessarily higher as they will at least have the opportunity to pick up on political information through chance invitations by friends or through advertisements by groups or campaigns. In this case, almost every Facebook account-holder should have some awareness that the campaigns are available and the opportunity is there if they so choose- they are much more likely to come across random bits of political knowledge than those without accounts. Also, this political knowledge will be packaged in a much more digestible format than traditional political knowledge mediums allow, therefore the retention capability will be higher. Carrying that concept forward, the overall time spent on Facebook should be a general indicator of overall likelihood of political participation- even those without political applications or politician pages.
The level after that will be between the account-holding group which has the applications without the candidate support and the account-holding group with the candidate support but without political applications. It will be very interesting to see which will have higher turnout; based on the theory of campaign appeal through personalized message opportunity, I predict that those with candidate ties will generally be more likely to turn out for their candidate given that their candidate is the nominee, but those with political applications will be differentiated based on how often they use their applications. On average, the two may not be statistically different because they are so close together, but I expect those with the closer ties to the campaign to have generally higher turnout. What makes this so interesting is that the reasons for being involved with a campaign and not a political application or installing a political application but not supporting a candidate will probably be very disparate. In the case of the political application holder, he or she may not feel comfortable with a candidate, or may not want to display their support of a candidate publically, yet still want to have an area to publically discuss political issues or consume news about politics. This is why the question about appeal is so important- why applications are added may have a lot to do with what is done with the application. Then again, I may find that the content itself drives turnout rather than other influences.
Clearly, the highest turnout of all is expected of those account holders who have both the political applications and the candidate support pages. This is based on how relative exposure to campaigns should decrease voter apathy and increase the likelihood of turnout and opportunity for mobilization. Of course this will fluctuate based on application usage, candidate connection and nominee presence/endorsement, but overall this should represent the highest turnout as they are most significantly exposed to both the campaign and the opportunity for involvement.
Turnout will also be significant when looking at the second independent variables- the feature selection. This survey includes the following options for why people added the application: to get information about election; find other supporters; show public support for candidates; debate others online; whether friend invited; not sure. In this data, it will be interesting to identify trends of interest in politics and hopefully find some level of crossover between the applications and the pages. This may also help with identifying differences between applications and pages, where pages may be more indicative as they show more obvious visible support and those seeking to publically align themselves with the candidate. Again, this will be mediated by the effect of whether there are other former candidate pages still being subscribed to, but the most significant effect out of all of the data will be which trends identified can be linked with the highest turnout. If there is significant data pointing to a trend which seems to have a lot of related turnout, it can be helpful for future internet campaigning purposes- by emphasizing certain elements of applications or pages, and they can be properly advertised and most effectively utilized.
The opposite effect can also be addressed- those who did not add the application or page have an opportunity to explain why they did not want to add the page. The two are similar for the purposes of comparison, each with options for: I do not add Facebook applications/pages; privacy concerns- everyone can see my positions (which can also lead to the development of friend limit theory); time consuming (usage or reading updates); not interested in politics; not interested in particular candidate; do not know. For these cases a lot of potential reasons for non-involvement are addressed- these have been added due to personal observation- some people simply do not add applications because it messes with the aesthetics of their profile pages in some way, and it really does not mean altogether too much about their personal politics, it merely means they do not add extraneous information. Same goes for those with privacy concerns, although it has less to do with aesthetics, it has the same or more to do with public appearance. Of course if the person is very interested in politics, those considerations will probably not be as important, but then again these individuals are more likely to turn out regardless. The benefit of the application is that it provides reinforcement effects for those moderately interested in politics and increases their exposure to relevant information. However, here too campaigns can use this information to more effectively target users and minimize the off-putting effects.
Also important in finding out how these pieces fit together is finding out whether more people come because they wanted the application before finding it or because they were invited by friends. This is important because, as mentioned earlier, this data can show whether application involvement is determined by prior interest or by reaction to content (this will also be an important filter through which turnout can be seen) without prior interest. This will cancel out those with the original incentive to actually find the application on their own and the actual ability for the application or pages to increase the turnout of otherwise less politically motivated can be gauged.
Other indicators that may prove interesting are the “friends invited” variable and the amount of time spent on Facebook as a control for political involvement and overall exposure to general political factors respectively. If I get a significant number of people who have invited other friends, it may be interesting to see whether those people found the application themselves or if they were themselves invited- this may again be an indicator of content-driven or previous interest. While many already-interested people may have gotten their invitation from their interested friends, the most involved people should be the ones who personally found the application. This will be seen through the lens of the demographic information.
Finally, demographic information can be used as necessary- although admittedly not the point of the entire exercise, there may be some interesting findings from that, especially along political lines and whether there are significant trends among general Facebook users, especially political ones. Strong partisans should be more likely to turn out anyway, but there should be some reinforcement effects through the applications, pages and other political options through Facebook. Through the demographic backend questions, the other questions can be improved in scope- questions about personal involvement, turnout and usage all filter through these pre-existing preferences. This will add a lot of dimension to the final study and perhaps later research done through the corresponding data set.
In all cases, it is clear that while many of the variables may not result in anything statistically worth reporting on, there is a lot of opportunity to find some interesting information. Specifically in the case of whether content can drive turnout or if it all has to do with whether the recipient was active or passive in their support, the findings of this survey will be instrumental in deciding which approaches should be stressed in developing applications for future campaigns.

References

Abramson, Paul R., Aldrich, John H., Rohde, David W. “Change and Continuity in the 2004 and 2006 Elections.” Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 2007. 96.

Bartels, Larry M. “Uninformed votes: Information Effects in Presidential Elections.” American Journal of Political Science: 40 (1996). 217.

CBS News “YouTube Making Politicians Sweat- Gaffes Caught On Tape, Posted On Popular Web Site Impacting Races” CBS Broadcasting Inc. 2006. Accessed 30 April 2008. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/09/26/earlyshow/main2039588.shtml

The Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning & Engagement. 2005. “Youth Voter Turnout 1992 to 2004: Estimates from Exit Polls.” Accessed 30 April 2008.
http://www.pewtrusts.org/uploadedFiles/wwwpewtrustsorg/Reports/Youth_voting/CIRCLE_Paper35.pdf

Cornfield, Michael. “THE INTERNET AND CAMPAIGN 2004: A Look Back at the Campaigners.” Pew Research Center. Accessed 30 April 2008. 1-3.
http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/Cornfield_commentary.pdf

Friedrichs, Ryan, Nickerson, David, Mervilde, Laura, and York, Tegan. 2006. “Young Voter Mobilization in 2004- Analysis of Outreach, Persuasion and Turnout of 18-29 Year Old Progressive Voters” Accessed 30 April 2008. http://www.skylinepublicworks.com/downloads/Young%20Voter%202004%20Analysis.pdf

Glynn, Carroll J., Herbst, Susan, O’Keefe, Garrett J., Shapiro, Robert Y. & Lindeman, Mark. “Public Opinion.” 2nd ed. Cambridge, MA: Westview Press. 2004.

Graduate School of Political Management. 2004. “New Voters Brief.” George Washington University Accessed 30 April 2008. http://www.pewtrusts.org/uploadedFiles/wwwpewtrustsorg/Reports/Youth_voting/new_voters_brief_0504.pdf

iCrossing. 2007. “How America Searches: Election '08.” iCrossing Digital Marketing Company Accessed 30 April 2008. http://www.icrossing.com/articles/how_america_searches_election_2008.pdf

Institute of Politics. 2007. “The 12th Biannual Youth Survey on Politics and Public Service.”Harvard University Accessed 30 April 2008. http://www.youngvoterstrategies.org/index.php?tg=fileman&idx=get&id=1&gr=Y&path=Research&file=Harvard+IOP+Spring+2007+Executive+Summary.pdf

The Pew Research Center. “Internet's Broader Role in Campaign 2008 - Social Networking and Online Videos Take Off.” 2008. Accessed 30 April 2008. http://people-press.org/reports/pdf/384.pdf

Pierce, Charles P. (17 June 2007). “Mud in the digital age.” Boston Globe, Third Edition, 36.

Niemi, Richard G., and Herbert F. Weisberg. “Controversies in Voting Behavior.” 4th Ed. Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 2001.

The United States as a Christian Nation

2008-05-01T10:42:00.000-07:00

In keeping with my trend of writing exponentially long papers about highly controversial subjects, I've decided that this blog will detail a paper I've written largely under the guidance of recent comments about my posts and remarks that they might lack some degree of verifiability. Fortunately, I have a class that concerns this very matter, and a corresponding term paper I would love to see comments on. So, whether you feel this is good or bad, or if you have some sort of remark of any nature, I wold love to see comments. Hopefully I can one day use this as a writing sample. Enjoy!

Religion in American Politics -The Case for a Christian Nation

“The highest glory of the American Revolution was this: it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity" (Kettler, 610). This quote from John Quincy Adams, the sixth president of the United States, clearly demonstrates an association often seen by many modern commentators as paradoxical at best and detrimental at worst. However it is the relationship between the church and the state, specifically Christianity and the federal government, which underlies the basis of many historical, foundational aspects of our nation. While it is clear to all that Christianity neither is or was an established national religion in America, the case can be made that Christianity is the common law moral foundation of the nation. This can still be seen in the underlying basis of the foundational institutions and policies of our country as well as the legacies left by our founding fathers. In examining the founding era for America- highlighting critical events from the Mayflower Compact to the treaty of Tripoli- it is most important to examine the impact of both nominal statements of founding fathers and the corresponding policies that went with those statements. In each area, the claims for and against the concept of a religiously founded nation will be judged in terms of basis, purpose and context.

The first and most obvious nominal statement to judge is the quote by Thomas Jefferson that there was “a wall of separation between Church and State” in relation to the establishment clause and protection of natural rights. However, I find that this is often left without the context that this was primarily a letter between a state official and a church body- not regarding religious impact on federal decisions but regarding federal impact on religious decisions. Specifically, the Danbury Baptist Association was upset because the leaders felt that going through a government-sanctioned process to avoid paying church taxes was a violation of their freedom (Boston). This is specifically regarding the intervention of the Federal government on the actions of individual believers, not vice versa. Also ignored is the fact that Jefferson’s letter goes on to say:

“I reciprocate your kind prayers for the protection & blessing of the common father and creator of man, and tender you for yourselves & your religious association, assurances of my high respect & esteem.” (Jefferson)

While this maintains the respect for the establishment clause, it still recognizes, in similar nominal form, the common backgrounds of faith shared by both the state official and the church association. It also leaves room for states to choose for themselves how or whether they want their own While many have interpreted the “wall of separation” to mean that there may be no involvement of either church or state in the other's realm, here, it is in response to concerns by the Danbury Baptist Association that

“...what religious privileges we enjoy (as a minor part of the State) we enjoy as favors granted, and not as inalienable rights: and these favors we receive at the expense of such degrading acknowledgments, as are inconsistent with the rights of freemen.” (Dodge)

The clear concern was that, as a part of the state, the association wanted to ensure that their religious privileges would be permanent and not just a function of the legislation of the government. The wall then would be the non-interference of government in free exercise, and the recognition of religious exercise by the government should be kept as an inalienable right. More context also exists which is often ignored- there was an earlier draft of the piece that Jefferson wrote which was edited in the final version for political expedience. According to a bulletin in the Library of Congress,

The unedited draft of the Danbury Baptist letter makes it clear why Jefferson drafted it: He wanted his political partisans to know that he opposed proclaiming fasts and thanksgivings, not because he was irreligious, but because he refused to continue a British practice that was an offense to republicanism. To emphasize his resolve in this matter, Jefferson inserted two phrases …: "wall of eternal separation between church and state" and "the duties of my station, which are merely temporal." These last words -- "merely temporal" -- revealed Jefferson's preoccupation with British practice. Temporal, a strong word meaning secular, was a British appellation for the lay members of the House of Lords, the Lords Temporal, as opposed to the ecclesiastical members, the Lords Spiritual. "Eternal separation" and "merely temporal" -- here was language as plain as Jefferson could make it to assure the Republican faithful that their "religious rights shall never be infringed by any act of mine." (Hutson)

Jefferson had been opposed to religious celebrations by the new American republic as it would give the impression that the government was showing partiality to one sort of Christian tradition over another, not that he was avoiding religion altogether. The editing process shows that religion was such a matter of significance in that time that, regardless of whether there was a true “wall of separation” in place or not, religion was definitely having an impact on how at least Thomas Jefferson was acting and what he chose to say. This proves that while he was advocating non-involvement by government in religion, religion was having an effect on government. In fact, this article goes on to say:

Jefferson's public support for religion appears, however, to have been more than a cynical political gesture… in the 1790s Jefferson developed a more favorable view of Christianity that led him to endorse the position of his fellow Founders that religion was necessary for the welfare of a republican government, that it was… indispensable for the happiness and prosperity of the people. Jefferson had, in fact, said as much in his First Inaugural Address. His attendance at church services in the House was, then, his way of offering symbolic support for religious faith and for its beneficent role in republican government. (Ibid)

So, in fact, there was an effect of religion on even Thomas Jefferson. This context shows a different implication than mere separatism- that while the church should be free of interference, the government should also be free to recognize (rather than from recognizing) the importance religion, particularly Christianity, has in governing the lives of the citizens. This recognition is crucial as it shows that ignorance by the government about the role of the church will be to the detriment of the rights of the citizens as a whole, and to itself. As even Jefferson himself came to recognize, religion is not only necessary for the people of the United States, but it is also necessary for the welfare of the government of the United States. This recognition is crucial to understanding the other arguments involved in nominal recognition of Christianity as a common law basis for the nation as it is shared by many other founding fathers.

And yet the claim can clearly be made that these nominal statements have no effect on actual policy, that they amount to mere words and have no effect on lasting policy of the country. In point of fact, when looking to the area of policy, we can clearly see that the nominal statements are actually rather poignant, and are influential in shaping the direction of the policies. James Madison, fourth president of the United States and widely considered “Father of the Constitution”, objected to slavery using religious principles, stating

"It is a great evil and under the providence of God, I look forward to some scheme of emancipation which shall free us from it. Do not, therefore, let us appear as if we regarded it perpetual, by using in our free Constitution an odious word opposed to every sentiment of liberty." (Morris, 177)

The underlying argument here is derived from a religious perspective, and prevented precedent from being set which would have caused even more lasting divisions in the Civil War era.

Even before the founding of the nation as separate from Britain, the Mayflower compact, established a legal precedent of recognition of Christianity:

Having undertaken, for the Glory of God and advancement of the Christian Faith and Honour of our King and Country, a Voyage to plant the First Colony in the Northern Parts of Virginia... (Bradford)

This recognition is even seen in the form of a covenant between God and Man, particularly those who were coming to create their own new traditions in the new nation, largely escaping the religious persecution of their former European states and creating a place to worship God in their own fashion. Moreover, this is a direct declaration that their foundational act of planting a colony was for the Glory of God and to advance Christianity.

Recognition of the role of the Christian Church and the role thereof comes more directly from the pre-constitution Massachusetts Body of Liberties, which states specifically in the introduction that the commonwealth and the church are both necessary for a proper society:

The free fruition of such liberties, immunities, and privileges as humanity, civility, and Christianity call for as due to every man in his place and proportion without impeachment and infringement hath ever been and ever will be the tranquility and stability of churches and commonwealths. And the denial or deprival thereof, the disturbance if not the ruin of both. (Massachusetts Body of Liberties)

This clearly shows a positive relationship between natural rights, like civility and liberty, and Christianity. Indeed, it shows that both rely on each other for their very existence. This document furthermore has an entire section titled “A DECLARATION OF THE LIBERTIES THE LORD JESUS HATH GIVEN TO THE CHURCHES”, the first provision of which states that

“All the people of God within this jurisdiction who are not in a church way, and be orthodox in judgment, and not scandalous in life, shall have full liberty to gather themselves into a church estate. Provided they do it in a Christian way, with due observation of the rules of Christ revealed in his Word,” (Massachusetts Body of Liberties)

While not recognizing a specific church and allowing for those outside any specific church, there was a specific precedent for the free exercise clause later made in the constitution, but with specific parameters not mentioned in the final form of the constitution. However, the precedent is in place and demarcates a clear requirement for (particularly Christian) churches to be established.

The Constitution of the United States is sometimes referred to as “the Godless constitution”, in reference to the fact that there was no mention of God or a Creator, except the Establishment clause does state that there would be no established religion. In fact, on all of these matters, the federalists framing the Constitution were avoiding controversy and deferring these matters to the state. The Library of Congress, in its exhibition on Religion and the Founding of the American Republic states specifically:

That religion was not otherwise addressed in the Constitution did not make it an "irreligious" document any more than the Articles of Confederation was an "irreligious" document. The Constitution dealt with the church precisely as the Articles had, thereby maintaining, at the national level, the religious status quo. In neither document did the people yield any explicit power to act in the field of religion. But the absence of expressed powers did not prevent either the Continental-Confederation Congress or the Congress under the Constitution from sponsoring a program to support general, nonsectarian religion. (Library of Congress)

Therefore this lack of inclusion demonstrates that the matters of specific sectarian religion would not be impinged upon by the state rather than the federal government, not that the federal government would not be affected by the religion or morals of those state governments, but that the federal government itself would not tell state governments which sect to choose.

A document which has also been long held as evidence of foundational separatism is the Treaty of Tripoli, which states the following in article 11-

As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion,-as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Musselmen,-and as the said States never have entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries. (The Avalon Project at Yale Law School)

Here again, we see a quotation without context, but see that there is a mention of the “Christian Religion”, and that in a ratified document, the United States took the position that the United States was not founded upon it. However, a crucial point is missing here- in that time, there was no similar democratic government to look to, only the governments of European states, which were founded specifically on one religion or another. In fact, at the time, Americans such as Noah Webster, founder of Webster’s Dictionary, wrote that “The ecclesiastical establishments of Europe which serve to support tyrannical governments are not the Christian religion but abuses and corruptions of it” (Webster, 339). Here, the authors of this document are stating that they are separate from the governments of Europe. Note also that there is still a mention of God even within the document- “Praise be to God” and “(Signed) JUSSUF BASHAW-Bey whom God Exalt” are both found with the document (The Avalon Project at Yale Law School). This doesn’t seem to work with the concept of separatism- in fact it seems to point to either confused contradiction or political understatement. To determine this, it is important to note that this entire treaty was created to deal with the fact that this treaty would end America’s first war as an independent nation (Tucker, 127). In fact, this conflict was justified to the Muslims because of the injuries incurred as a result of Crusades and in retaliation of Ferdinand and Isabella's expulsion of Muslims from Granada (Ibid, 50) - again a response to a perception of Christianity as it pertained to European Christian nations which needed to be responded to. In correspondence with Thomas Jefferson about the conflict, John Adams, the sitting president at the time of the treaty, stated:

The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were. . . . the general principles of Christianity. . . . I will avow that I then believed, and now believe, that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and attributes of God; and that those principles of liberty are as unalterable as human nature. (Adams, 45-46)

It appears that there was real distinction being made at the time of the treaty between the American Federal government and the European governments of the time. This is summarized clearly in the frustration of General Eaton in his personal account of the conflict:

April 8th. We find it almost impossible to inspire these wild bigots with confidence in us or to persuade them that, being Christians, we can be otherwise than enemies to Musselmen. We have a difficult undertaking! (Prentiss, 325)

It would be a harder undertaking to prove that this single article, with all of its justifications and limitations, expressed the will of the founding fathers more clearly than all the publicly recorded statements of the elected officials ratifying the document. It is also worth mentioning that the in the Arabic version, each section was preceded by the phrase “Praise be to God!” and that, about the eleventh article, on which this entire argument lies, the translator wrote the following-

The eleventh article of the Barlow translation has no equivalent whatever in the Arabic. The Arabic text opposite that article is a letter from Hassan Pasha of Algiers to Yussuf Pasha of Tripoli. The letter gives notice of the treaty of peace concluded with the Americans and recommends its observation. Three fourths of the letter consists of an introduction, drawn up by a stupid secretary who just knew a certain number of bombastic words and expressions occurring in solemn documents, but entirely failed to catch their real meaning. (The Avalon Project at Yale Law School)

Interestingly enough, the eleventh article as translated makes no mention of America not being a country founded on Christian principles.

Noah Webster wrote in the preface to the 1828 version of the American Dictionary:

In my view, the Christian religion is the most important and one of the first things in which all children, under a free government ought to be instructed...No truth is more evident to my mind than that the Christian religion must be the basis of any government intended to secure the rights and privileges of a free people. (Webster, Preface)

This summarizes the clear opinion of many founding fathers as expressed in their previously quoted statements and actions- that the basis of American government was Christianity. Although inherently separate from the otherwise religiously controlled governments of Europe, there was a definite Christian basis for the foundation of the nation. This moral foundation underlies the precepts of our law today, just as it did at its inception. When examining the basis, purpose and context of important quotes and corresponding policies of the founding fathers, it becomes clear that the morality inherent in Christianity was critical to the creation of the freedoms we enjoy today. Even when examining more controversial documents and quotes, it becomes clear that they only serve to enforce the claim that while there was no established sect, Christianity as a general, non-sectarian religion, was the foundation America was built on, and the basis on which she was founded.

Bibliography

Adams, John. Works. Vol. X, to Thomas Jefferson on June 28, 1813.

The Avalon Project at Yale Law School. The Avalon Project: The Barbary Treaties 1786-
1816. New Haven, Connecticut: The Lillian Goldman Law Library in Memory of
Sol Goldman, 2007. 6 Apr 2008.
<http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/diplomacy/barbary/>

Boston, Rob. Priority Mail- Why President Jefferson's Letter To The Danbury Baptists Is
Still Being Read By Americans After 200 Years. 2002. Americans United. <http://www.au.org/site/News2?abbr=cs_&id=5609&news_iv_ctrl=1046&page=NewsArticle&security=1001>

Bradford, William. U.S. GOVERNMENT > Introduction to the U.S. System > Guiding
Principles > Basic Readings in U.S. Democracy. InfoUSA. 1952. Bureau of International Information Programs (IIP), U.S. Department of State. 6 Apr 2008 <http://usinfo.state.gov/infousa/government/overview/2.html>.

Brewer, David J. The United States a Christian Nation. Philadelphia, PA: John C.
Winston Company, 1905

Dodge, Nash. Danbury Baptist Association, Letter to Thomas Jefferson, 1801. The
Unofficial Stephen Jay Gould Archive. 07 Oct 1801. Library of Congress. 5 Apr 2008 <http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/dba_jefferson.html>.

Hutson, James. 'A Wall of Separation' - FBI Helps Restore Jefferson's Obliterated Draft.
June 1998. Library of Congress. 5 Apr 2008
<http://www.loc.gov/loc/lcib/9806/danbury.html>.

Jefferson, Thomas. "Jefferson's Letter to the Danbury Baptists (June 1998)." Library of
Congress. June 1998. Library of Congress. 5 Apr 2008
<http://www.loc.gov/loc/lcib/9806/danpre.html>.

Kettler, Steven C. Biblical Counsel: Resources for Renewal : An Annotated Topical
Bibliography. Keezletown, VA: Lettermen Associates, 1993

Library of Congress. Religion and the Founding of the American Republic: Religion and
the Federal Government. http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel06.html
Machine, J. Gresham. Christianity and Liberalism. NY: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1923.

"Massachusetts Body of Liberties," The Colonial Laws of Massachusetts, ed. W. H.
Whitmore. Boston, MA: 1890

Morris, Benjamin Franklin. Christian Life and Character of the Civil Institutions of the
United States Developed in the Official and Historical Annals of the Republic. Philippians, PA: George W. Childs, 1864.

Prentiss, Charles. The Life of the Late Gen. William Eaton: Several Years an Officer in
the United States' Army Consul at the Regency of Tunis on the Coast of Barbary,
and Commander of the Christian and Other Forces that Marched from Egypt
Through the Desert of Barca, in 1805, and Conquered the City of Derne, Which
Led to the Treaty of Peace Between the United States and the Regency of Tripoli.
Brookfield, CT: Merriam & Company, 1813.

Tucker, Glen. Dawn Like Thunder: The Barbary Wars and the Birth of the U. S. Navy.
Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill Company, 1963.

Webster, Noah. History of the United States. New Haven, CT: Durrie & Peck, 1832.

Webster, Noah. An American Dictionary of the English Language…in two
volumes. New York, 1828.

Bittergate, part 1

2008-04-29T07:37:00.000-07:00

I definitely have a backlog of things to blog about, I beg patience and understanding with the whole collegiate finals situation. I did, however, find a way to make the two work together in a paper I recently wrote on the whole Obama-Wright situation, especially in light of the recent fallout due to Bittergate. I shall write more on that later (trust me, I have a lot to say), but for now, I will leave you all with a recent excerpt from one of my class papers. Enjoy!

American Political Thought

Bitterness- To Be or Not To Be?

Over 100 years after the original publication of Up from Slavery, race still figures prominently in the national conscience. The term “bitterness” figures very strongly in the headlines, albeit probably for reasons beyond the scope of those living in 1901. And while “bitterness” has a lot to do with race and the nation's first African American Presidential nominee, Barack Obama, it extends beyond his now-famous comments about small-town conservatives and concerns Obama's pastor, Jeremiah Wright, who has also figured prominently in the news. The issue concerns recorded statements Rev. Wright made from the pulpit while Obama was a member, statements which condemn America for its treatment of black citizens. About black people, Wright has famously stated “The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, God damn America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people, God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human.”[1] Obama stated that Wright's perspective comes from a “lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one’s family... the reality in which Rev. Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up.” Ironically, Rev. Wright's background is a far cry from what one would expect for someone with such bitterness. Wright lived in a middle class neighborhood and attended an “elite” high school characterized as having “no racial friction”. Wright now lives in a house worth $1.6 million, with 10,340 square feet on the corner of a golf course of a country club [2]. Clearly, this bitterness is not directly a response to any socioeconomic opportunity, but rather a perceived condition which is not a reality to Wright. This begs the question- what is bitterness and why does it matter politically? How is it related to anger, and what kinds of actions does it motivate? ...

Clearly, the first place to begin with the concept of bitterness is at the origin- the original comments by Booker T. Washington. In Up from Slavery, Washington states:

I have long since ceased to cherish any spirit of bitterness against the Southern white people on account of the enslavement of my race. No one section of our country was wholly responsible for its introduction... Having once got its tentacles fastened on to the economic and social life of the Republic, it was no easy matter for the country to relieve itself of the institution. Then, when we rid ourselves of prejudice, or racial feeling, and look facts in the face, we must acknowledge that, notwithstanding the cruelty and moral wrong of slavery, the ten million Negroes inhabiting this country... are in a stronger and more hopeful condition, materially, intellectually, morally, and religiously, than is true of an equal number of black people in any other portion of the globe. [3]

Here, several important points are made- bitterness against any section of the country is altogether unproductive and unrepresentative. Washington starts with recognition that to characterize an entire section of people in a negative way is not realistic. Then he does something very interesting- he looks at the situation from the perspective of the former slave owners. This is an important technique for dealing fairly with any situation, and especially in a situation where hard feelings would be expected, it can help people come together and put aside their differences, racial feelings or prejudices, all of which Washington clearly sees as negative deterrents. Essentially, racial tension on the part of African Americans is seen as a hindrance to fair assessment of reality, as well as reconciliation. This is borne out in the later quote that when the slaves were originally emancipated,

there was no feeling of bitterness. In fact, there was pity among the slaves for our former owners. The wild rejoicing on the part of the emancipated coloured people lasted but for a brief period, for I noticed that by the time they returned to their cabins there was a change in their feelings. The great responsibility of being free, of having charge of themselves, of having to think and plan for themselves and their children, seemed to take possession of them... [4]

There is an inherent implication that the manifestation of bitterness would not only hinder the newly freed former slaves, but would keep them from their greatest purpose- being free. These passages suggest that on the part of the whole African American community, Washington feels that bitterness is counterproductive and works against the purposes of the community- self determination and advancement. In fact a significant point from the passage is that those who were former slaves actually felt pity for their former masters- another example of looking at a situation through the perspective of those on the other side and understanding their feelings so there could be healing and reconciliation.
...

The race and bitterness issue will never be solved or irreparably broken purely through the efforts of one person, much less one paper or book. In the last 100 years, there have been many obvious improvements in race relations. However what I think has been the most significant problem with race relations over that time has been the efforts of demagogues and opinion leaders who stand to gain from division. Those who use politically divisive language and who constantly use the past as a wedge can undo the work of countless others. History has shown us that leaders have either used their words to bring people together in reconciliation or drive them apart to separation. Hopefully, our future leaders will be more of the former and less of the latter.

[1] Ross, Brian, and Rehab El-Buri. "Obama's Pastor: God Damn America, U.S. to Blame for 9/11." ABC News, March 13, 2008, http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=4443788&page=1

[2] Kessler, Ronald. “Obama's Rev. Wright Mythology.” Newsmax April 13, 2008 http://www.newsmax.com/kessler/obama_wright_pastor/2008/04/13/87617.html

[3] Washington, Booker T. “Up From Slavery: An Autobiography.” Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc. 1901: 16.

[4] Ibid, 21

Our Christian Nation

2008-04-28T10:18:00.000-07:00

Those who know me know I never do this. I never post chain letters, I never forward emails saying "forward this to 100 people or your mom will die in 5 minutes!!!!1". I have nourished a healthy disrespect for all content overly cutesy and sentimental as being (no offense intended here) largely inherently vapid.

Yet in doing some research for a paper I'm doing on Religion and Politics, I came across a webpage which hit me as being different from all the rest. Sure, it had the same cutesy pictures and mildly grating MIDI music playing in the background, but it was different- there was truth in what it said, and it contained a message I think everyone should hear. And so, in the spirit of all things patriotic and obnoxiously forwarded, enjoy the following.

-Brad

Did you know that 52 of the 55 signers of The Declaration of Independence were orthodox, deeply committed Christians? The other three all believed in the Bible as the divine truth, the God of scripture, and His personal intervention.

It is the same congress that formed the American Bible Society. Immediately after creating the Declaration of Independence, the Continental Congress voted to purchase and import 20,000 copies of scripture for the people of this nation.

Patrick Henry, who is called the firebrand of the American Revolution, is still remembered for his words, "Give me liberty or give me death." But in current textbooks the context of these words is deleted. Here is what he said: "An appeal to arms and the God of hosts is all that is left us. But we shall not fight our battle alone. There is a just God that presides over the destinies of nations. The battle sir, is not of the strong alone. Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it almighty God. I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death."

These sentences have now been erased from our textbooks.

Was Patrick Henry a Christian? These are the words he wrote shortly before his death: "I have disposed of all my property to my family. There is one thing more I wish I could give to them, and that is the Christian religion. If they had that and I had not given them one cent, they would be rich. If they have not that, and I had given them the world, they would be poor."

Consider these words that Thomas Jefferson wrote on the front of his well- worn Bible: "I am a Christian, that is to say a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus. I have little doubt that our whole country will soon be rallied to the unity of our Creator and, I hope, to the pure doctrine of Jesus also."

Consider these words from George Washington, the Father of our Nation, in his farewell speech on September 19, 1796:

"It is impossible to govern the world without God and the Bible. Of all the dispositions and habits that lead to political prosperity, our religion and morality are the indispensable supporters. Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that our national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."

Was George Washington a Christian? Consider these words from his personal prayer book: "Oh, eternal and everlasting God, direct my thoughts, words and work. Wash away my sins in the immaculate blood of the lamb and purge my heart by the Holy Spirit. Daily, frame me more and more in the likeness of thy son, Jesus Christ, that living in thy fear, and dying in thy favor, I may in thy appointed time obtain the resurrection of the justified unto eternal life. Bless, O Lord, the whole race of mankind and let the world be filled with the knowledge of thy son, Jesus Christ."

Consider these words by John Adams, our second president, who also served as chairman of the American Bible Society.

In an address to military leaders he said, "We have no government armed with the power capable of contending with human passions, unbridled by morality and true religion. Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."

How about our first Court Justice, John Jay?

He stated that when we select our national leaders, if we are to preserve our Nation, we must select Christians. "Providence has given to our people the choice of their rulers and it is the duty as well as the privilege and interest of our Christian Nation to select and prefer Christians for their rulers."

John Quincy Adams, son of John Adams, was the sixth U.S. President.

He was also the chairman of the American Bible Society, which he considered his highest and most important role. On July 4, 1821, President Adams said, "The highest glory of the American Revolution was this: it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity."

Calvin Coolidge, our 30th President of the United States reaffirmed this truth when he wrote, "The foundations of our society and our government rest so much on the teachings of the Bible that it would be difficult to support them if faith in these teachings would cease to be practically universal in our country."

In 1782, the United States Congress voted this resolution: "The congressof the United States recommends and approves the Holy Bible for use in all schools."

William Holmes McGuffey is the author of the McGuffey Reader, which was used for over 100 years in our public schools with over 125 million copies sold until it was stopped in 1963. President Lincoln called him the "Schoolmaster of the Nation."

Listen to these words of Mr. McGuffey: "The Christian religion is the religion of our country. From it are derived our notions on character of God, on the great moral Governor of the universe. On its doctrines are founded the peculiarities of our free institutions. From no source has the author drawn more conspicuously than from the sacred Scriptures. From all these extracts from the Bible I make no apology."

Of the first 108 universities founded in America, 106 were distinctly Christian, including the first.

Harvard University, chartered in 1636. In the original Harvard Student Handbook rule number 1 was that students seeking entrance must know Latin and Greek so that they could study the scriptures:

"Let every student be plainly instructed and earnestly pressed to consider well, the main end of his life and studies is, to know God and Jesus Christ, which is eternal life, John 17:3; and therefore to lay Jesus Christ as the only foundation of all sound knowledge and learning. And seeing the Lord only giveth wisdom, let everyone seriously set himself by prayer in secret to seek it of him (Proverbs 2:3)."

For over 100 years, more than 50% of all Harvard graduates were pastors!

It is clear from history that the Bible and the Christian faith, were foundational in our educational and judicial system. However in 1947, there was a radical change of direction in the Supreme Court.

It required ignoring every precedent of Supreme Court ruling for the past 160 years. The Supreme Court ruled in a limited way to affirm a wall of separation between church and state in the public classroom.

In the coming years, this led to removing prayer from public schools in 1962.

Here is the prayer that was banished:

"Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence on Thee. We beg Thy blessings upon us and our parents and our teachers and our country.

Amen."

In 1963, the Supreme Court ruled that Bible reading was outlawed as unconstitutional in the public school system. The court offered this justification: "If portions of the New Testament were read without explanation, they could and have been psychologically harmful to children."

Bible reading in public schools was now unconstitutional , though the Bible was quoted 94 percent of the time by those who wrote our constitution and shaped our Nation and its system of education and justice and government.

In 1965, the Courts denied as unconstitutional the rights of a student in the public school cafeteria to bow his head and pray audibly for his food.

In 1980, Stone vs. Graham outlawed the Ten Commandments in our public schools.

The Supreme Court said this: "If the posted copies of the Ten Commandments were to have any effect at all, it would be to induce school children to read them. And if they read them, meditated upon them, and perhaps venerated and observed them, this is not a permissible objective."

Is it not a permissible objective to allow our children to follow the moral principles of the Ten Commandments?

James Madison, the primary author of the Constitution of the United States, said this: "We have staked the whole future of our new nation, not upon the power of government; far from it. We have staked the future of all our political constitutions upon the capacity of each of ourselves to govern ourselves according to the moral principles of the Ten Commandments."

Today we are asking God to bless America. But how can He bless a Nation that has departed so far from Him?

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Bittergate, part 1

Our Christian Nation

Adam Kissel
Director, Individual Rights Defense Program
Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE)