In reacting to the news this morning that he had won the Nobel Peace Prize, the President struck a note of humility and recognized that the award was a nod to a vision of what is to come:
I am both surprised and deeply humbled by the decision of the Nobel Committee. Let me be clear: I do not view it as a recognition of my own accomplishments, but rather as an affirmation of American leadership on behalf of aspirations held by people in all nationsTo be honest, I do not feel that I deserve to be in the company of so many of the transformative figures who've been honored by this prize -- men and women who've inspired me and inspired the entire world through their courageous pursuit of peace.But I also know that this prize reflects the kind of world that those men and women, and all Americans, want to build -- a world that gives life to the promise of our founding documents. And I know that throughout history, the Nobel Peace Prize has not just been used to honor specific achievement; it's also been used as a means to give momentum to a set of causes. And that is why I will accept this award as a call to action -- a call for all nations to confront the common challenges of the 21st century.
From Vice President Joe Biden:
A few weeks ago, President Obama asked you to share your personal story about how the health care crisis has affected you and the ones you love. Hundreds of thousands of stories poured in from every corner of the country. The President and I have read through many of them ourselves -- and now I'm encouraging you to do so as well. Read these powerful, personal stories from people in your area and around the country.And after you do, please forward this note on to as many people as you can. For folks who don't yet understand why health care reform is such an urgent priority, these stories make the case far better than any statistics ever could. For those who support health care reform but haven't yet found the time to join our campaign, these stories provide more motivation than any speech any politician could ever give. So please read these stories, pass this note on to everyone in your address book, and help us show everyone in America why fixing our broken health care system is a necessity that just can't wait: http://healthcare.barackobama.com/stories Thank you, Vice President Joe Biden
A few weeks ago, President Obama asked you to share your personal story about how the health care crisis has affected you and the ones you love. Hundreds of thousands of stories poured in from every corner of the country. The President and I have read through many of them ourselves -- and now I'm encouraging you to do so as well. Read these powerful, personal stories from people in your area and around the country.
And after you do, please forward this note on to as many people as you can. For folks who don't yet understand why health care reform is such an urgent priority, these stories make the case far better than any statistics ever could. For those who support health care reform but haven't yet found the time to join our campaign, these stories provide more motivation than any speech any politician could ever give. So please read these stories, pass this note on to everyone in your address book, and help us show everyone in America why fixing our broken health care system is a necessity that just can't wait: http://healthcare.barackobama.com/stories Thank you, Vice President Joe Biden
Diebold subsidiary Premier Election Solutions admitted in a California state hearing on Tuesday that its voting machine software can lose votes and fail to log the fact that the votes were lost.
The admission, reported on Wired's Threat Level blog, is significant. For years, the company has touted the quality of its electronic voting machines amidst mounting criticism that they were prone to errors and tampering.
Prediction: 10,000 apps for Google Android Market by Oct. 2009?
The hearing related to last November's election in Humboldt County, California. Nearly 200 votes disappeared from a tally handled by Premier's Global Election Management System (GEMS) software.
Mitch Trachtenberg was one of the volunteer auditors who discovered that the GEMS system had eliminated the votes. Writing as a guest blogger in The Brad Blog, Trachtenberg said that Premier's voting systems, which are used in 34 states, could not effectively handle audits. "An election system's audit logs are meant to record all activity during the system's actual counting of ballots," he wrote. "Diebold's software fails to do that."
According to Threat Level, "the company acknowledged that the problem exists with every version of its tabulation software." California officials examined Humbolt's GEMS-created audit logs and could find no record of when 197 absentee ballots were removed from the system, which apparently prompted California's secretary of state to call the audit logs "useless."
Trachtenberg also mentioned the "disturbing revelation that Diebold had been aware of the problem for years." According to an earlier Brad Blog post, dated December 8, 2008, the tendency to delete ballots "was part of a bug [Diebold had] known about for at least four years." The blog reproduced an internal Diebold email about the problem dated 2004.
Reported problems with Diebold products are nothing new. The company was sued by Ohio last year for voting machines that allegedly dropped votes. Earlier this week, the company was forced to admit that criminals have successfully hacked Diebold ATMs.
Diebold Machines are rigged, and it is time for America to rid us of these cheating raging machines.
http://www.thestandard.com/news/2009/03/18/diebold-admits-voting-machine-flaw-had-been-aware-problem-years
Even though President Obama and His Presidential Team have strategically targeted the automobile industry, are you aware that the Obama Administration is buying 17600 cars from GM to help the industry, economy, People of Mich. and America as a whole. The homelessness in Detroit (and all of America) has been rampant for years if not decades and no one took it upon themselves to change it, but this is Our Opportunity to do so Now. Now is the time for every community in America and the Whole Wide World to start appropriating, living, teaching, and applying the Principles of Change/Faith to ourselves . There has been always been talk about the Rich the Middle Class but we have forgotten the poor, the down trodden class. Poverty and lack must become the enemy of all of the people of the World!!!!! More Millionaires were created in America During the Great Depression of 1929. Questions: 1. How?. 2. When?. 3. Where?.
YES WE DID! YES WE MUST:
Þ Protect him from harm both verbal & phyiscal
Þ Stay "FIRED UP" by staying active
Þ Work Bi-Partisan to bring "Change" together
Þ Don't just bitch, get active and stay engaged
Þ Start and join a local "Change" group
Þ Be philanthropic, serve your community, state and nation
Þ Stick by Obama, STOP smears on the Right & the Left!!!! Hold yourself responsible as you hold Barack!
Join the future of this movement!!
http://change.gov/joinus
http://www.communityorganize.com
http://www.ourpresidency.com
http://www.usaservice.org
http://www.whitehouse.gov
Barack's DNC 2004 Speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWynt87PaJ0&feature=PlayList&p=B1939005B8A4D4ED&index=188
Barack's DNC 2008 Speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ato7BtisXzE&feature=channel
Barack’s Election Acceptance Speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wJ-2Zu_Iic&feature=channel
Barack’s Inauguration Speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjnygQ02aW4
Ten More Days until the Inauguration!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Short and Simple!!!!!!!!!!!
Enough Said!!!!!!!!!!!!!
January 20, 2009.
!!! Obama - Peace on Earth tree design for the holidays!!!
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I have access to a home in Gaithersburg, MD 20879 available during mid-January to February. Perfect for Inauguration! Red line subway is Shady Grove - 25 miles to heart of DC. You can get to the metro station without a car (bus across the street), and be in DC via metro in ~35-40mins.
Its a 3 bdrm, full basement, and 3.5 bath townhome. Make me an offer!
And, it is worthing pointing to a few compelling reads from the NYT Op-Ed today, all of which are in the "most-emailed" list:
Here are ten quick ideas for the coming Obama administration. The GSA commissioned this article last year. A PDF version and looong version with international examples is available.
Ten Practical Online Steps for Government Support of Democracy
By Steven CliftChair, E-Democracy.Org and Ashoka Fellow
This article will appear in the upcoming Intergovernmental Solutions newsletter of the U.S. federalGeneral Services Administration: http://tinyurl.com/2dhl9s
Does e-government have anything to do with democracy and citizen participation? Let's getstraight to the point - not yet.
Should it?
Yes. Government should be leading a charge into the increasingly and fundamentally interactiveweb.
Information access, considered the safe starting point for government accountability online nowmostly presents the public a daunting needle in a huge haystack. This system is so complicatedthat the valuable and substantive information that government produces is often ignored in theincreasingly interactive public lives of active citizens. . The lack of real and effective online accessto governance will substantially increase cynicism about and distrust in government among apublic that demands a more participatory representative democracy.
A bit of context: I coordinated e-government for the State of Minnesota in its early days. As acitizen, I independently started E-Democracy.Org which created the world’s first electioninformation and discussion website in 1994. When “services first, democracy later” envelopedmost e-government projects, I went independent in late 1997. Since then, I've spoken andconsulted across 26 countries on "e-democracy.”
Here are the 10 things I would do in government at every level to help rescue our democracy inthe information age.
1. Timely, personalized access to information that matters.
Government decision-making information is not really public or relevant if people cannot act on itwhen it still matters. Give people tools like personalized e-mail alerts based on keywords,location, etc. and eliminate the "nobody told me" backlash government often receives due topoor public outreach. Every government needs a “what’s new” democracy portal or a thematicsection covering all democratic processes as part of their main website.
2. Help elected officials receive and sort, then better understand and respond to email.
E-mail overload is the number one complaint I hear from elected officials around the world. Mostwant to respond effectively, but simply aren't being provided the tools they need. If there everwas an opportunity for open source collaboration among governments, this is it. In general, ourrepresentatives and representative institutions must start to invest in the online infrastructurethey need to connect directly with the public they represent.
3. Dedicate at least 10% of new e-government developments to democracy.
Let’s define democracy starting with public input. In an e-service initiative, the 10% should startwith citizen focus groups to guide the design of the service, usability testing and studies togenerate user input and accountability, and post-transaction user surveys. If the investment is anew content management system for information access, then use the 10% to addpersonalization and survey input features or democratized navigation (those nifty menus thatshow you the top ten articles viewed that day or week).
4. Announce all government public meetings on the Internet in a uniform manner.
All public meeting notices, agendas, handouts, and digital recordings must be online. The systemshould be standards-based and tie state-by-state systems into a national network coveringfederal, state, and local government public meetings. This is the only way for people to ask to bepro-actively notified of any government public meetings within a certain geographic areaaddressing specific topics that interest them.
5. Allow citizens to look-up all of their elected officials from the very local to nationalin one search.
Along with the ability to look-up all public meetings, Americans should have the right to easilydetermine who all the elected and appointed officials are who represent them currently. Justbefore elected and appointed officials assume office, every government unit should be requiredto submit contact information for those officials into a national database.
6. Host online public hearings and dialogues (or “e-consultations” as they are knownoutside the U.S.)
As in-person public meetings begin to incorporate live online features, envision more deliberateonline exchanges to improve the outcomes of the decision-making process. If your governmentagency hosts three public hearings across the country or your state, host the fourth hearingonline over a week or two and improve the format in the process. In 10 years, the legislatures,commissions and city councils not holding hearings online will be in the minority.
7. Embrace the rule of law by mandating the most democratically empowering onlineservices and rights across the whole of government.
Technology itself is not forcing real institutional democratic change. I estimate that 90% of thedemocratic innovations online that really share power are based on a political tradition or lawthat existed before the Internet arrived. If we want all citizens to benefit universally from a morewired democracy, then now is time to update our legal requirements and fund core onlinedemocracy services.
8. Promote dissemination through access to raw data from decision-makinginformation systems.
Let’s explode decision-making data, like Congressional information and rulemaking relatedcontent into bits via XML and open standards and make it easy to re-use public government datafrom many sources to create views and searches that provide insight, understanding, andaccountability. Think “Web 2.0” interactivity built on top of government data by those outside ofgovernment.
9. Fund Open Source sharing internationally across e-government.
Sharing and supporting open source software takes resources – a consortium of nationalgovernments need to step up with collaborative funding. The new and less cluttered area of eparticipation tools are an ideal starting point within e-government to reduce technology costs andbuild systems for use by multiple governments.. Efforts to place modules and customizations outfor community use will be key. Government and its vendors must contribute code back for thewheels of reciprocal value to start turning.
10. Local up – a strategic approach to building local democracy online.
To build e-participation momentum, citizens need to experience results they can see and touch.By investing in transferable local models and tools, more people will use the Internet as a tool tostrength their communities, protect and enrich their families and neighborhoods, and be heard ina meaningful way. Every community needs an “online town hall,” E-Democracy.Org calls themIssues Forums, for agenda-setting discussion of public issues. Comparative evaluation of accessand participation related online service and content indicators will introduce efforts for an online"Democracy Tune-up." This same tune-up concept should be applied at the state and federallevel as well.
Conclusion
In the early days, folks thought the Internet was inherently democratic. Parts of it are, but thatmistaken sense of technological determinisms has not carried over to make constitutional andlegally-ground representative processes more open and responsive. Today, “politics as usual”online may actually make things worse. Civically conceived e-participation efforts need to countersuch negative trends rather than being viewed as an extra option. Ultimately, each generationneeds to rebuild democracy with the special tools of their time. Our tools are online and ourdemocracy needs us.
Steven Clift leads the “Online Consultation and E-Participation” online community of practice atDoWire.Org and shares numerous articles on e-democracy from Publicus.Net. An extendedversion of this article with specific examples is available from that site.
If you've been following this blog at all, you had to know that its intended destination was to be able to post this song. Thank Jesus/Moses/Muhammad/Buddha/Zorro/etc that I'm actually able to do so.
"Funky President" by James Brown
As a P.S., here's a recap of how I spent election night in DC:
Congratulations to America!
I've been saving this song for a while.
If you're under the age of 40, you've probably heard it before. And you may have lost your mind whylin out at some house party, some club or in some car in some traffic jam on some American street.
It is quite obvious what we're on the precipice of. No need for any more salesmanship.
"The Choice Is Yours" by Black Sheep
Like any other creative type, I get very excited to start a new venture. At some point, I might grow bored, frustrated, impatient, distracted or disillusioned. Whenever that point (or those points) occur, I may be inclined to abandon the venture. Most likely, my energy will wane and I'll complete the venture on a lower note than I started it. Often, arriving at the destination feels less rewarding than was the act of launching into it.
The longer this campaign has dragged on, the more I've struggled to sustain my enthusiasm for it. I suspect I am not alone. At the very least, I figure there are a fair amount of people who've stagnated in their abilities to advocate for Obama and have leaned very heavily on talking points to sell the Senator's candidacy. If you're reading this and you're one of those people, let me see if I can give you a shot of rhetorical adrenaline.
Let me start on a low note. Obama is not going to deliver on everything he's told us he wants to do. Even if he has a Democratic supermajority in both chambers of Congress, the circumstances he will be asked to respond to (economic impotence, globalization, nebulous enemies, Iraq, etc) will require him to change up the game plan just a bit. He'll probably have to compromise on some elements of some of his bigger ideas (taxes, healthcare, withdrawal from Iraq, etc). I don't doubt his ability to execute, but I am realistic. And no politician is ever able to honor every single aspect of every single campaign promise. That's just not how governance unfolds. Governance, as we all know, is about compromise. For good. For ill. For the survival of those who play the game.
Now, let's find that high note.
There is a man we have become better acquainted with during these last 12 months. There is a campaign we have all participated in. There is a movement forward in which we have all invested. We have been awed by the intelligence of it all. We have been encouraged by its cunning. We have been inspired. And we have felt, for the first time in many of our cases, like the future really is ours to shape.
There is also a gasp. It is, in part, a wheeze from the willfully ignorant. It is, in a much larger part, an urge to operate as America 1.0. To retain an identity that is predicated on old world realities that allowed our little empire to manifest. That gasp is woefully unreasonable and it is ill-prepared for the historical moments that lie ahead of us. It informs some of the structure of America 2.0, but it is not, many of us believe, the business model that will work best in the world of tomorrow.
The future that started yesterday needs imagination. It needs forward thinking. It needs everything we have born witness to during the course of Senator Barack Obama's campaign to become President of these United States.
If you find yourself talking to undecided voters--whom we understand to still be quite plentiful--maybe it is no longer worthwhile to discuss with them the issues. At this point, if you're not informed on the issues, why should anyone believe that the issues really matter to you? Really. Web sites have been up for months now with pretty much every position statement you could want. And if you're not willing to seek out information that is so easily available, then I question your patriotism. After all, America is supposed to be about you controlling your own destiny. Or, at least, the illusion that you can control it. But I digress.
At this point in the campaign, if someone out there is still struggling to make sense of everything and decide for whom they will vote on Tuesday, perhaps the best appeal is to simply ask them, in their gut, what exactly do they want for their country?
Do they want to help seize an opportunity to take bold steps forward to empower the smartest guy in the room? Or do they believe it really is a good idea for America in 1950 to be the model for America in 2010?
Times have changed, yo. Time for us to vote for the guy who reflects that. The guy who is best equipped to guide the ship--through every kind of water.
It's a simple choice, really. Someone will take the weight. Regardless. It's up to the entire country to make the choice whether the broken, creaky tradition will carry on or whether a bold, daring advance will take the day.
If the song for today is any indication, you should know what I think. And you can play it for anyone still looking for some inspiration to help them make their choice.
"Who's Gonna Take the Weight" by Kool & the Gang.
