[Grovenet] Another Choice

Thu Feb 1 13:22:44 PST 2007

I basically agree with the genesis of their goal of pointing the country 
back to the middle too. What I disagree with is that their method will do 
that.
Correct me if I'm wrong but there will only be one R candidate for president 
to make it out of the R convention and only one D candidate for president 
make it out of the D convention.
The number 2 candidates will likely be asked to run for VP in their 
respective parties.

How will Unity 08 get their combo candidates?
If they ask one of the presidential candidates to 'step down' and run as the 
VP to the other party's candidate they will not be greeted very warmly. 
What R or D winner would willingly do that?
If they go to each party's #3 or 4 candidate to be on the combined ticket 
then automatically #3 or4 has ruined their future chances of being the 
leader 4 years from now.   And if they do get a #3 or 4 to agree to the deal 
who ever is the presidential candidate for Unity '08 will have the effect of 
splitting the vote for their own party's voters.  Even if they are able to 
draw some independents or moderates from the other party the Unity 
candidates will have to have a new party name because so many election laws 
are written that only allow one candidate of each party.

If Unity 08 wants to actually have a slate of one R and one D run as the top 
two slots, they will have to start soon to change the election laws to have 
two R's and two D's running simultaneously.  The R and D parties will not 
sit idly by and give up having their team of front runners on both the pres 
and vice pres slots.

Never say never comes to mind so I won't say this could never happen, but I 
think trying to get a D and an R on the same ticket is backwards from the 
way to go.  It is too candidate centric.
Already candidates are modulating themselves to try to appeal to the middle, 
so if Unity '08 could get a significant number of voters to merely identify 
themselves as being in the murky middle I think that candidates would flock 
to the voters instead. A voter centric movement would have more of a chance 
to actually be effective in meeting the stated goal.

We probably disagree about whether Unity 08 is really a voter centric 
movement with a gimick to draw attention (the R and D candidate slate) or 
whether it is a gimick trying to attach itself to a cause.  I just think 
they will be spinning their wheels so much in trying to get the slate 
together that the beneficial cause will be neglected in the attempt.

If they don't have to get their candidates into the white house to win then 
they need to focus their attention on what it means to 'win' and go for 
that.  But if tell people that you want to run a candidate or two, but your 
goal is not necessarily to elect them, then you are sending a mixed message 
to voters and they will reject it.

I give applause to Unity 08 for trying to do something, I just don't see 
this as being the 'fix' for what ails us.

And maybe I am in a hopeful mood. You are right that having an independent 
candidate hasn't been the cure in the past either.  But I think we are 
seeing every candidate try to scramble to the middle as they declare that 
they are running in '08.  The voters have said they want something more in 
the middle and the candidates are responding.

Katie

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ron D'Eau Claire" <rondec at easystreet.com>
To: "'Forest Grove local interests list'" <grovenet at rdrop.com>
Sent: Thursday, February 01, 2007 10:58 AM
Subject: Re: [Grovenet] Another Choice

>I would never assume that Sam Waterson was a "neutral face"? How can one
> endorse any political agenda and be a neutral face?
>
> Katie wrote, "...he is also a shill for those who have strong ties to the
> corrupting influence of rampant corporatism."
>
> What are you referring to, his TV commercials? He's a paid spokesperson 
> for
> some companies. "Rampant" corporatism is bad, just as bad as "rampant"
> liberalism. Rampant is just another word for "extremist" and I agree, it 
> has
> a corrosive, even corrupting influence.
>
> I would be skeptical of the Unity '08 approach as well if I considered it
> necessary to put their candidate in the White House in order to be
> successful. I don't. I think I can understand genesis of their goal of
> nominating people from both major parties. We've seen independents fall 
> flat
> on their face, even when they had the cash to run a competitive campaign.
> Remember Ross Perot? I think one of the biggest problems is that Americans
> want professional politicians in office. Look at poor Senator Obama ("He
> can't be a Presidential candidate! He's only been elected to the Senate
> once!!"). So this group seems to be trying to draw established and
> disaffected candidates from both parties who feel they can't be heard 
> inside
> the narrow confines of the "Red" and "Blue" designations.
>
> I applaud that. From that standpoint I think they've already "won" and won
> big, but winning is much more than that.
>
> To me, getting your candidate elected doesn't mean the party won. Indeed,
> getting their candidate elected gives that party the power to lose, and 
> lose
> big! Look at the Republican party over the past two Presidential terms! 
> Lots
> of losing going on because the guy they got elected wasn't able to do the
> job. No, I'm not talking about winning a war in Iraq, I'm talking about
> motivating people and following through with that motivation that puts the
> American people in a stronger, more positive position than before.
>
> It's easy to drum up an angry mob when people are frightened. That's 
> exactly
> what happened after 9/11. It took no "leadership" to cause people to lust
> after revenge (we like to call it "justice")to the point of supporting a
> war, especially when the President put his reputation on the line saying
> we'd find that Saddam had hidden WMD ready for use against Americans.
>
> Whether the President realized it or not, angry mobs have a short 
> attention
> span, and America's attention to the war has faded with whatever became of
> those supposed WMD. And who got us into this mess? This President and the
> people who supported him.
>
> President Bush may have secured the White House for two terms, but I doubt
> if he, or the Republican leadership, feels like they "won" anything. 
> Indeed,
> I think they lost as big as anyone has ever lost who aspired to the
> Presidency. They lost so big because, by securing the White House, they
> exposed their failures to the entire nation, and made the entire nation
> suffer in those failures along with them.
>
> The Republican party is struggling mightily just to retain a decent 
> position
> in the Congress. They know they are far, far behind in the race to select
> the next President. That's the position a loser finds himself in; it is 
> not
> the position of a "winner".
>
> In their goal statements Unity 08 defines winning as, "...to effect major
> change and reform in the 2008 national elections by influencing the major
> parties to adopt the core features of our national agenda. With a group of
> voters who comprise at least 20% of the national electorate, we feel
> confident that our voters will decide the 2008 election."
>
> I think they have a good chance to do that. There are two groups of voters
> on election day: those who have ignored the campaign and the issues 
> because
> they vote a party line regardless, and those who have thought about their
> vote, considered the campaign and who chose the candidate to vote for 
> based
> on their impressions and feelings about the campaign. Attempting to do
> something about the first group whose minds are made up is pointless in 
> the
> campaign. That group is affected by their experiences over time. President
> Bush has seriously reduced the number of people in that group who would 
> have
> voted Republican in the next election. That's why he has produced what I
> call a huge loss for the Republican party during his presidency. But those
> diehard voters don't listen to campaigns. The second group was swelled in
> size by the President Bush's mistakes. There is a "bumper crop" of people
> willing to listen to a campaign.
>
> If the Democrats are smart, they'll focus on those people. Unity '08 is
> doing that too, saying, "Look! There's another choice".
>
> I applaud that! It makes them a winner just being there.
>
> Ron D'Eau Claire
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: grovenet-bounces at rdrop.com [mailto:grovenet-bounces at rdrop.com] On
> Behalf Of allnutt
> Sent: Thursday, February 01, 2007 8:58 AM
> To: Forest Grove local interests list
> Subject: Re: [Grovenet] Another Choice
>
>
> Interesting concept. And one that holds a lot of promise in the concept.
> Though I have to question whether Sam Waterson is truly a neutral face to
> get the message across.  While his character on TV is very straight arrow
> and usually sides with 'the right' choice in TV land (perhaps 'the 
> correct'
> choice would be a better way to phrase it) he is also  a shill for those 
> who
>
> have strong ties to the corrupting influence of rampant corporatism. I
> sympathize with the movement because if they wanted a truly neutral spokes
> person they would have to pick somebody that was an unknown.  And by doing
> so they would not have the advantage of a recognizable spokesperson that
> would get people to stop and listen long enough to hear the message. 
> Overall
> I think it is a good goal to have politics move more toward the
> middle but it is too simplistic to think that the way to do that is to 
> have
> one R and one D on the ticket to accomplish it.  I also think it is too
> simplistic to think that it will happen in a year, even if they use the
> power of the internet to attempt it. When it happens on that short of a 
> time
>
> frame it is more of a fad than a movement.
> But I'm not trying to poo poo the idea of change itself.  I'm just a 
> little
> skeptical that this is the answer.
>
> Katie
>
>
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Ron D'Eau Claire" <rondec at easystreet.com>
> To: "'Forest Grove local interests list'" <grovenet at rdrop.com>
> Sent: Wednesday, January 31, 2007 3:40 PM
> Subject: [Grovenet] Another Choice
>
>
>> And so it happens again, a movement for more choice than the same old
>> Red and Blue 'polarizers' is building for the '08 elections:
>>
>> http://www.unity08.com/believe
>>
>> They're collecting some well known faces to back them. One is Sam
>> Waterson:
>>
>> http://www.unity08.com/buzzworthy/sam_team
>>
>> Ron D'Eau Claire
>>
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