Democracy on the Move

Democracy is a Team Sport

Are we being governed by a minority? It would appear so. Our political system has become so fractured that a significant minority holds the White House. This is not something new. It’s been going on for quite some time. How has this been allowed to happen? Well, it could be that people have become accustomed to thinking that the extent of their involvement in government only takes place at the voting booth. As a result, we have a government that is not truly representative, with a congress that is largely indifferent to our real needs.

So how do we fix it? The concept is simple, though its implementation takes a lot of work. It starts by recognizing that democracy is a team sport. Voters must do more than simply cast votes and then complain when they don’t get what they need. They have to get involved!

More Notes on Censorship

Are you okay with Trump's Twitter account being canceled? Are you okay with corporations censoring our messages on social media?

Well . . . it depends.

The first amendment guarantees the right to free speech, but that doesn't mean you can spread false rumors, or damage someone's reputation or incite violence. Preventing someone from doing harm with words is called censorship.

The word "censorship" implies nefarious government control, but on a deeper level, it is merely a mechanism to ensure that words are not used to unfairly cause damage. Censorship may take the form of removing a person's social media account. Or it may take the form of lawsuits for damage to reputations. Or it may simply be a reporter that challenges a politician in real time.

So who gets the right to censor messages? Judges? Corporations? We should work toward answering these questions, because currently, corporations exercise that judgment by default when they cancel a person's social media account.

If you speak the truth, you should not be censored in any way. This is critical, because you can’t have democracy without truth. And you can’t have truth when facts are buried beneath layers of manipulative lies and baseless conspiracy theories. Censorship can help clarify the truth. But censorship is a blunt instrument, and it may well do more harm than good unless it’s used judiciously, transparently and without prejudice.

Censorship and Asange

In this short podcast, we talk about some controversial subjects dealing with digital information. Is Assange a journalist? Hacker? Hero? Villian? Also, should social media companies be allowed to censor your online messages? This topic touches a lot of nerves in the Twittersphere, but we won't shy away from it here. Both these issues have profound significance in a healthy democracy.

State Representative Candidate Jessica Piper

Jessica Piper, a high-school American Literature teacher, public schools advocate and a Democratic candidate for House District 1 in Missouri, discusses issues facing the rural voter.

Jess was raised - and has always lived - in rural America, yet she rejects much of the Republican orthodoxy and embraces the Democratic Party. Since rural America is solidly in the Republican orbit, Jess’s candidacy as a Democrat is a difficult journey. But she cites a number of reasons for her desire to run, including her deep sense of passion for her constituents and the belief that everyone should have basic rights, such as a reasonable minimum wage, access to healthcare, the right to unionize, and several other progressive ideas. Rural voters actually embrace these ideas, though the Republican Party does not.

Why is Republican messaging so effective in rural America even though economically, their policies often work against the rural voter? Why do the Democrats struggle with their messaging in rural America? Jess has deep insight into these issues, and in this podcast, she explores some possible answers.

Book Recommendations

This week we focus on book recommendations for listeners interested in learning more about our current democracy, warts and all! The books are:

The New Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, by John Perkins

The Politics Industry: How Political Innovation Can Break Partisan Gridlock and Save Our Democracy, by Katherine Gehl and Michael Porter

Shadow Network: Media, Money, and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right, by Anne Nelson

Let them Eat Tweets: How the Right Rules in an Age of Extreme Inequality, by Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson

Move to Amend

Kaitlin Sopoci-Belknap, National Director of Move to Amend, talks about a proposed 28th amendment to our Constitution - an amendment that basically says “Corporations are not people.” Kaitlin explains that though the infamous “Citizens United” Supreme Court decision of 2010 asserted First Amendment rights to corporations, this was not the beginning of corporate privilege in America. Our nation has a long history of treating corporations with all the privileges of human beings, but without the responsibilities. As a result, corporations have, for a long time, acted with virtual impunity in violating human rights in this nation. When faced with deciding between human rights and corporate privilege, the courts typically decide in favor of corporations. Citizens United is just the latest example.

Move to Amend calls for a new amendment to the US Constitution that unequivocally states that inalienable rights belong to human beings only. It also states that money is not a form of protected free speech under the First Amendment, and therefore it must be regulated in political campaigns.

The organization embraces a set of values that includes accountability and responsibility on both a personal and organizational level, a commitment to transparency, and a recognition of the importance of community. Additionally, they are strongly committed to the elimination of oppression in all forms; individuals, communities, workplaces, policies, and political representation.

In addition to being the National Director of Move to Amend, Kaitlin Sopoci-Belknap is the President of the Board of Directors of Democracy Unlimited, and a Local Democracy Fellow for the Liberty Tree Foundation. 

Kaitlin believes in a diversity of tactics to bring about systemic social change. She has served on numerous national and local boards, helped elect many progressive candidates to office, served as a local elected official herself for 12 years, bird-dogged candidates and politicians, citizen lobbied Congressmembers and state officials, and she has hosted a community radio station program. In the summer of 2019 she was arrested for taking part in a civil disobedience action to shut down Congress over climate collapse inaction. She and 16 other activists superglued their hands to the doors leading from Congressional office buildings to the US Capitol.

Anne Nelson, Author of Shadow Network

Anne Nelson stops by to talk about her book, Shadow Network: Media, Money and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right. Anne is an award-winning book author and playwright who has written extensively about human rights and the defiance of totalitarian regimes. As a journalist she covered the conflicts in El Salvador and Guatemala, and won the Livingston Award for best international reporting from the Philippines. She currently teaches at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs, where her classes and research explore how digital media can support the under-served populations of the world through public health, education and culture.

Shadow Network is a compelling investigation into the network of fundamentalist organizations and oil barons, who have carried out a forty-year mission to get control of our government. The men and women in this movement call their coalition the Council for National Policy, or CNP. The CNP coordinates the political activism of many member organizations, including the National Rifle Association, the Federalist Society, and the Family Research Council.

The major players in this organization include Oliver North, Ed Meese, Kelyanne Conway, Ralph Reed, Tony Perkins, and the DeVos and Mercer families, to name but a few. These powerful individuals reach into the highest layers of our government.

I highly recommend this book for those interested in further understanding the ultra-conservative influences within our government and how it intends to take our nation into the future.

Find Shadow Network here.

The Straw Man

In this short podcast, we talk about straw man arguments. Though straw man arguments are considered “false arguments,” they can nevertheless be very convincing, and they can be used to persuade large groups of people into false beliefs. We quickly examine two popular straw man arguments in our recent past - one used by then-candidate Trump, the other employed by Democrats when arguing for Obamacare. The good news is that you can train yourself to recognize the pattern of the straw man, and thereby make yourself less vulnerable to holding false beliefs.

Issues and Previews

This is a fairly short episode that briefly reviews some of the major issues that stand in the way of a more perfect union. We touch on just a few of the issues and give some references to places you can go to get more information and, more importantly, get involved in our precious democracy. This episode also provides a preview of upcoming episodes, where we will discuss the electoral college, the fallacy of our current primary system, Gerrymandering and campaign finance in light of Citizens United.

As always, please contact us at info@democracyonthemove.org if you have any questions or suggestions for upcoming episodes.

The National Popular Vote

In our very first podcast at Democracy on the Move, Vermont State Senator Christopher Pearson drops by to talk about the National Popular Vote organization. National Popular Vote is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the promotion of something called the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact -- an agreement among states to send all their presidential electors corresponding to the winner of the nationwide popular vote. Essentially, it holds states to an agreement to get around the arcane rules of the electoral college by guaranteeing that the winner of the national popular vote is sent to the White House.

The most recent presidential election illustrates the problem that the National Popular Vote organization is trying to solve. The presidential popular vote wasn't even close, yet we all collectively held our breath waiting for a few thousand votes from key swing states to determine the actual outcome. Luckily, these swing state votes aligned with the popular vote, but it could have easily gone the other way; a few thousand votes could have canceled out over 5 million other votes. It’s not fair, right? Indeed, but in this century alone, we've seen two instances where the presidency was granted to the second-place winner.

Yes, the electoral system was put in place by the constitution, but that doesn’t mean that we’re powerless to do anything about it. The Interstate Compact will guarantee that the winner of the popular vote is granted the presidency without running afoul of the constitution.

Listen in as Senator Pearson describes the details of how this Interstate compact works, how both Democrats and Republicans are working together to make it happen, and how it will change the way presidential campaigns are run.