Get FISA Right

The outreach to bloggers we’re doing is starting to have an impact … here’s our current list of endorsements:

• Moon In Cancer
• Mad Progress
• saysmeinc.blogspot.com
• Democrats.com
• newsrackblog.com
• Chris Weekly
• Knightwhosaysni’s blog
• Liberty’s Crossing
• Beyond The Matrix
• peerflow
• WebUrbanist
• The Worley Dervish
• DreamActivist
• Obama Letdown Watch
• No Borders and Binaries
• Reality Catcher
• Happening Here
• Amygdala

I’m pretty sure these are listed in chronological order …

The list is shorter than some other ideas but the quality is incredibly high, surprisingly diverse, and with a great mix of original Get FISA Right organizers,* people who are just starting to step forward, our longtime partner SaysMe, and some folks I don’t even know.  There are at least two endorsements by other ideators in the final round: DreamACTivst, whose Pass the DREAM Act – Support Higher Education for All Students is in 13th place, and Bob Fertik of Democrats.com, whose Appoint a Special Prosecutor for the Crimes of the Bush Administration is in 26th.**

Read the rest of this entry »

It’s been a spirited discussion so far on whether or not Get FISA Right should endorse the Bob Fertik’s idea Appoint a Special Prosecutor for the Crimes of the Bush Administration in the change.org Ideas for Change in America competition.  Currently, our Get FISA Right, repeal the PATRIOT Act, and restore our civil liberties is in 7th with a little over 6000 votes, and Bob’s is in 21st at 2136, so the decision could have a big impact on which ideas make it into the top 10.  We’ll be voting on this starting on Monday (details TBD) and so I wanted to continue the discussion in a fresh thread.

Something to keep in mind from a strategy perspective is that an effort spearheaded by Ari Melber propelled Bob’s special prosecutor question to the top of change.gov’s recent Open for Questions; we should expect something similar here.   Wiretapping had significant support as well (#2, #9, and #10 in National Security) without any promotion … but nobody seems to have covered it.  For whatever reason the “special prosecutor” angle seems to be hotter right now than “policy and legislative changes”.  So right now, despite the relative difference in our votes, the special prosecutor idea probably has as good a chance to make it into the top 10 as ours.

There were a lot of good opinions on both sides about whether or not we should endorse the special prosecutor idea.  I’ve also had discussions with various people in email, on the phone, and in-person, and overall it seems to me that opinions continue to be split: roughly 1/3 “we should endorse”, 1/3 “I personally support a special prosecutor but Get FISA Right shouldn’t endorse”, and  1/3 “I don’t support a special prosecutor at this time”.  The discussions are changing minds in all directions, though, and a lot of people haven’t weighted in yet, so that’s not necessarily an indication of how the vote will come out.  I’ve invited Bob to do a guest-post here to present his case.

So now’s a great time to reread the earlier thread.  Which points do you think are especially compelling?  Has your opinion changed?  Are there aspects we’ve overlooked so far?  Please let others know what you’re thinking!

And if you haven’t already voted for our idea, please do!

jon

* The comments in Once again Open for Questions: the pilot continues have more details on this.  Ideally we will benefit from these effects in the change.org competition as well: the progressive bloggers like digby, Open Left, and Daily Kos who support a special prosecutor care about FISA and the PATRIOT Act as well.  We shall see …

Over the weekend, Bob Fertik proposed the idea of a “Constitutional slate” of Ideas for Change in America, including his Appoint a Special Prosecutor for the Crimes of the Bush Administration as well as our Get FISA Right, repeal the PATRIOT Act, and restore our civil liberties and Pierre Loiselle’s Repeal the Patriot Act.

Does Get FISA Right want to take the first steps towards this by endorsing Bob’s idea?

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The second round of voting in change.org’s Ideas for Change in America competition kicked off today. Please vote for Get FISA Right, repeal the PATRIOT Act, and restore our civil liberties — and help promote it!

To vote, just click on the button displaying the current number of votes on the top left of the change.org page. (If your vote doesn’t register, you may need to log in or sign up first.)  You can also use the widget on the front page of our web site.

There are a lot of ways you can help promote the idea — see the list on our wiki. A few ways to get started:

1. Email the link to your friends and listservs.
2. Post it to your profile and share it on Facebook or MySpace
3. If you’re a blogger, write up a post on it and include the code for the widget (available here). Then sign up as an “endorser” (the link’s on the right-hand side of the change.org page)
4. Help with our blogger outreach — more details here

We’re having a conference call to discuss promotion on Tuesday, January 6, at 5 PM Pacific/8 PM Eastern. Please RSVP on Facebook or MyBO if you’re interested!

Stay tuned for more!

jon

PS: and if you’ve got other ideas for promotion, please mention them in the comments

PPS: please also consider voting for Pierre Loiselle’s Repeal the Patriot Act idea. If we decide to combine the ideas later, you can always change your vote …

Facebook and MyBO events for the Ideas for Change competition are up; please accept and forward!

We still don’t know the ground rules, so at this point the most important thing to do is start getting the word out, set up our communications channels — and get the planning discussions going.  So please, have a look at our thinking and give your feedback and suggestions … and start letting people know about it, via email, blogging, and social networks.