How can I help in political push to change the USA?
I’m trying to figure out politics, how to leverage my skills etc, to oust Bush (personally) and globally push for more participation and diverse viewpoints and discussion in this country.
Where do I start? Will it help to volunteer for the Democrats?
What I really want to do is to setup a conference of people in Open Source (who I know tow their own and make major differences) to discuss these issues, start some political open source projects, and to plow ahead on either fixing this government or making a new one.
Yes. I’m serious.
It seems that both the us parties are pretty much the same.
http://politicalcompass.org/uselection
Though that chart does show some real alternatives, even if they are not as popular/rich/good looking.
Comment by Alan — September 23, 2006 @ 6:52 am
He Jon,
You’ve got my vote
I feel for all the sane Americans with a government that certainly isn’t sane. BTW, not that we’ve got anything better in the Netherlands
. Politics seems so far away from trully changing things. Anyway, best of luck with your plans!
Comment by BjornW — September 23, 2006 @ 2:28 pm
Lots of people are trying to apply “open source” principles to politicing, have been since at least the Dean campaign.
As for getting rid of Bush, I wish someone would tell me how. Best I can think of is to continue pushing the idea that impeachment is necessary, but without the typical Bush-hater verbiage that makes one easy to write off.
There’s no hope of getting the open source community united behind a narrow goal like getting rid of Bush that has nothing to do with open source. However, everyone involved in the community should get politically active — on the issues that directly impact the community, like software patents and the DMCA — and on issues that open source has direct application to, like electronic voting. I’d be excited by a conference with these foci.
Comment by Mike Linksvayer — September 23, 2006 @ 10:41 pm
The person who said that both sides are essentially equal is right. It would be nice to return to a time when women could not vote, there was segregation, and no social security but these things just won’t happen in my lifetime under the current two party system.
I don’t think that the democrats are the answer. It seems to me we need to roll back about 150 years of legislation and that I would support a “regressive” party if one existed.
Comment by Fred — September 24, 2006 @ 1:00 pm