Friends, Boulderites, Countryfolk, your ears!
Former Senator Mike Gravel's performance at the first Democratic
debate has received some good coverage, including this from the Boston
Globe: www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/04/28/835/ and CNN has just
relented, re-inviting him to the NH debates. Mike is the man who read
the Pentagon Papers into the Congressional Record, and who
single-handedly filibustered until the draft was ended in 1971.
I'm asking you to help a bit to promote Mike's most cherished project,
the National Initiative for Democracy because the debate format didn't
allow him to even mention it. I worked with Mike in 2002 on this
proposal for more, better and national ballot initiatives, and have
devoted 18 years to the concept.
It's important to understand that Mike has found a way to get the
amendment into the Constitution WITHOUT begging Congress, which has
proved fruitless for a century. For brevity, I refer you to the
second paragraph of www.Vote.org for an explanation. Suffice it to say
that all serious constitutional scholars agree that since citizens
wrote and ratified the Constitution -NOT the 13 Legislatures- citizens
can also amend it.
Here are some things we can do to get the National Initiative into the
Constitution, starting with the easiest:
1. If you haven't yet, you can vote at the completely redesigned
www.Vote.org to ratify the National Initiative, and ask others to do
so. If American Idol can get more votes in a night than any president
ever has
(http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,1783339,00.html),
then we can attain the threshold to enact the National Initiative,
modeled on the Constitution's Article VII threshold. Both thresholds
are ad hoc, "ordained and established" by citizens, not legislatures.
(Mike's online voting, unlike Idol's, insures only one vote per
person.) Polls have shown for decades that over 70% of us want a vote
on important national issues.
2. You can mention Vote.org in your writing and put links to it on
websites. Of course Mike has his own website www.ni4d.us, but many
find mine a better and simpler explanation, and it features your
distinguished endorsements. Mike's always the maverick, and goes it
alone. When people are ready to vote for the Initiative at Vote.org ,
they are seamlessly sent to Mike's voting site.
3. At the bottom of our home page, you can "vote" for our website at
"social bookmarking" sites Del.icio.us and Digg. Read about this
phenomenon in the Wall St. Journal article "The Wizard of Buzz":
http://tinyurl.com/33j8u9. You have to register for these sites, but
they respect your privacy. They are a good way to find and share
websites and stories that other people find useful.
4. I've gotten some interest from Common Cause in emulating the
successful coalition strategy adopted by the Progressive and Populist
parties a century ago: those who wanted women's suffrage, secret
ballots, direct election of Senators and direct primaries decided to
press for initiative and referendum first, and then used them to get
the others. For example, men in 13 states voted for women's suffrage,
which encouraged Congress to pass the 19th Amendment.
I've suggested that we press for national initiatives to empower those
who want, for example, withdrawal from Iraq and curbs to the
military-industrial complex, a carbon tax, national health care and
curbs to government secrecy. If you have contacts at Common Cause
please let them know if you support this concept. If you have other
ideas for forming such a coalition, or anything else, please let me
know.
Evan Ravitz
founder, Vote.org
"We want saints and gurus and leaders and heroes because we are lazy.
We think they have done all the work, and all that we have to do is
just to follow them. You know, when you follow somebody, you're not
only destroying yourself, but the other whom you follow." -J.
Krishnamurti
"The age of the leaders has come and gone. Every person must be their
own leader now. You must remove your projection, and contain the
spirit of our time in your own life and your own nature because to go
the old way and follow your leader is a form of psychological
imprisonment." and "There is a very profound reason why there are no
great leaders any more. It is because they are no longer needed." -Sir
Laurens van der Post
www.Vote.org
Taking the "mock" out of democracy!
Evan Ravitz, founder (303)440-6838 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
also: www.Vote.org/photos www.Vote.org/paradise
"Fool's gold exists because there is real gold." -Rumi
