Whether as the result of crony capitalism, monied interests calling the shots in Washington, the myriad broken promises of politicians of both parties, millions of Americans find themselves “Politically Homeless.” According to ABC News’ Amy Bingham, an organization called Americans Elect Aims to Bypass Parties with Online Presidential Nomination.
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They are creating an opportunity for people who are not part of the establishment of either party to get on the presidential ballot. While I cannot profess to know much about the organization behind this movement, the idea itself is an intriguing one:
For the 68 percent of Americans who said in an ABC/Washington Post poll released Wednesday that they had a negative view of government, the possibility of having a presidential candidate free of the currently gridlocked political parties could be just a few clicks away.
The nonpartisan, nonprofit Americans Elect has collected petition signatures – millions of them [1.6 million in California alone] – in all 50 states to put a “candidate of the people” on the ballot in November 2012. This candidate would be selected through an online draft and nomination process instead of through the traditional Republican and Democratic parties primary and caucus schedule.
“We are creating competition for all these folks who are politically homeless,” said Elliot Ackerman, Americans Elect’s chief operating officer. “A lot of the folks that engage with us are socially liberal and fiscally conservative, and those people don’t really have a voice in our political system right now. What we’re doing is really creating an incentive structure so that those individuals will be competed for.”
I understand the sentiment. I too have felt politically homeless since I witnessed the shenanigans of Democrats in the 2008 primaries. Whether one is in favor of Hillary Clinton or not, for her to have achieved a virtual tie in delegates, lead in the popular vote and still be cast aside at the Convention as the clear loser was the final disgrace in a contest fraught with sexist hazing and character assassination. Her opponent, however, received rose petals and caresses from the media daily, coupled with a startling lack of examination for his pie-in-the-sky – and often contradictory — campaign promises.
But Hillary’s treatment – and the disgraceful treatment her 18,000,000 supporters received at the hands of the mainstream media had another effect on the populace. We saw that the media, in the name of anointing their favored candidate was not above calling millions of Americans racist to threaten and keep them in line. Not to mention fellow Democrats calling us every dirty name in the book for supporting the “ho” and not the “bro.”
When we were called “low information, dried-up Archie Bunkers” by pundits and party powerful alike, many of us for the first time stepped back from the party we stood with for many years, ostracized and rejected. For the first time we felt what it must be like to be a conservative in this country, insulted regularly by the bulk of mainstream media and by many elitists in the DNC. As someone who made hundreds of GOTV calls around the country, I found that the “backwoods hillbilly” meme the media tried to sell was a lie. The mainstream media continues to hemorrhage credibility. There are many like me, waking up from a kool-aid stupor, no longer willing to accept demagogic ranting of the left or right at face value when its sole purpose is to fill Party coffers.
Continued gridlock in Washington, the refusal of either side to let productive legislation be crafted if it is contrary to the interests of politicians’ powerful backers, or partisan jockeying to prevent the other side from getting credit for a win has rendered us, for all intents and purposes, without advocates in Washington – regardless of where we fit in the progressive/conservative spectrum.
So far, the group has secured a spot on the ballot in six states, has collected the required number of signatures in four states and has about half the necessary signatures in four other states. Americans Elect spokeswoman Ileana Wachtel said the group would begin the petition process in seven more states within the week.
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The eventual nominee can be a member of either party or an independent but must chose a vice presidential running mate who is from a different party. Ackerman said he expected many of the losing GOP presidential candidates to move into the Americans Elect primary process after Republicans chose their nominee.
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“In the primaries you have to go far to the right or far to the left and tickets are having a hard time tacking back to the center,” he said. “Americans Elect allows a ticket to run authentically without having to go to extremes in the primary.”
A coalition ticket is an inviting notion although I cannot imagine who would be willing to abandon their own party in order to couple with the ‘enemy.’ A Sarah Palin perhaps…
While I am skeptical an idea like this can take hold to upend those currently in control of our two parties, its very existence, along with the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street should really give those in power something to worry about. Democrats have mistakenly tried to co-opt the current disorganized (and sometimes confused) OWS protests as their own version of the more conservative Tea Party movement, yet increasingly OWS is making clear they feel President Obama has sold out to Wall Street. Republicans also worked to co-opt the Tea Party movement, with mixed results.
Congressional approval is at an all time low. President Obama’s poll numbers continue to tank. Polling also reports that Mitt Romney, Herman Cain, even the currently downward trending Gov. Rick Perry could all beat Obama next year. Even still, Republicans are not all that enthusiastic about their choices. Neither party is anxious to undo the Gordian knot of special (read big money) interests that actually do the governing in this country. The phrase “politically homeless” rings as true as it is painful. To feel like it is not possible to trust the majority of our elected officials to do the right thing leaves many feeling bound and gagged. Americans are inching closer to that pitchfork moment.
Is the Americans Elect concept a good one? If so, who would you want on such a coalition ticket? And do you think there is any hope we can get ever move past the current plutocracy? We don’t want to split the vote and keep an ineffectual incumbent in office, but in the long run would enough dissatisfaction expressed through these myriad movements around the country actually lead to reform of our system?
Only when the failing crop currently in office know they are about to lose their jobs do we have a prayer that they will finally start to do their jobs. And yet, if they are fired, as long as they can count on a ritzy “K” street paycheck or some cushy commentating gig on CNN – what muscles can we flex to keep them honest? The teat is still flowing…