Unity08 is an American political reform movement that aims to offer all voters an opportunity to directly engage in politics by ranking the most crucial issues facing the country, discussing them with the candidates and engaging in an online, secure vote to nominate a bipartisan alternative to the Democratic Party and Republican Party presidential tickets for the 2008 U.S. presidential election. [1] Founded in 2006, the group has gained attention from various media outlets, with Newsweek's Jonathan Alter dubbing the group's efforts a kind of open source politics. [2]
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History
The political reform movement was founded as a non-profit organization by several political figures; Democrats Hamilton Jordan and Gerald Rafshoon, Republican Doug Bailey, and the former two-term independent Maine Governor, Angus King.[1] Unity08 is attempting to leverage online technology, such as secure voting, to allow American voters to determine the most crucial issues facing the country, discuss them with potential nominees, and participate in an online convention to nominate a bipartisan presidential ticket. In an interview that aired on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer in May 2006, Unity08's founders said that the group was formed in response to the polarization between the Republican and Democratic political parties. The group also cited a poll it commissioned from Princeton Survey Research and claimed that 82 percent of Americans think that the two major political parties are unable to address the country's problems and that 73 percent of Americans are in favor of alternatives to the two parties. [3] The group's status as a non-profit organization came into question when they asked the Federal Election Commission if the group could defer registering as a political action committee until after its candidates for the 2008 presidential election are named. A draft released by the commission in July 2006 concluded that, "Unity08 must register as a policy committee and therefore is subject to the reporting requirements and limitations and prohibitions." [4] In October 2006, the commission voted on the matter and declared that the group must register as a political action committee. Unity08’s spokesperson is actor Sam Waterston.[5] On June 28, 2007, Doug Bailey, the co-founder of Unity08, went onto Stephen Colbert's The Colbert Report and spoke about the organization. Shortly after announcing a poll to the "Colbert Nation" about whether Mr. Colbert should run for President, the web site servers crashed due to the overwhelming traffic. More recent publicity includes interviews of Mr. Waterston on The O'Reilly Factor and Hardball with Chris Matthews.
Grassroots presence
Unity08's web site is a community for members to communicate and participate via blogs, forums, and polls. The movement also has a presence on:
Finally, Unity08 leverages the online event tools of Meetup.com and Eventful for members to organize local gatherings.
Goals
Unity08 has four major goals:
- Enable Americans to rank America’s most crucial issues.
- Empower Americans to draft or evaluate Unity08 candidates and actively engage them in debate about the crucial issues.
- Empower Americans to nominate a bipartisan Unity ticket via an online convention and secure voting process.
- Elect the Unity08 presidential ticket to national office.
The Unity08 presidential ticket must be two candidates that come from different political parties. This bipartisan team must also propose a bipartisan cabinet in an effort to end paralysis in government. Co-founder Doug Bailey claims "What we are trying to do is to create a forum for people who are in the middle who have been left out of politics."[1]
Potential candidates
Candidates for the Unity08 bipartisan ticket may come from many areas. Members may start a movement to draft politicians or other leaders that have not yet announced their desire to seek the presidency. Members may also start a draft movement for candidates that have announced their campaign asking them to join Unity08. Candidates, politicians, and leaders, themselves, may choose to seek the Unity08 nomination on their own, which is expected to be in full force after the major party primaries that will take place in early 2008. Actor and spokesperson Sam Waterston acknowledged in an April 25, 2007, interview on washingtonpost.com's "PostTalk" show that Unity '08 would need an appealing candidate at its center to succeed. This was in response to speculation that Unity '08 was pursuing either New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and/or Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel[6] [7]. Bloomberg and Hagel have said they will not be running for President. Former U.S. Senator Sam Nunn of Georgia, however, has stated that he might be interested in running as the Unity08 nominee.[8]
Criticism
Campaign watchdog groups such as The Campaign Legal Center and Democracy 21 have criticized the group's initial classification as a non-profit organization, "because Unity08 makes clear that its principal purpose is to influence the 2008 presidential election". [4] The group has also come under criticism by political commentators such as David Harsanyi of The Denver Post, who contends that the Unity08 ticket will serve as a "spoiler" for one party's ticket, siphoning off enough votes from one candidate and delivering the election to the other (while failing to win the election itself). Harsanyi points to the third party tickets of Ross Perot in 1992 and Ralph Nader in 2000 that he claims may have delivered those elections to Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. [9] Liberal bloggers have also expressed frustration with Unity08 because they contend that the group promotes "establishment" centrist or center-right politicians in the molds of Joe Lieberman and Michael Bloomberg while at the same time doing little to promote the progressive values it would seemingly represent. Chris Bowers of MyDD, a blog that has long denounced Unity08, called the group's supporters "rich, center-right, 'non-partisan' donors who trash progressives and never criticize conservatives in power," and claimed that the movement has no grassroots support.[10] Other bloggers also criticize the heavy representation of lobbyists among the organization's officers.[11]
References
- ^ a b c VandeHei, Jim. "From the Internet to the White House", The Washington Post, 2006-05-31, p. A04. Retrieved on 2006-10-20.
- ^ Alter, Jonathan (2006-06-05). A New Open-Source Politics. Newsweek. Retrieved on 2006-10-21.
- ^ Online NewsHour: Unity Party Eyes 2008 election. Retrieved on 2006-10-20.
- ^ a b Ackley, Kate (2006-07-16). Roll Call: FEC Counsel Skeptical of Unity08 Request. Campaign Legal Center. Retrieved on 2006-10-20.
- ^ Unity08.org: "Actor Sam Waterston Calls on Americans to Join Growing 2008 Political Movement, Unity08" Retrieved 2008-01-04.
- ^ Cillizza, Chris (2007-04-25). Unity08 Seeks Middle-of-the-Road Candidate. Washingtonpost.com. Retrieved on 2007-12-21.
- ^ Bloomberg: 'I Intend To Be Mayor For 925 Days'. Retrieved on 2007-12-21.
- ^ Joyner, James (2007-08-20). Sam Nunn Mulls Presidential Bid on Unity08 Ticket. OutsidetheBeltway.com. Retrieved on 2008-01-03.
- ^ Harsanyi, David. Unity08 should stick to Kumbaya. The Denver Post. Retrieved on 2006-10-21.
- ^ Bowers, Chris. Unity08 has no grassroots support at all. MyDD. Retrieved on 2006-12-04.
- ^ Lobbyists and Unity08. Retrieved on 2007-02-02.
