Subject: [big campaign] MUST READ - HuffPo: Right-Wing Voter Guide Revolution: What Can Progressives Learn?
From: Aniello Alioto <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2010 12:49:15 -0400
List-Id: <bigcampaign.googlegroups.com>

The Right-Wing kicks our collective ass' on voter guides... we are now
fighting back with a fantastic aggregator of resources - TheBallot.org ...
please share this resource FAR & WIDE... the article below is more than
enough to convince us all of the need to publicize this resource to our
maximum collective potential.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/van-jones/rightwing-voter-guide-rev_b_771368.html
Right-Wing Voter Guide Revolution: What Can Progressives
Learn?<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/van-jones/rightwing-voter-guide-rev_b_771368.html>

*By Van Jones and Billy Wimsatt
*
We'll give you the punch line first:

Voter guides are cheap and easy and they help win elections. The right-wing
uses them better than we do. Luckily, there's a new tool that compiles local
progressive voter guides: www.TheBallot.org <http://www.theballot.org/>.
Everyone should go to www.TheBallot.org right now. Find one, create one,
then Facebook it, Blog it, and Tweet it like mad!

Please take two minutes right now and help us reach millions of 2008 Obama
voters and inspire them to vote again in the next few days.

We feel real urgency because we've seen what the other side is producing.

It looks innocent enough at first.

A plain-looking one-page sheet entitled: Nevada Voter Guide For Christians
(PDF).

So far, so good.

There's Democratic Senator Harry Reid, a good practicing Christian. We learn
that he is: "Anti-Free Speech" "Pro-Homosexual" "Pro-Abortion" and the
kicker: "Anti-Jesus."

Yep.

It's all marked there in the little chart with a "Y" by his name.

His percentage score for "Faith Friendly?"

A big fat: 0%.

Then we look over at Nevada's other Senator, Republican John Ensign, who
during the summer was involved in a major sex scandal and was found to have
inappropriately funneled money to his mistress.

Senator Ensign's faith-friendly rating?

You guessed it: 100%.

According to these voter guides (which exist in all 50 states), the vast
majority of Democrats in Congress are "Anti-Jesus" and have a "faith
friendly" rating of zero. No matter that the majority are Christians and
people of faith. Meanwhile, the vast majority of Republicans are similar to
John Ensign: They get a perfect score.

The goal of this campaign, created by www.PrayInJesusName.org is to fax
these voter guides to 120,000 churches, to be distributed among
congregations during Sunday services.

Was this propaganda paid for by the GOP?

Part of Karl Rove's multi-million dollar war chest?

Not as far as we can tell.

The voter guides state very clearly across the top: "This voter-guide is
non-partisan, and neither endorses nor opposes any candidate for office. It
simply reports the actual votes of Senate or Congressional incumbents, and
lists their main (challengers). You should register to vote NOW to vote on
November 2nd." The donation page for
www.PrayInJesusName.org<http://www.prayinjesusname.org/>says: "Your
donation to this ministry is tax-deductible under the IRS code."

The total budget for the entire campaign is only $36,250. They simply fax
these one page voter guides to 120,000 churches and allow local
congregations to distribute them.

As the website brags: "How many millions of dollars will be wasted on ads
that don't mobilize Christian voters? For just 29 cents, we can equip and
mobilize an entire church of voters. For just $29, we can mobilize 100
churches. For just a few thousand dollars, we can wake the entire nation. We
don't need millions, just a few thousand dollars spent wisely, and SUDDENLY
WE WIN."

Nevermind that this particular website and these voter guides appear to be
in violation of IRS guidelines (someone should file a formal complaint). The
larger point is that the right-wing has been using local voter guides for a
long time. They're incredibly effective, and they cost almost no money.

"That's a really smart idea," you say. "Why aren't we doing that?"

Well... we're starting to. A new alliance of groups recently launched
www.TheBallot.org to aggregate local progressive and non-partisan voter
guides. More than 200 have been posted so far, from 42 states, and dozens of
organizations. The best ones are personal voter guides created by local
bloggers, political junkies, and informal groups that tell you in plain
English (or Spanish or another language) the real deal on races and ballot
measures all the way down the ballot to the School Board level.

Instead of wasting precious time getting offended by right-wing hypocrisy --
or even worse, responding with offensive anti-Christian bigotry -- please go
check out www.TheBallot.org. Think of it like Wikipedia for progressive
voter guides. The more people participate, the better it gets.

Is your town represented on www.TheBallot.org?

If YES, Blog it. Tweet it, Email it. Facebook it -go crazy.

If NOT, please forward this to your local political junkie and ask 'em to
make a voter guide so folks in your town know how to vote. Not just for
Congress, but down ballot: Judges. County Clerks. Ballot questions. The
stuff nobody knows.

The hidden benefit of local voter guides is that it actually makes people
understand what's on their ballot which makes them want to vote, and get
their friends to vote --especially new voters: The Obama 2008 Generation.

There's no time to waste! Get out there and do God's work! Make a
progressive voter guide today, or at least download one and spread the
gospel.

Can we get an Amen?

*
Billy Wimsatt runs TheBallot.org and is author of Please Don't Bomb The
Suburbs.*

*Van Jones is a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress, and
American Progress Action Fund. He is focusing on "green-collar jobs" and how
cities are implementing job-creating climate solutions. Van Jones is a
globally recognized, award-winning pioneer in human rights and the clean
energy economy. He is a co-founder of three successful nonprofit
organizations: the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, Color of Change, and
Green For All. He is also the best-selling author of the definitive book on
green jobs, The Green Collar Economy. Jones served as the green jobs advisor
in the Obama White House in 2009 and is currently a senior policy advisor at
Green For All. He also holds a joint appointment at Princeton University as
a distinguished visiting fellow in both the Center for African American
Studies and in the Program in Science, Technology and Environmental Policy
at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.*

*Van Jones is the Founder and former President of Green For All.*

* Follow Van Jones on Twitter: www.twitter.com/VanJones68 *

-- 
You received this message because you are subscribed to the "big campaign" group.

To post to this group, send to [email-masked]

To unsubscribe, send email to [email-masked]

E-mail [email-masked] with questions or concerns
 
This is a list of individuals. It is not affiliated with any group or organization.