e.politics: online advocacy tools & tactics

The Anti-Populist Idiocy of John Boehner’s Plan to Cut Congressional Budgets in an Internet Age

Also published on The Huffington Post

John Boehner’s tears may have overshadowed the substance of his 60 Minutes appearance last Sunday, but he did mention some “serious” policy options in his time on screen. I put “serious” in quotes for a good reason, because looking below the surface of one at least one of his ideas suggests just how un-serious he is about the job of governing.

Talking with Leslie Stahl, The Speaker-to-be made the following grand proposition:

Well, how about we start with cutting Congress? I’m going to cut my budget, my leadership budget five percent. I’m going to cut all the leadership budgets by five percent. I’m gonna cut every committee’s budget by five percent. And every member is gonna see a five percent reduction in their allowance. All together that’s $25-$30 million and it likely would be one of the first votes we cast.

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Congratulations to NOI and the RootsCamp Crew!

This past Saturday saw the latest running of the lefty online organizing bulls — the New Organizing Institute’s regular post-election RootsCamp, which brings Democratic and progressive field organizers and online staff from around the country in for a mass de-brief. It’s an “unconference,” meaning that the agenda is written on the spot as people propose discussion sessions and the organizers assign rooms. This year’s event drew roughly 1000 of us, many fresh off campaigns, and it was a true joy to get to learn from people who are applying online orgnizing principles in the Real World (i.e., we got to listen to actual practitioners rather than the usual loud voices that hog the stage at these things). Kudos all around — besides meeting some great folks, I learned a ton, the best parts of which you Loyal Readers will get to share in the coming weeks.

BTW, NOI also used the weekend to unveil their new Organizing Toolbox. More on that here shortly, but be sure to check it out for yourself.

– cpd

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