The Progressive magazine needs our help
If you're familiar with The Progressive, it's a wonderful magazine with a hundred-year history of advocating for progressive social change, going back to their founder, Robert La Follette. Doesn't...
View ArticleLife Lessons From a Dying Friend
My friend Robert Gordon is dying of lupus. He’s a novelist who spent a decade teaching in the Washington State prisons and written essays for everywhere from Esquire, to The Christian Science Monitor,...
View ArticleReining in the Rogue Democrats—Petition for Primary Challenges
As the health care fight approaches its end game, how do we, as ordinary citizens exercise power? How do we create enough of a potential cost to deter Max Baucus, Kent Conrad, Ben Nelson, Blanche...
View ArticleUpdated: Join MoveOn's Primary Pledge to Rein in Rogue Democrats
Like many of us, I've been cursing Max Baucus through most of the summer, for blocking our best chance for real health care reform in forty years. Now Baucus at least says he won't filibuster, but Joe...
View ArticleEight Reasons the Democrats lost Virginia & New Jersey--and How to Recover
Losing the Virginia and New Jersey governorships hurt. Local factors played a part, but these are major states. So it matters why the Democrats lost them. Here are eight reasons, with lessons on how to...
View ArticleCalling the Bluff in the Conference Committee
As the health care bill goes to conference, there's obviously a tension between a pretty decent House bill and a Senate one that's probably better than nothing, but contains some seriously problematic...
View ArticleCall for Coakley: How three votes can tip an election
On election day 2004, I was canvassing in home state of Washington, alternating between knocking on doors for gubernatorial candidate Christine Gregoire and breaking to call Ohio and Florida. After...
View Article'Soul of a Citizen' Excerpt: What Cynicism Costs Us
With over 100,000 copies in print, my book "Soul of a Citizen" has inspired thousands of citizens to make their voices heard and actions count--and to stay involved for the long haul. I spent the past...
View ArticleHow The Democrats Can Reclaim The Youth Vote
If the Democrats don't get the youth vote, they're toast. That happened in Virginia, New Jersey, and Massachusetts, where young Obama voters stayed home in droves. It's an ugly conceivable future...
View ArticleSoul of A Citizen excerpt: The Real Rosa Parks Story
Last week, I began my excerpts from Soul of a Citizen by writing about the costs of cynicism. One reason people despair so easily these days is that we often have little sense of how change has...
View Article'Soul Of A Citizen' Excerpt: Taking Money Out Of Politics: A Grassroots...
Nothing makes us feel more powerless than the corruption of our democracy by money. It undermines progress on every issue we face. If America is ever to deal with our critical problems, we're going to...
View Article'Soul Of A Citizen': Barack Obama, Vaclav Havel, And When Small Steps Yield...
To keep the political hope to stay involved, it helps to remember that our actions can bear unforeseen fruits. Change comes, to be sure, when we shift governmental or corporate policies, elect better...
View Article'Soul Of A Citizen' Excerpt:How The Christian Coalition And MoveOn Helped...
Pursuing bipartisanship at the expense of conviction is a losing game, as we saw with the endless delays on the health care bill. But when we create unexpected alliances that cross political lines,...
View ArticleReclaiming Our Hope
How do we counter political demoralization among those who had such high hopes for the American political process just over a year ago? It helped to finally pass the healthcare reform bill--Democratic...
View ArticleFrom Drunken Party Girl To Climate Change Activist
When we try to engage people politically we never know who will respond, or when someone will shift from reveling in their apathy to taking powerful public stands. With Earth Day coming up, here's a...
View ArticleJesus And Climate Change -- The Journey Of Evangelical Leader Rich Cizik
When we become frustrated in working for change, we might remember how hope can come from unexpected places and historically resistant constituencies. Rich Cizik's efforts to engage his fellow...
View ArticleVolunteers Can't Solve Our Problems: For Every House Habitat Builds, 100s...
Through Global Youth Service Day, millions of young women and men got involved in their communities last week, often taking their first steps into lives of commitment. That's a powerful potential force...
View ArticleArun Gandhi, Martin Luther King, And Looking Beyond The Impossibly Perfect...
From reining in Wall Street to preventing the next oil spill and tackling global climate change, we often hold back from taking important public stands because we're caught in a trap I call "the...
View ArticleFrom An Eighth Grade Education To Testifying Before Congress
Too many of us hold back from community involvement because we think we don't know enough to act on our beliefs, or don't have the standing or confidence to take a public stand. When we see a woman who...
View ArticleHow A 17-Year San Quentin Inmate Helps To Heal His Community
What would happen if we listened closely to the stories in our community, and used them as clues to how to act for change? It's tempting, for instance, to dismiss the criminals in our jails as...
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