The Merger of Old School and Online Organizing

Crossposted at OpenLeft.com

I am about as old school as you can get. I started knocking on doors in campaigns 35 years ago, at the age of 12, and I still go out door-knocking at least a little bit every election cycle. I think that kind of person-to-person political work can tell you a lot more about how people are thinking and feeling about politics then anything else you do throughout a campaign.

But I am also very excited, as I think is pretty obvious to anyone who has read my posts at OpenLeft.com or on The Huffington Post, about online organizing today, as well as its long-term potential. From the first time I talked to Wes Boyd as he was starting MoveOn.org, I have been completely enamored with the potential that organizing over the internet has for progressive politics.

That's why I'm so excited to announce the merger between USAction and TrueMajority, and discuss its potential impact. USAction is a great old school organization specializing in the best kinds of field organizing, door knocking, voter registration and get-out-the-vote work. (Full disclosure, I was the executive director of USAction's Iowa affiliate back in the 1980s, and currently do some consulting work for them.) TrueMajority is one of the most innovative internet organizations in the country, with a membership topping 600,000 people strong. By bringing old style community organizing and door-knocking together with innovative online strategies, this newly merged group has the potential to really create some exciting new models of organizing.

This merger also presents a great opportunity to build the greater progressive infrastructure. This merger is, in some sense, a cooperation agreement between two powerhouse organizations and organizing models to help bring about greater progressive change today and in the years to come. I am very excited to see the interplay that will take place between the new USAction and the netroots community, who will team up to win big fights for our side. Today, they are working on SCHIP, but they are already working on strategies for ratcheting up the fight over on Iraq and stopping a possible war with Iran, as well as fighting for health care for all Americans. They will work hard to bring the netroots community to the table and help facilitate the new ideas and campaigns that will surely rise out of this new and innovative organization.

A great model of how the netroots and specifically the local blogosphere can help win big fights is the Lamont campaign in 2006. Lamont's campaign manager, Tom Swan, was on leave from his job as the long-time executive director of USAction's Connecticut affiliate, and he brought that old school organizing experience to bear to great effect in the campaign. However, the primary campaign never would have won without bloggers and MoveOn.org making it their cause as well. The combination of the two kinds of organizing brought about a huge upset in the primary, and almost knocked off Lieberman, even after he cut a deal with the Republicans for their money and support in the general election.

Today, USAction affiliates are planning dozens of events across the country to oppose Bush's threatened veto on SCHIP, and to urge members of Congress to stand with their constituents to override the president. TrueMajority will urge its members to participate in these events, and will launch an online petition demanding congressional support for SCHIP.

So, in honor of this marriage of two great organizations, I urge you to take a stand today and check out their SCHIP petition, attend a rally or event in your hometown and continue check in on the new and improved USAction, as I expect great things out of them in the years to come.

Comments

[mommamia526]

Here is an idea: often there are different petitions going on by various organizations with the same objective. Find out about them, and put links to all of them on the various websites and try to get people to sign on on all those petitions. It multiplies each voice. Then, in addition to signing on to those petitions individual letters to Congress may be written as well. That, too, can be incorporated into the online petitions. AMA does this, for example. Online participation is great for people who are confined to the homefront, i.e. no car and working from home, or disabled, or too old, or ill to go knocking on doors. I, for one, never have the time to talk to people knocking on my door, or calling me, and being preoccupied anyway, I do not hear what they are saying in any case.