The Problem: Our government is out of alignment; money trumps the public interest.
People want their opinion to count not only on a ballot for a general election, but in results delivered by legislation and government action in D.C. That's not happening. The system has been gamed by a powerful minority of moneyed interests that stretch beyond our borders. Public will, common interest, our prosperity have been marginalized.
The Solution: Realign government action with public will utilizing the Internet.
Together, we can restore our Republic by leveraging our democracy. Doing so requires breaking an old paradigm of political polling. The scope of this model is limited and doesn't allow for interested citizens to participate when they want. Currently, asking people for fifteen minutes of their time to answer a biased survey of poll questions on pertinent political choices will never generate enough response, let alone political weight to make a true difference. If it could have, it would have.
Polling does however drive political discussion, which is critical to the health of our Republic. The public wants to participate politically on an honest and level playing field, in between elections and on their time, not that of a pollsters. That's what Tea, 99%, Rainbow Coalition, anyone with an issue that matters to them want, that we each have an equal voice in the issues that matter to us. We want that voice to affect decisions made in DC by our elected leaders.
A single nonprofit online entity, dedicated to unbiased public polling of the U.S. electorate, can generate the leverage needed to bring government into realignment with the will of We the People as stated in our Constitution. Nonprofit Democracy can align interests.
- Nonprofit: our Republic is realigned with public will and funding instead of the market and economic leverage.
- Anonymous Unique Membership insuring a single account per user -- one person, one vote. Keeping personal identity of public members private as in official voting.
- Real-Time Unbiased Polling on all major issues generating dynamic reporting on all data current and historical. Written as neutrally as possible on all relevant political issues (wedge, green, human rights, Supreme Court rulings, taxation, jobs, economy, debt, climate change, war, your issue here...). If the election for president were today, how would you vote?
- Public Profiles of all Elected Officers: voting records, issue positions, job approval, related information to make transparent each officer's actions and decisions as they perform their duties as public servants. On a scale of 1 to 100 how do you rate Obama's performance as president so far? Your representative? Your governor?
- Public Profiles of all Candidates including judges. All people declaring to run for election state their position on issues by answering related questions.
- Officer- & Candidate-Generated Questions directed to their specific constituents regarding relevant issues as they arise in the course of governing in between elections (natural disaster, budget effects on local industry, political tactics...)
- Public-Generated Questions for all the issues currently unaddressed nationally, statewide, or locally. By their popularity, questions and answers become relevant and prominent in this online community.
- Legislation and Political Action tracked from presentation in Congress, membership urges their leaders directly how they would vote on specific bills. Presidential action is tracked and polled. Supreme Court rulings are posted to agree or disagree with.
- Simplified Intuitive Web Design: minimalistic presentation of information that is more ATM than current web design. Instead of a cluttered few pages, many simple pages that are easy and quick to gather information, make educated decisions, and engage further or move on to the next issue, candidate, officer, survey question, polling result. The individual user determines their level of involvement.
- Education on Issues is critical to create an informed public. Pop-up definitions of key words, a common glossary of terms, links to related reference, web forums and media outlets provide the means to help generate informed decision making.
- Calendar of Political Events all public events of elected officials and candidates to increase public interaction between the elected and the governed.
- Ad-Free reduction of clutter in page space, which eliminates possible conflict of interests regarding specific issues, and reinforces the focus of the website as being on the issues facing our nation. Kept relevant by public member donations.
- Available 24/7 on member's time, not that of a phone pollster's with an agenda.
- Politically Neutral the only stake this nonprofit democracy has in the game is the integrity of the process, not of any single individual, party or political stance. Integrity of the democratic system and the people trumps any specific belief.
Imagine what the opinion of millions of people made public is like in real time. Imagine one website dedicated to democracy, a nonprofit democracy founded by angels, made relevant by public will.
One person, One vote, collected together in one place to create an online virtual democracy that supports our Constitution with the voices of educated engaged citizens. This is possible if you want.