We have some unfortunate news: there will be no FreeGov campaign this year.
What Happened?
Shortly after deciding on an applicant who would have made an amazing candidate, we began to organize our team for the next phase, seeking out signatures to get on the ballot. However, it wasn't long before we realized what a time-crunch we were in - less than 10 days to get 2000 valid signatures from voters in the district. We looked for shortcuts (read: endorsements from the popular folks), but we had a hard time getting people to conceptually differentiate FreeGov from direct democracy. With even more time lost, we found ourselves with an impossible target.
For a few days, everyone's head on the team hung a bit low. We reflected on both our successes and failures. Then we came to a consensus: yes, we had failed to get on the ballot this year, but no, people were not losing interest.
What Next?
Just looking through the emails we've received, there are so many passionate people who get the concept and want to see FreeGov succeed. Given that many of those people come from different parts of the country, we have realized that it was myopic to try and get FreeGov out so quickly and with such a limited scope. Therefore, we'd like to announce our next set of goals:
* Continue to build on site features
* Grow our community nationwide
* Use the FreeGov technology as means of internal decision making
* Find candidates well ahead of the 2010 elections
* Run a unified multi-district campaign in 2010
Longer time-frame, larger targets - as you can tell we are not backing off. With Congressional approval ratings at 9%, why would we?
Finally, one more show of appreciation to our volunteers for all their support and dedication. It's been through your help that we laid the foundation for FreeGov, and though the upcoming two years are going to be packed with even more to do, nothing can compare to the effort we needed to kick-start FreeGov and get out that initial release - thanks everyone.
4 comments:
I'm glad you guys are keeping your heads above water on this one. Despite my sense that binding a representative's votes to a referendum is a bad idea, it was certainly a cool enough idea that I wanted to see it happen and where it went. It's really ambitious, and it looks like you guys just started a little late on it. I'm sure that in these last days until November, all sorts of people are having all sorts of good ideas that are coming to them just a little too late.
I still think FreeGovernment.org is a cool place and I'll be hanging around. I'm sure you'll think of other great ideas, and I look forward to seeing how you guys work with the 2010 midterms.
It would be a good idea to seek out those who are already running on the Free Government ticket -- such as the guy from New England who got a short blurb in Wired some years ago.
While I'm forgetting his name currently, I do know that others such as R.U. Sirius @ MondoGlobo, and the MetaGovernment Project, are currently working towards the same end.
Your original plan has at least one weakness. One U.S. House member can submit a bill to committee and there it will lie. It takes lots of co-signers and usually lots of political deals with other U.S. House members.
However; if 75 political candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives promised to submit and support a specific bill , they would have a real chance to get that bill out of committee. Even if only 30 of them got elected! The internet makes it much simpler to create ( and more important - promulgate ) something that could be called a single issue party platform or maybe a very specific caucus.
Do you want to know how to get multiple politicians to sign up for specific bills? So do I!
Why not try for some local offices in the interim? I would love to read about your successes in the coming months, even if they aren't at the Federal level.
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