Change Congress

Inbox refugees from the last week:

• At Next Gen GOP, Aaron Marks grades the youth outreach plans of the many candidates vying for chairmanship of the Republican Party. Almost all get failing marks.
• Looking for a job in the Obama Administration? Jamal Simmons has some advice.
• MTV will broadcast the official youth inaugural ball. Look for me and Sarah in the crowd.
• The New Yorker covers last week's hack of Soapblox, ending with an important quote from Markos of Daily Kos:
  

  We have built this new progressive movement on a lot of volunteer labor, a shoestring budget, a lot of heart and soul, but not a lot of resources. We’ve got to professionalize our movement, and we can’t rely only on labors of love, like what Paul did."

  Here here.

• At The Nation, Cora Courrier picks up on our coverage of the Belcher memo and the new staff picks at the DNC.
• You should read everything in yesterday's tech/politics round up from Tech President.
• Check out this great interview that Change Congress's Larry Lessig did with Stephen Colbert. I got Remix for Christmas but have not yet read it.

• Network Centric Advocacy surmises that the economic downturn will shrink the nonprofit space. They suggest that this will not necessarily be a Darwinian survival of the fittest, but that by pure luck and stupidity the unfit may survive at the expense of some of the better non profit advocacy groups.
• Speaking of Change Congress, the organization recently launched a donor strike, asking people to pledge not to give money to candidates who don't support public funding of elections. This strikes me as a bad idea. Wouldn't this just result in a large number of decent if not perfect candidates getting handicapped while corrupt GOP competitors continue to rake in the cash?
• Here's an interesting idea that we should perhaps pursue here at FM: Tweetbacks on blog posts.
• Next New Deal has resources for understanding the new economic stimulus package.
• McClatchy offers yet another attempt to compare Obama's youth support to JFK and the 60s, with a caveat that we're all going to become disillusioned.

Hey folks. I'm sure those of you who visit the site regularly notice that there are a few different things around here lately (and for those of you in RSS-land, come see what I'm talking about). I'll have more on what's new around here tomorrow after I complete a few finishing touches tonight. In the meantime, here's some good stuff that didn't get blogged today:

• Larry Lessig's anti-corruption group Change Congress is looking for some tech-savvy kids to help run the operation. Job description is here. This should be right up the alley of FM readers.
• I've been talking for months about how John McCain plays the mainstream cultural media. Well Rock the Vote actually has some stats on it, along with a big BS detector on McCain's attempts to reach youth:
  

  Indeed, John McCain has made more guest appearances on the Daily Show—12 in total—than any other guest of the show ever. According to IMDB, McCain has also made 10 appearances on the “Tonight Show with Jay Leno,” and 8 appearances on the “Late Show with David Letterman.” By comparison, he has appeared on the famed Sunday political talk show “Meet the Press” only 6 times.

  Too bad Obama is massacring McCain on the web. It is just not the 20th Century anymore . . . . Definitely worth a read.

• HeadCount is getting some big media play for their work at Bonnaroo this past weekend. Not in the article is the fact that HeadCount registered 1,100 new voters at the festival and received 2,000 more vote pledges. Great work y'all.
• Music for Democracy, a PAC looking to get the music scene into partisan politics, launched their website this week.
• It's been a big week for culture and politics. The Progressive Book Club also launched their website today.
• The Concord Monitor notes that over two dozen candidates under 35 are on the ballot this year. Looks like the Granite State might get a big youth-infusion in its state house.
• Finally, Marc Ambinder has the goods as to what the 3,600 Obama Fellows are doing with their time.

Items of interest on the interwebs today:

• Jim Wallis has an interesting article about a new "Great Awakening" among young people of faith who are looking to increase the common good and drive our politics towards real progress on issues of social justice.
• Forbes (yes, Forbes) looks at increased youth participation through the lens of young presidential campaign staffers (including FM friend James Hannaway).
• The New York Times takes a look at Green Collar Jobs.
• Mobile Voter is rolling out an interesting new program that will use your cell phone and spare minutes to distribute pro-bono consulting and expertise to the masses.
• Larry Lessig will be speaking at UPenn on March 29th on behalf of Obama. I'm sure he'll also be talking about his recently launched "Change Congres" initiative. If I lived in PA, I wouldn't miss it for the world:

• Press Think takes a look at how McCain got in so good with the media. On this topic I would also recommend an essay by David Foster Wallace called "Up, Simba," in which the author followed McCain on the campaign trail for a week during the 2000 primaries.
• Finally, video of Barack Obama's speech on race has become the most popular political video on YouTube, netting over 4 million views, an audience that rivals most cable news networks.