One of the best critiques of Americans Elect was written by professor of law and political science Rick Hasen and published on Politico, entitled A Democracy Deficit at Americans Elect? . He writes: “But Americans Elect is doing more than simply paving the way for ballot access for the candidate who wins its Internet plebiscite. It has [...]

You state that our statement of 40% is not true, at the same time that you acknowledge that the data you use to refute our statement covers only 29 out of the 50 states. Therefore, with all due respect, you can only state that 27% of voters are registered outside of the two major parties [...]

Let me note that neither I nor the author of this post are advocating Warren as a Senate candidate, but using a hypothetical Warren candidacy to show how the Interactive Voter Choice System opens up the electoral process to self-organizing, voter-controlled voting blocs and insurgent candidates who would otherwise have little chance of winning.

Wouldn’t the fact that Warren has no electoral experience work against her creating a winning electoral base if she ran for president? Wouldn’t Obama’s tenure in the White House and grip on Democratic electoral machinery rule out running and winning as a third party candidate? Wouldn’t a Senate seat put Warren in the public eye [...]

Excellent piece showing that we are held captive more by misrepresentation of the facts than by the facts themselves. As you point out, there is a solution to the feigned debt/deficit crisis, which is to recognize that it is the result of misrepresentation of the facts than by the facts themselves. Your analysis, and that [...]

IVCS as a web technolgy per se is unrelated to efforts to alter the legal status of corporations. However, it does create a framework within which voters across the political spectrum can create voting blocs and electoral coalitions around shared policy agendas that might seek to alter the legal status of corporations.

The Interactive Voter Choice System (IVCS) is not an Internet system for public voting.

It enables voters to take action BEFORE elections to create voting blocs and electoral coalitions around shared policy priorities that can run winning candidates in primary and general elections.

IVCS, however, does not involve voting in actual elections.

Thanks for the compliment! Actually, if you read the home page of the Re-Inventing Democracy website , you will see that it enables voters to get control of elections by creating voting blocs and electoral coalitions that make corporate campaign contributions irrelevant. These contributions become irrelevant when it is the voters who put candidates on the ballot [...]

Regrettably, we must recognize that Congressional representatives who are legally bribed by corporate special interests to pass laws that favor corporate interests over the welfare of their constituents are NOT going to pass any meaningful laws limiting the Citizens United ruling or any legislation or court decisions that decrease their ability to raise unlimited campaign [...]

Special interest organizations of individuals like the NRA that use their campaign contributions to buy the votes of Congressional representatives can be just as harmful to the public as corporate special interests that also buy votes through campaign contributions. When special interest organizations, whether the NRA or corporations, skew elections by giving their candidates unfair [...]

Boehner is acting true to form. He and a majority of his colleagues can be expected to dance to the tune of the NRA at the expense of the safety of the American people. What I hope is that Representative Giffords makes a full recovery and takes on the special interests and Congressional representatives who [...]

Your argument about how IVCS blocs would differ from typical interest groups is insightful and on target. Traditional interest groups usually morph into formal organizations with fairly inflexible agendas run by professionals. Voting blocs created using IVCS tools would be comprised of varying numbers of voters with flexible agendas who can easily leave the bloc [...]

FYI, here’s Americans Elect’s mission statement: “In order for Americans to enjoy the governance they deserve, Americans Elect will organize an Internet-based convention that nominates a presidential ticket for 2012 that will bridge the vital center of American public opinion.” “The winning presidential and vice presidential nominees will be on the ballot in all 50 [...]

Jeff, Americans Elect is doing the ballot access work, per my post NO LABELS+AMERICANS ELECT=BLOOMBERG?.

My main source of information is Irregular Times. Jim Cook has been writing about Americans Elect for this publication for a long time. It has an extensive archive on Americans Elect.

A Grassroots Takeover Strategy The rise of a “dictatorial democracy” can be prevented, according to Joseph Firestone (aka “letsgetitdone”), by a grassroots governmental takeover strategy that he writes about in The Threat to Open Society and the Interactive Voter Choice System . The system, now in development, provides free web-based tools by which voters across the political spectrum [...]

You’ve got it!

Hallelujah!

I love this reply, it is so wise, hopeful and forward looking. Also, I really appreciate how well you can envisage a re-configuration of U.S. party alignments in light of the emergence of No Labels. What I wish is that I can convincingly convey to techno-visionary folks the extent to which IVCS can catalyze a [...]