When he wrote his piece of political reportage, Chris Cillizza made it sound so deliciously good when he mentioned Iowa Governor and 2008 hopeful Tom Vilsack starting
…a series of online conversations Vilsack is trying to facilitate through his political action committee that, in his words, “offer solutions to issues people care about.” Vilsack’s next project asks readers to define what the Democratic Party stands for in 10 words or less.
The success of this project remains an open question, but through it Vilsack has started to establish himself as one of the serious policy thinkers at the state level in the party, a nice niche should he decide to run for president in 2008.
Wow! How grassroots it all sounds. It sure is corny for a presidential aspirant to believe that talking things out can change a country, but this is Iowa we’re talking about, so why not? I eagerly tripped on over to Vilsack’s web page to jump in, share my thoughts, read others, and begin the work that Cillizza says Vilsack has enabled.
But then… oh, the horror. The horror.
When I visited his website, I found two things:
1. His “community-building site” is a really a PAC (political action committee), an organization dedicated to campaign fundraising.
2. On that website, all that exists of his ballyhooed “project” for “serious policy thinkers,” getting Americans to talk about finding a new core for the Democratic party, is a web form for ideas that are not posted.
After my encounter with Vilsack’s online web presence, I wrote the following on December 2:
Tom Vilsack wants us to get to know him? Well, he’s introduced himself, all right, and it’s not as shiny and pretty as Cillizza’s puff piece tries to make it seem. I find it instructive that Tom Vilsack’s “outreach effort” is through a Political Action Committee, a fundraising organization. It is also instructive that the neat-sounding “Democrats in Ten Words” event is, far from encouraging thoughtful community-building as Mr. Cillizza suggests, a simple one-page html form to be filled out with contact information. What do you think Vilsack’s PAC is going to do with that contact information? It all looks like one of those profoundly stupid “surveys” Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National Committee send out every couple of months. Do these politicians honestly think we’re so stupid as to not see through the charade?
Visitors’ “ten words” thoughts, in the meanwhile, are swallowed up by the database and are not being shared with others. That’s hardly a community-building activity. It’s an information gathering and hoarding procedure.
Vilsack will have to do better than this if he wants to be taken seriously as an inclusive presidential candidate.
Within a few minutes, Kevin Thurman from Vilsack’s “Heartland” website came over and wrote the first comment to this post, in which he said that all of the “ten words” contributions would be shared soon. Over on the Vilsack website, Thurman said they’d be up by the week of December 9th. Kevin wrote very sincerely, and to give him and the Vilsack organization a chance to deliver on their promise I suspended this post.
It’s December 20, and there’s nary a contribution of “ten words” that’s been published, although Thurman noted that hundreds of people have sent in their thoughts — and their contact information — to the web site.
It’s possible that this is the result of a well-meaning lapse, in which case the problem is one of organization: promising something and then not delivering it as scheduled. I hope that’s what’s going on, because the alternative — that the idealistic-sounding enterprise is just a fundraising scheme in disguise — is really depressing.
I’m looking for a presidential candidate who stokes my fire, but right now Vilsack is quenching my flame with a cold dousing of “whatever.”
Thanks for taking a look at the Heartland PAC website. I am sorry you feel like we are not being honest and forthright. I hope that I can help you understand what Gov. Vilsack is doing with Heartland PAC.
1) The Heartland PAC education discussion that is just finishing has included hundreds of blog posts on an off the site helping spur discussion about ideas. In additions, a lot of that discussion took place on conference calls, other blogs, and had nothing to do with forms. We were looking to get ideas anyway we could – so we can send them all to governors and governor candidates.
2) The Ten Words discussion is just beginning. We will be launching a new site in the next couple weeks dedicated with many of the features for interaction and discussion you mention.
3) You can post your own ten words here, they will be included in the discussion as we move forward and none of your information (except your ideas) will ever be used. We have done this with anyone who uses their own blog to be part of the education discussion and will continue.
Last, of courtse Heartland PAC (a 527 organization) is looking to build an activist e-mail list. Heartland PAC is looking to spur discussion and action that will help elect Democratic governors and down-ballot races. But you should know it has never asked for money from that list. It may do so someday — but that is not our priority.
Gov. Vilsack is interested in the discussion and using online communities to affect change and find solutions to problems that affect people everyday. Gov. Vilsack and the Heartland PAC staff have been working hard to make sure that everything we do has an impact.
But, as you know, Gov. Vilsack and Heartland PAC can’t do this alone. He can blog on his blackberry in his free time to his hearts content, but unless a community grows around the discussion it will never be the best it can be. Real discussion will never happen on the internet if people continue to distrust each other.
People took the time to believe in our education discussion and their ideas are being used. I hope you are willing to do the same for the Ten Words discussion or the healthcare discussion.
And before you take part — you might be interested to know it’s history of the discussion as well – it began in August with a single blog post. Michael Faris who started the idea has more here: http://sisypheantask.blogspot.com/2005/12/power-of-memes.htm
E-mail me if you have any questions.
Kevin Thurman
HeartlandPAC.org
Sorry it taking longer than we thought to get the site up and begin the discussion. It is not one of organization, but technology — the site is being finished tomorrow and the discussion will begin very soon.
Great. Looking forward to it.
If anyone is interested the site has launched.
Heartland PAC are a spam outfit. I would be surprised if any of the funds raised even go to much at all after lining their pockets. Spammers are not known for their honesty.
They get email addresses from other sources too. I had never heard of them when they first started spamming the crap out of me.
Don’t even touch these bastards with a bargepole unless it is to launch a DDOS attack.