American People Not Ready to Seize Power

The American people do have the power to change the political process and affect real change. Yet, it seems they are not quite ready to seize that power. For the past four years, I have been helping to form America's Third Party. We have been using social media to spread our message. Every week night, we host a video chat show at blogtv.

Recently, I volunteered for Americans Elect, an organization that wanted to move beyond the two party system and put America's choice for President on the ballot. People had the opportunity to draft anyone they wanted, including the current President and people running under the Republican party. The only caveat was that the person must choose a VP that was different than themselves ideologically in order to "balance the ticket."

Unfortunately, people did not show enough interest in Americans Elect for any candidate to advance into the primary round. Perhaps, the American people just aren't ready for this kind of power.

The American people are content commenting on social media sites, REACTING to what is in the news, but they are not comfortable actually steering and guiding the conversation. Plus, a key factor is their desire to stay anonymous on the internet. Americans Elect asked people to verify their real identities and they were registered voters before they could support candidates on the site. This is primarily where efforts broke down. People prefer to remain anonymous as much as possible in this digital age, including many of the donors to Americans Elect.

Americans Elect Afterthoughts

Americans Elect offered a huge opportunity to the American people, yet we failed to seize it. Therefore, their efforts to influence the 2012 Presidential race has come to an end.

Perhaps a lot of people were hesitant to get involved due to the account security verification process. There is a huge difference between clicking a support or like button and the complex account security on the AE website.

I tried to tell AE to just use a "Like" or Facebook coded "Support" button to show candidate support during the primary process, and they could even limit it to people over 18 living in the US, like Votocracy did. I truly tried to connect these two organizations early on.

However, AE insisted on high security in the support process. I felt the security was definitely needed in the voting process (which never happened), but not needed to show support.
Many people were turned off by the process when they were asked to reveal the last 4 digits of their Social Security numbers, not to mention the questions that AE seemed to know personal info. About the person getting verified. This information came from Aristotle- an informational database aggregator.

From the perspective of the end-user, it seemed personally intrusive, especially in the digital age of phishing emails and scammers. We are told not to reveal personal information over the internet for fear of potential identity theft. Yet AE asked for this information simply to support a candidate.

Maybe next time, AE will hire more programmers (maybe the ones from Votocracy) so the support process will be easier, but the voting rounds will still be secure. It would definitely help to have more Facebook integration.

Perhaps many people just didn't know about Americans Elect. During the last month or so, I started calling television stations across the country and newspapers in my state. Many of these press people had never heard of Americans Elect. If I had started this process sooner, or if the paid Press Team had taken on this effort, the organization may have gained more traction. Oftentimes, we wait for the press to discover us, when we need to do the work of putting ourselves out there. Plus, if we do as much work as we can for the press, the more likely they will run a story about us. I hope that the negative press of AE not succeeding in this election prevents us from moving forward in the future.

AE volunteers developed "Rapid Response" teams to try to respond to negative press. In the future, I think more effort can go into developing positive stories. In addition, I think money should be spent on cable television advertising. I tried sending information about this to Americans Elect. I know they may have been hesitant to do so because of FEC regulations that require donors to be revealed who engage in electioneering communications. We should have more clarity about this from the courts by the next election.

I do believe a lot of people who would have otherwise gotten involved with Americans Elect were hesitant to do so because the donors were not revealed. I understand their desire to remain anonymous, even though we were asked to reveal our identity through the account verification process. To see where I stand on Anonymity, read my poem at www.americasthirdparty.com/NotAnonymous

I just hope the Ackermans and other financial backers did not become disheartened for the future. The American people are not ready yet, but I really think they could be ready in 2016. I look forward to working with the organization in the future.

I am switching gears and starting to reach out more to media. You might want to join me in this effort. You can get the phone numbers for newspapers and TV stations at www.usnpl.com - I started in Wasington State on Monday. A lot of times they are busy. So, I get their email addresses and send them a press release. On Monday, I sent 20 out. Every little bit helps.

I'm campaigning for Sponheim, and bringing people to AE, which will help America's Third Party and Americans Elect organizations become more viable. I am going to focus on TV stations and push the May 8th Online Caucus that all Americans can participate in.

Even if we have some overlap in our efforts, it's not bad. As a teacher, I was told studrnts have to hear a concept aboutt 5 times before they get it.

Here's what you can say when you call, "I have a great news story for you." At this point, they will usually transfer you to the newsroom where you have to make a pitch. Here's what I said, "I have a great news story. Washington State resident, David Jon Sponheim is running for President of the United States. He is working to get on the ballot in all 50 states through an organization called Americans Elect, which will be holding an Online Primary on May 8th to choose their Candidate. Any US citizen can participate."

For non- Washington State I'll say, "On May 8th, Americans Elect will be holding an Online Primary to choose their Presidenttial Candidate. All Americans can participate in this process. I personally support David Jon Sponheim from America's Third Party."

If they want more information, offer to send tham a press release. Get their email address and send it to me and I will send them a Press Release.

Less Than a Month Until Americans Elect Online Primary

I know I haven't written in a while. I have been busy campaigning on twitter and facebook. I would like to encourage any readers I might have to post a link to David's candidate page on Americans Elect on their facebook and twitter at least once every day. A shortcut to his page is : www.tinyurl.com/voteDJS .

The last couple of days I have been commenting on as many political articles as I can. If I cannot post links, I still write something like this:

David Jon Sponheim is a centrist running for Presideny. In 2008, he created America's Third Party. Recently, he released a book called "Hybrid Capitalism."
PLEASE support David Jon Sponheim on Americans Elect:
1. Sign up to be a delegate at Americans Elect.
2. Go to "My Account" (at the top) then "Voting Security"
3. Answer the Security Questions so you can participate in the online primary in May and the online convention in June.
4. Click "Candidates" click "View All" search "Sponheim" click "Add My Support"

Please, just go to Google news and their Election section and start commenting on articles. Do write a sentence or two about the article before you add the info to support David.

My next step is to call newspapers, tv stations and radio stations. You can find the contact info for newspapers and tv stations and more at www.usnpl.com - if you havr time please help me in this effort.

Thank you for reading and participating.

Teaching

Some of my favorite teaching quotes are:
"When the student is ready, the teacher will appear." OR
"When the teacher is ready, the student will appear."

As you may know, I am a substitute teacher, which helps give me a little income to supplement my political and techological pursuits. I taught all last week ranging from middle school down to life skills. I like that I can be done at the end of the day and I'm almost forced to leave the work at school.

If I were teaching full-time, I think I would almost breath it, live it all the timw. When I had a long-term sub position, I'd wake up in the middle of the night thinking about my lesson plans for the next day, or I'd be thinking about how I could reach particular students. Next week, I am scheduled to teach in my friend's classroom. Since I know what the students have been working on, I've already thought about two lesson plans I want to teach that day.

I also agreed to sub for someone who has possible jury duty. That could turn into a two week job or it could fall apart completely. I already am giving up one day (or had to turn down a day of teaching for my friend) to leave myself open for this.

Anyway, teaching and learning is a lifelong process. The next thing I need to work on learning is more technology. I have a couple of websites I need to work on.

Addressing Poverty

I just read an article about poverty in America: http://www.thenation.com/blog/166705/week-poverty-welfare-reform-bad-worse - the stats are truly staggering . I truly feel for so many people in poverty. I personally know how it feels to be a child in poverty. I guess I should consider myself lucky because I turned 18 in 1996, the same year that the TANF welfare reform was put in place. Now, many more families are in poverty and funding is being cut.
I feel that I understand both sides of this issue, because I can understand the government's point of view as well. Governments are in a financiawl crunch of their own. Many states are bankrupt and the Federal Government is nearly $15trillion in deht and sliding deeper everyday. So, they cut the poor because their vocal constituents say, "people should work for any money they get." Meanwhile, the US has lost millions of jobs.
What is the solution? We need to rethink our entire economy, starting with how we provide services to the poor.
I do not believe we need to raise minimum wage or simply hand out more cash. Instead, let's begin a discussion with housing. Housing stats were not addressed in this article other than the mention that spending cuts lead to more people being homeless.
We at America's Third Party propose a Homestead Renewal Program where people can build up government owned apartment buildings and houses they can then live in. In the long run this would save the government the money they are currently using on Section 8 housing. If we address the housing issue, the families would have more money in their pockets from the small jobs they do get.
We do also need to allow people to still receive subsidies (at least food stamps) if they work. I met an individual on SSI who wanted to start a home-based business, but was hesitant to do so because benefits would be cut from both SSI and SNAP.
The governments should have the various benefits agencies work together to find a way to encourage people to work. Perhaps, people who initiall qualify for food stamps and TANF or SSI should have $.50 of cash benefits cut for every $1.00 they earn until they receive less than $10.00 in cash benefits. However, they should still the same amount of food stamps until they receive less than $10.00 in cash benefits. Then, they should cut food stamps (perhaps dollar for dollar they make working) -slowly until the person no longer needs any governmental assistance (besides housing). We need to develop a way to encourage entrepreneurship if possible.
We lay out our solutions for housing further on our website, www.americasthirdpwrty.com and in even greater detail in our book, Hybrid Capitalism.

New Candidate Page on Americans Elect

This week, Americans Elect released a new version of their candidate pages. I had to send in a scanned version of David Ssponheim's driver's license in order to prove I truly represented him. Now, I have uploaded David's picture. I still need to upload his biography and answer some questions rating his priorities. Then, I will continue to request people support him. Please, do so now at www.tinyurl.com/votedjs

I am also going to work on editing David's video responses to the first version of the Platform of Questions. They don't have the ability to post that on the site, or link to it yet. That will be coming with the next rollout.

The past couple of weeks, I have been very active on twitter www.twitter.com/thirdparty and I just started on Pinterest as well www.pinterest.com/thirdparty. I have been enjoying using my Pandigital Nova for twitter and facebook and writing these blog posts. I have yet to try to use it with pinterest.

Thanks for reading.

Website Shoutout

Here are a couple of sites you might not know about, that I like:
http://www.billkeefe.com/
http://agreater.us
Please post sites I should check out in the comments section and I might give them a review in the future.
I find out about both of these sites by the creators sending a message through the "Contact Me" button on www.centristalliance.com (Thank you Alan Hyman for setting that up). I called both of these gentleman on the phone and spoke with them.
Bill Keefe wrote a book which is posted on his site and which I've read through called W.A.Y. "Wisdom is Always Yours." I found the words very inspiring. He says I am on a Hero's Journey. I believe the entire earth and our country especially, is going through a time of transition. It is our duty as citizens to help this transition occur in the more peaceful way possible.
Jon Denn from agreater.us has created a site where users can rank bills. I have not had time to do this yet. I just found out about this site this week. He wants as many people as possible on the site ranking bills. The top three bills would be merged together into a "Greater Bill." The idea is that the ideas that rise to the top are the issues that citizens care about the most. So, log in and start ranking today!

Alright, I also wanted to write a little bit about what I accomplished today. I sent out a newsletter really promoting David's page on Americans Elect. Then, I updated David's page on wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Coolnation/David_Jon_Sponheim.
Finally, I changed the settings here on my blog.
During our BlogTV show, I started by unbanning about 10 people. I avoid unbanning the obvious trolls, but I do plan on unbanning 10 people a day until all but the obvious trolls are on the ban list. I figure that we can re-ban those 10 people if they come in again. I did have one of those unbanned come in and naysay our show, but he was kicked out by one of our Ops.
Speaking of Ops, I have been de-opping people that have not been in our show for a while. I spent the entire show doing that tonight, removing anyone who doesn't have a recognizable username. I think that going in this direction will make for a more interactive show.

My Americans Elect Story

My name is Sarah Hart and I love Americans Elect. I have a strong passion for politics and technology, and this organization merges both of these. Americans Elect has the potential to revolutionize the political process.

I am also the campaign manager for David Jon Sponheim for President. In early 2008, David was constantly complaining about the state of the nation. He disliked Bush and did not like any of the candidates that were running for President. I told him to essentially, "Stop complaining and Start campaigning." We started America's Third Party and I ran for Washington State Senate and David ran a write-in campaign for President.

I made an impression on both the Democratic and Republican candidates and got 5% of the vote. I heard about Unity08 by following their activities through the FEC Register. I tried to volunteer for that organization, but they closed up shop.

Since 2008, we have been campaigning for 2012 online using social media. Every week night we host a video chat show on blogtv at www.tinyurl.com/atpblogtv at 6 pm Pacific.

During this time, I have been researching ballot access laws as they pertain to the presidency. I've realized that the laws are rigged against Independent and Minor political party candidates. I have been reaching out to other political organizations. When I heard that some of the same people involved with Unity08 were involved with Americans Elect and they were working on getting ballot access in all 50 states, I contacted them to see how I could help. I was glad to hear they were using my site, with the ballot access research I had done, as a resource.

I became the first Delegate Leader in the Northwest for Americans Elect. I talked to Peter Arno (my AE Regional Director) about how to get more involved in Facebook and create Facebook Groups. I have been involved since before the beginning of our weekly conference calls in the Northwest.

Recently, have been part of the creation of the Web Team / Rapid Response Team in our area. I responded to articles, blogged and wrote Press Releases about the Western Regional Conference. I have been very active on the Delegate Leader Facebook group and I have been tweeting about Americans Elect as well (#WhoWillAmericansElect now that it's a #3wayrace).

As soon as the Draft process opened, I started a committee to Draft David Jon Sponheim to be Americans Elect candidate (www.tinyurl.com/votedjs). I believe Americans Elect provides the best opportunity to gain ballot access for 2012. However, I am involved in Americans Elect for more than that reason alone.

I like the fact that that Americans Elect is providing an alternative nominating procedure and candidate selection process for the Presidency. This has the potential to take the power out of the hands of powerful lobbyists and move in the direction of a more Direct Democracy.

The method Americans Elect is using is by no means perfect. I have advocated to make the system more fair and easier to use. There has been some progress thanks in part to the concerns I've voiced. I still advocate that Americans Elect should require the same amount of "Support Clicks" from all the candidates - eliminate the two-tier qualification process. I also think the process to support candidates should be easier. Finally, I have made suggestions to ensure the online voting that occurs is anonymous, yet transparent.

Americans Elect has the potential to revolutionize the political process. I am happy to be involved on the ground floor of this potential groundswell. We are the re-founding fathers and mothers of America. We are starting a social revolution to avert a violent revolution.

You can follow my political activities by reading my blog at http://ideasforchange.blogspot.com

Taking back my blog

After I went to the Americans Elect conference in San Ramon, I was going to change this into a co-blog dedicated to Americans Elect. Since, I've had no takers and there are other AE blogs out there, I'm going to take over this space again as my personal blog. This way, I'm likely to post more often and I'll feel more likely to be myself. I'll still blog about AE, but it won't always be pretty and superfluous. I actually have a lot to say about ways to make Americans Elect better, but I'll save that for another entry.

For now, I'll focus on my to do list for America's Third Party.
Today, I plan on uploading our book, "Hybrid Capitalism," to Create Space, Amazon's paperback/ hard copy edition company. David did order another book from www.blurb.com just to keep it listed in their store. I would advise any authors to not go through that company. Use Microsoft Word until you are ready to publish, and go through Amazon instead.

Once the book is uploaded, I will send out a newsletter. I really need to push David's candidate page on AE: www.tinyurl.com/votedjs - I made that tinyurl link yesterday, in time for David's weekly video. I hope they don't change the URL like Votocracy did when they got started.

Another thing I need to do is update the page I createdt for David back in 2008 on Wikipedia. I didn't realize people still access it, since it is not really a main page link, but I got advice about it yesterday. I need to add a picture and lay out bullet points. It makes sense to update David's bio since he is now a published author.

The person who gave me the advice, Philip Armstrong, offered to help me increase my social media presence so we could get David more support clicks on AE, for a fee. I am considering it, after I run it by David.

In the meantime, I have invested in www.ning.com and brought our community back online http://americasthirdparrty.ning.com -when I send out the newsletter, I'll send it to the members on there as well, with a message to start using that again. After a month, I will check activity and ask them to "use it or lose it" since I have limited membership ability on there for now.

I also need to reach out to the media. Local media is going to be my focus this week. I'll start with newspapers and go from there. That will keep me busy for a while.

Yersterday, I started using twittert. I feel a little odd since I am using the @ThirdParty account, which is supposed to be David's account. I never made one of my own. It's OK, since I'm just using it for campaigning.

Enough writing for now, I better get going.

Please Support David Jon Sponheim on Americans Elect

We now have a page to support David Jon Sponheim For President on Americans Elect: http://www.tinyurl.com/votedjs.

This is the easiest way to get David Jon Sponheim on the ballot in all 50 states. We need to get at least 50,000 support clicks = 5,000 support clicks in each of 10 different states.

To support David, you will need to verify your identity with Americans Elect. To do this, go to "My Account" and then click "Voter Security" after you verify your email address. You will need to put in the last 4 digits of your Social Security number and answer some personal questions.

Once your identity is verified, you will be able to vote in Americans Elect Online Primary and Online Convention. The online primary will begin May 8, 2012 and the online Convention will begin June 12, 2012. You do not have to change your political party registration to participate in Americans Elect.

Process for Drafting Candidates

I started a Draft Committee for David Jon Sponheim For President on the Americans Elect website today. His page is here: http://www.americanselect.org/profile-candidate/366392/draft-status. You can "Add My Support" or Draft a Candidate of your own. Each Delegate may only Draft one Candidate, but you may support as many candidates as you like (at least this is my understanding).

They truly do have "Bank Level Security" on the website. The main programmer for Americans Elect worked for E-Trade for a number of years. When I wanted to Draft a Candidate today, I had to go through a series of steps for "Voter Security." First, I had to confirm my email address. Secondly, I had to reset my pin to 6 to 10 digits rather than the 4 digit code I used to sign up. Unlike other websites, the pin is numerical only- similar to a pin number for an ATM card. Third, I had to answer security questions, much like a bank would ask you. Finally, I had to post my information for Identity Verification.

This "Identity Verification" process is where you can see the security, with true identity verification occurring. I input the address where I was registered to vote, my phone number, birth-date and the last 4 number of my Social Security number. Suddenly I was asked to verify 2 other addresses (asking if I had lived there, not input by me). I was also asked where my sister lived (they knew her name). I believe there may have been a couple of more questions as well, the types of which a bank would ask if you were applying for a loan. Finally, it said it was checking my voter registration. Then, I could Draft my Candidate and "Add My Support."

I believe Americans Elect is doing a good job verifying identity in order to ensure that Delegates who are able to Support Candidates and Vote in the Online Convention truly are registered to vote. They are also doing a good job of ensuring security for this internet voting.

On Financing and Splitting the Vote

A lot of people ask, "Who is Financing Americans Elect?" and/ or say "This will just Split the Vote." Here are my thought on these issues:

Only donors who actually reveal THEMSELVES are public. So, it is a personal choice of the donors. I did tell the leadership that all donors should be strongly encouraged to reveal themselves and IF they all disclose, that AE should then make a public statement in that regard. I think this would go a long way toward building the movement. One interesting comment Jake Brewer made in regards to this is that the Presidential candidate chosen by Americans Elect will be in a better position to not kowtow to these large money contributors. Especially since the Board of Directors and anyone who works for Americans Elect cannot endorse or support a candidate. They must remain neutral. Therefore, this process really gives the power to the American people. It begins to build a direct Democracy - You choose the issues. You nominate the candidates. You pick the President. In my opinion, this is much better than the illusion of choice we are currently given by powerful elitists who contribute to the Presidential candidates and then come knocking on the door for a favor once the person is elected.

On the issue of "Splitting the Vote" both Democrats and Republicans have been controlled by the same powerful monied interests for far too long. I believe it is time to SPLIT THE VOTE. However, I do have to say that Americans Elect has put some safety nets in place if this SPLIT is actually not big enough to make a difference. If Americans Elect wins the electors in one or more states, but not a majority of the vote, they will have the delegates vote again to determine who these electors should vote for from the other candidates. 

On The Road Again

It took us much longer than I anticipated to pack the car. We finally left the house at 1:30. We drove through Seattle about 3:30. It's amazing how much traffic there was at 3:30pm on a Wednesday. We have a couple of more days of driving and will arrive in San Ramon in time for the Delegate convention for Americans Elect.

Before I left the house this morning I sent a Press Release to TV stations in San Francisco (and posted on there Facebook walls and twittered them) about the event. I got an email tonight that the Conference will coincide with Americans Elect having a Web-Conference with Delegate Leaders across the country about the Draft Committees for Candidates! This is very exciting news, and I feel like writing another press release.

We are traveling with Amber. I think she was getting a little bit of cabin fever at the house. She only meowed once, when David brought her in the carrier to the car. She settled into his jacket that we had positioned between us. About an hour into the trip, she meowed again. I think she was trying to tell us she didn't feel well, because right after that she threw up. I guess she had a bit of car sickness. After we pulled off the road and cleaned up the mess, she settled back down and slept the remainder of the trip.

We are staying in a Motel 6 tonight. They do not charge a pet fee. We have stayed in quite a few, traveling with Amber across country in the past. She is comfortable in them. David bought her a fabric pet kennel for Christmas, and he put her litter box in there. She finished her wet food and a little bit of kibbles. I just hope she doesn't hide under the bed when we try to leave, as she has a tendency to do when we stay in these places.

I might not post for a few days, since we might camp out tomorrow and then I will be busy with the conference. Do follow me on twitter in case I decide to stream the conference - I'll post the web address on there.  My twitter is www.twitter.com/ThirdParty

Preparing to Travel

Last night, I spent at least another three hours on formatting the book for the Kindle. The good news is, we now have it published for the Kindle. I posted the link on our website and on BlogTV.

Peter Arno should be calling me today to finalize the plans for the AE conference. After that, I will pack the car. That is actually more involved than it sounds. We are going to be taking out the back seat, cleaning out everything that's currently in the car, and putting in a mattress and blanket so we can camp in the car on the way down. I still also have to pack snack food for the trip too. Plus, Amber will be going with us.

Tonight is the AE Northwest conference calpl where we will be discussing committees and electors. I would be willing to serve on a committee, but not as an elector at this point.

While we are on the road, I will be reviewing Kris McAlister's questions/ suggestions on the AE Bylaws. His concern is that ther Board can seemingly over-ride any committee activity. They can also advise the electors if the AE candidate does not win a plurality or the popular vote. Kris' concern is that the Board is not elected by the Delegates. The original Board was appointed by the founding members and future Board members will be appointed by the sitting Board.

It will be interesting to see how Americans Elect evolves. It's almost February and their candidate selection process is not live on their website yet. That is my next big project, to put together a Draft Committee for with all the necessary information so I am ready to go live when they are ready. Until then, I'll post the information on our website.

Accomplishments and Goals

When I woke up this morning, I spent an hour and an half formatting the book to prep it for the Kindle. I still have to convert it to a webpage format before I upload it. I may also look into Amazon's version of a paperback store, called Create Space.

I just wrote an email to one of our supporters, Jake in Idaho, about an idea I have for a video. I'll have David do most of the Voiceover, or we'll each do a section of the voiceover.
Jake can edit the video which will save us a lot of time.

I'm glad I bought this Pandigital Nova eReader, since I can write draft emails while David is driving, which I am doing right now. Then, I can just send the messages when I get access to a wireless connection. This device is definitely coming with me on the trip.

When I get home tonight, I plan on packing David's clothes. Then, I'm going to print out business cards and flyers to take with us. We will also take a big banner that we have.

Other things I need to do is continue my research of news email addresses and send out the Letter to the Editor I created. I also want to keep on with my ballot access research.

The frustrations of writing a book

Whrn I woke up, I wrote the previous blog, from bed on my eReader. Then I spent a couple of hours doing internet work -reading posts on facebook and an article about Americans Elect. I signed up for a Politico account, but I did not comment on there, yet. I created an event on Facebook for the upcoming AE conference and invited my politically-minded friends. I also did some corrections on our website, including limiting the number of posts on the front page to 3.

When David got up, he was admiring our book. He realized that some of the bibliographical information was missing - the last page and a half. So, I started the program we used to edit the book, Booksmart by Blurb. It had deleted the information. Perhaps this happened if we saved and closed the program and reopened it before uploading it. Booksmart is one of the worst programs I've ever worked with. We would have been finished with the book much sooner, or would have written much more, if that program had not kept crashing on us. When it did crash, it would delete huge amounts of information. The only way we got through it and actually published a book was through sheer tenacity and determination.

Anyway, I reuploaded the book. Of course, the link I sent in the email that went out yesterday was to the wrong version. So, I posted a link to the corrected version in the description section of the previous version. I then sent an email to the support team telling them what happened and asking them to do an auto -redirect from the old version to the newer version. I don' t really have hope that they will actually honor my request, since they have not responded to other emails.

I decided to go through the book and save each chapter in a file. That took quite a few hours. Then, I researched how to self-publish a Kindle book on Amazon. The ebook through blurb that I bought was unreadable on my eReader - it completely jumbled the words.

Now, I have to go through and put all the book into one Word file and do some special formatting to prep the book for the Kindle. I trust Word more than Booksmart.

Right now, I need to post the updated links to the newest version of the book on our website and on our BlogTV page.

I think the only writing I'll do for a while is here or in my journal.

Newsletter -New signup

Yesterday, I made a few edits to a Lettert to the Editor I've been working on. Before I sent it to any publications, David said what I really should be working on is sending out a newslettter, announcing the Release of our book - Hybrid Capitalism. He was really upset we lost our ability to send the newsletter through our website server since the last newsletter I sent, requesting donations, was seen as spam.

Anyway, I checked out Mailchimp, and there free service allowed many more emails than I thought. So, I decided to go forward with using their service. The thng is, I had to remove many email addresses I had gleaned from correspondence from my list, since they require you only use addresses from people who signed up at your website. I now have a clean list for mailchimp.

David helped me create a very nice newsletter which we sent out in the wee hour of the morning. It looks much better than anything I've sent out previously. I may still forward my newsletter to the people I removed from my list and ask them to sign up on our website: http://www.americasthirdparty.com/Member - new sign up forms which will input the data into Mailchimp.

David also made suggestions for changes to our website. He wanted the chat buttons above the fold, so they are more apparent to visitors. I just realized, I need to do some more work on this today. I moved the things into the header from a sidebar, but that header only appears on the main page. So, I need to re -add tthem to the sidebar, but make those not appear on the front page. Coding is difficult, because it takes so much time to get everything to look right. That is why I get so defensive when someone criticizes my website. I DO want to get better, but I've already spent huge amounts of time on getting it to the point it's at now.

This morning, I created an event on Facebook to promote the Americans Elect conference I'll be attending this coming weekend. It's at the San Ramon Marriot in California. I'm really looking fotwarde to meeting Peter Arno and other members of Arno Political Consulting and Americans Elect.

Today, I'm going to start packing for the trip. I'm also going to print material for America's Third Party to take with me - lots of business cards, some flyers and some brochures. I'm really looking forward to this event. It has alreadu reignited my passion for politics.

A Letter to Americans Elect

Dear Americans Elect,

I want to begin by stating that I appreciate the changes you made to the Rules regarding Contingently Qualified Candidates. Although I feel it is still unequal, I appreciate the changes made. I know I had my own agenda, to make it easier to Draft David Jon Sponheim For President to being the Americans Elect candidate. Yet, I want you to know, I truly appreciate what you are attempting to acheive at Americans Elect and I completely support the process, regardless of the outcome.

I understand very well how the ballot access laws, and election laws in general, are stacked against any change. We live in a highly technical world. It is time to UNITE America and bring our Candidate Selection Process into the 21st century. By creating a coalition ticket and introducing an Online Primary and Convention Process, you are acheiving something that seems almost impossible. Keep up the great work and do not get discouraged. What you are attempting to do at Americans Elect is nothing less than affect a complete change in the political system. BRAVO! 

I understand why your have set up your organization as a 501c4 and why you allow the donors/ lenders to not disclose their information. This is the right thing to do at this juncture as the people who go public with support for your efforts may be harassed and intimidated. Many people are scared of this type of political change and will attempt to discredit your efforts. We have a secret ballot in our country to encourage democracy - so that voters are not intimidated or bought by politicians to vote a particular way. Therefore, I believe donors/lenders should have the right to remain anonymous as long as they wish. Although I do not have financial resources to donate to your efforts, I will continue to support Americans Elect through my volunteer efforts. I will not be anonymous in my support of Americans Elect. (Please read: http://www.americasthirdparty.com/NotAnonymous to see how I feel about this).

Please know that any recommendations I make are because I believe in YOU and I believe in making Americans Elect the best possible organization it can be. We are at the very beginning of something truly transformative. You are a valuable part of the process. I have stated for some time that we are starting a social online revolution to avert a violent revolution. We are the re-founding fathers and mothers of America. This process truly has the power to be something bigger than any of us individually can imagine, just like our Founding Fathers may not have realized what a great nation America would become long after their lifetimes.

Thank you,
Sarah Hart

Productive Day

Yesterday was a very productive day for me. I worked on promoting America's Third Party (ATP) and Americans Elect (AE) .

When I woke up, I received an email about a negative article about AE asking if I could write a response defnding AE. I posted my response and a link to the article in yesterday's blog. I sent this to the actual publication as a letter to the editor as well as posted it as a comment.

Then, I made some changes and posted it on the ATP website. I madw more changes and posted it on the South Whidbey Record Facebook page, and submitted it as a letter to the editor for that publication.

After lunch, I researched the contact information for all the main stream media news organizations in San Francisco. This is actually quite tedious work, since I had to go to the website for each station and look for it. I'm creating a spreadsheett of this information to push publicity in the future.

Before the show, I created a rough draft of a Press Release for an AE West Region Delegate Leaders conference I have been invited to next week, starting on the 27th.

I know there is always more to do. I'll just keep moving forward.