Blogs

Sunday evening, I went to a planning meeting for Occupy Hartford. (For my initial thoughts about the meeting, see my #OccupyHartford blog post.)

One of the topics discussed was about whose attention are we trying to get. Is it business leaders? Is it the politicians? Is it the traditional media? Is it the general populous? Related to that, what is the message we are trying to get across and the results we are trying to accomplish.

A mailing list has been set up, and there is incredible energy on the list, as people work together to reach consensus on some of these topics.

With this being a group drawn together by some general ideas, different people will have different opinions, and many of these opinions will overlap. For example, business leaders, politicians, and journalists are all part of the general populous. So, if we try to reach the general populous, we are trying to reach business leaders as part of that.

Likewise, as we talk, we find ideas that resonate and we can speak individually about the ones that are most important to each one of us.

Since I am a social media person, this plays an important role in how I am looking at things. Years ago, I wrote about 'post-broadcast politics', a phrase I learned from a friend. Yet the post broadcast politics we talked about nearly a decade ago, really didn't take shape. Maybe, now, it really is.

The #Occupy movement, like the Arabic Spring, is powered by social media, where each one of us can have our say, and can say it socially as part of something bigger. It is the sort of direct involvement that has been so elusive for years, and many of us may still have problems tapping into it.

Instead of listening to the news to tell us what they think we need to hear, or even having to have the group agree on exactly what we are going to say, each one of us can say what is important, and the themes others pick up on end up getting the most focus.

This presents difficulties for people used to the older hierarchical broadcast style of involvement, but it is very liberating. #occupy your mind with post broadcast politics.

With this, let me share a few thoughts about what the #Occupy movement is really all about. I'm using #occupy extensively since it seems to be 'the brand', and it is a word that we can do a lot with.

What is it that #occupies your mind? Are you pre-occupied with what is being broadcast to you by the traditional media? By bloggers, and new media or social media? Is your mind occupied with searching for mindless entertainment, or simply getting the next meal? Are you pre-occupied with bread and circuses?

Is your career occupied with an effort to get ahead by taking advantage of others, or does the idea of working together to help one another out occupy a greater place in how you try to live your life?

What matters to me, is reaching the general populous and trying to get them to occupy their minds with post broadcast politics based on collaboratively seeking the common good That, it seems to me, is what is sorely needed today, and is the anti-thesis of the corporate greed where 1% take advantage of the other 99%

Sunday evening, I went to a planning meeting for Occupy Hartford. (For my initial thoughts about the meeting, see my #OccupyHartford blog post.)

One of the topics discussed was about whose attention are we trying to get. Is it business leaders? Is it the politicians? Is it the traditional media? Is it the general populous? Related to that, what is the message we are trying to get across and the results we are trying to accomplish.

A mailing list has been set up, and there is incredible energy on the list, as people work together to reach consensus on some of these topics.

With this being a group drawn together by some general ideas, different people will have different opinions, and many of these opinions will overlap. For example, business leaders, politicians, and journalists are all part of the general populous. So, if we try to reach the general populous, we are trying to reach business leaders as part of that.

Likewise, as we talk, we find ideas that resonate and we can speak individually about the ones that are most important to each one of us.

Since I am a social media person, this plays an important role in how I am looking at things. Years ago, I wrote about 'post-broadcast politics', a phrase I learned from a friend. Yet the post broadcast politics we talked about nearly a decade ago, really didn't take shape. Maybe, now, it really is.

The #Occupy movement, like the Arabic Spring, is powered by social media, where each one of us can have our say, and can say it socially as part of something bigger. It is the sort of direct involvement that has been so elusive for years, and many of us may still have problems tapping into it.

Instead of listening to the news to tell us what they think we need to hear, or even having to have the group agree on exactly what we are going to say, each one of us can say what is important, and the themes others pick up on end up getting the most focus.

This presents difficulties for people used to the older hierarchical broadcast style of involvement, but it is very liberating. #occupy your mind with post broadcast politics.

With this, let me share a few thoughts about what the #Occupy movement is really all about. I'm using #occupy extensively since it seems to be 'the brand', and it is a word that we can do a lot with.

What is it that #occupies your mind? Are you pre-occupied with what is being broadcast to you by the traditional media? By bloggers, and new media or social media? Is your mind occupied with searching for mindless entertainment, or simply getting the next meal? Are you pre-occupied with bread and circuses?

Is your career occupied with an effort to get ahead by taking advantage of others, or does the idea of working together to help one another out occupy a greater place in how you try to live your life?

What matters to me, is reaching the general populous and trying to get them to occupy their minds with post broadcast politics based on collaboratively seeking the common good That, it seems to me, is what is sorely needed today, and is the anti-thesis of the corporate greed where 1% take advantage of the other 99%

On Saturday October 1st, I was pleased to be a part of the The Future panel at the Caltech/MIT Voting Technology Project event, Election Integrity - Past, Present & Future. The event was to celebrate the 25th anniversary of a conference on voting integrity 1986.

I arrived at the Charter Oak Community Center in Hartford Sunday evening at 5 PM. There was a circle of chairs in the downstairs room, which was being expanded as I arrived. There were about thirty five people there and more were arriving. People were scurrying around to find more chairs, and some people started bringing cushions to put on the floor for people to sit on. I chatted with a couple people and looked around to see who else was there.

It was a mixed crowd, with kids still in college to people who had been in Haight Ashbury in the sixties. One person took the lead to act as facilitator. A note taker was selected as well as a person to keep track of whose turn it was to speak.

One of the first people to speak was from Tunisia. He was very excited to be there and was warmly welcomed. Others had been down at the demonstrations in New York and brought back various reports. There was some discussion about the goals and the near term plans.

As a very broad based group, there were many ideas expressed, from universal health care and bringing the troops home, to challenging corporate personhood and the detrimental effect it is having on our political process.

There was strong support voiced for some sort of direct action, such as occupying Bushnell Park, an abandoned building, and various other locations.

In terms of messaging, the key idea of representing the 99% that hasn't prospered while the richest 1% have received strong support.

I tweeted various parts of the meeting, and shared one picture, although from where I was sitting, the lighting wasn't all that good. I had to leave early to call into Fiona's Radio Show and to get home to wrap up the day. The meeting was only half over, so I look forward to receiving an email with additional notes from the meeting.

There was a lot of support and energy behind the meeting and it will be interesting to see how Occupy Together comes together in Hartford, and the rest of Connecticut.

Was the "online tampering" done by outside hackers? Or was it an insider? Does the Courant have the expertise to determine the cause in this instance and actually create effective controls to prevent future online voting attacks? If so, the editors should be advising the likes of the Department of Defense, banks, and Google.

UPDATED: Yesterday, members of the Coalition assisted in the drawing of districts for the Post-Election Audit of the September 13th Primary. New Haven, on average, expect to have 3-4 districts selected each time and Hartford 2-3 districts. However, since the law exempts districts from the selection that have recanvasses or contested races, the expected average is higher than 10% in each particular post-election audit. As random selection from a single collection of districts goes, the average seldom occurs.

Oooops the law passed just this year to fix the problems in Bridgeport said nothing about the SOTS being able to walk into central absentee ballot counting operations, only polling places. In the words of Cindi Rice, "Who could have imagined..." Update: More problems, documented this time. Was it fraud, mismanagement, or incompetence? Who knows for sure?

Monday's meeting featured presentations by Yale Law School Prof. Heather Gerken, Ted Bromley of the Secretary of the State's Office, and an outline of the next meeting, along with deadlines for the Task Force.

Who says there is little a single legislator can do to affect election integrity and confidence? Human error can change an election result or serve as a ready excuse to cover-up fraud.

Saving money, getting people voting are laudable goals, yet we caution that in the process we should not sacrifice voting integrity and confidence in pursuing increased participation. In fact, we should be increasing integrity and confidence while we also pursue convenience and participation. And we should be cautious that our efforts actual result in the intended results.