At its most fundamental core, the ultimate goal of any true democracy is to best represent the will of the people. And it is of absolutely paramount importance to note that the democracy should not only represent the will of some people from a particular demographic or sub-set of the population; the democratic process should account for the views, opinions and desires of as many eligible citizens as possible.

And while this may sound like such an obvious truth, there has been a growing problem with voter apathy and dwindling voter turnout in many democracies all around the globe. This is all while so many other nations are desperately fighting for the opportunity to elect their own governments in a fair and transparent manner. For some, the reason why they choose not to vote is that they are not engaged with the political process, disenchanted with apathy and corruption. They do not feel that the political process is relevant to their everyday lives.

In the “Viral Voting” report issued by WebRoots Democracy, many of these issues are explored in the context of the United Kingdom, but they can be just as applicable in many other places around the globe. In particular, the report takes a look at the youth vote and what it will take to encourage more young people to visit the polls. This is not a new topic and it has been stated many times before that the future of democracy should embrace e-voting technology.

In the WebRoots report, Head of Citizenship and Political Participation Programme at Demos Jonathan Birdwell indicates that only 44% of those aged 18 to 24 voted in the 2010 election, while 74% of those over 55 voted. This gap is incredibly significant. It’s not that young people don’t care about the future of their respective countries. They may not be voting in the same proportion as older generations, but many are actively poltical in more informal ways. The challenge is engaging this demographic so that the voting process can once again be relevant to them.

Read more here.

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This article takes a look at some great ideas that you can implement into your petition strategy to make sure that the mass of people you have assembled behind your cause is well led and instructed. Being a good leader will help to focus your group and make sure that benchmarks are met.

What are some tools that you can think of that would make the charge of a petition stronger still?

Online petitions are everywhere. Increasingly news stories contain the line “an online petition has attracted thousands of signatures”, while Twitter and Facebook feeds are awash with people looking for support. The Government likes them so much they set up their own site. But are they any good and do they work?

My answer (unsurprisingly from someone who runs the UK branch of the world’s largest petition site) is ‘yes’ – but in themselves, petitions are only the start of a dynamic and exciting campaign journey. Petitions can win with ten signatures or with 10 million signatures. Despite the best efforts of the UK government to make 100,000 signatures the arbitrary petition signer threshold for access to our own elected leaders, there are no hard and fast rules. It’s not the size of the petition, it’s what the signers do that counts.

Petitions are simply a big group of people. As such they are the basis of your movement – the army you assemble to march toward your target. An un-commanded army is just a group of people ambling about. When you start the petition you are the general of this army and the soldiers need to be well commanded and well armed. In this incredibly stretched metaphor, you arm them with tactics to convey the message.

On Change.org we have hundreds of examples of ordinary individuals who’ve got people to do extraordinary things. One of the best is Lucy Holmes who has been using Change.org (as well as Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr, TV and newspapers) to ask the editor of the Sun newspaper to drop page three.

She’s got an 85,000 strong petition which, in and of itself, won’t win it alone. It’s the activity around it – the two way conversation she has with her supporters that makes the campaign so powerful. It’s the creative tactics like Leanne (a ‘Lego page 3 model’) that engages existing supporters, brings in new ones and generates publicity: a virtuous circle that’s made this one of the biggest people powered movements of recent times.

Then there’s Jayne Linney – ATOS wouldn’t record her disability assessment after continually getting her details wrong, despite ministerial statements that they would do. She started a Change.org petition and got a relatively modest 1,500 signatures but by combining this with traditional tactics like writing to MPs and calling local journalists she won her campaign too.

There was a great line in a local newspaper about a petition on our site, “the petition gathered over 12 signatures in two days” it’s easy to laugh – but it proves that there’s no magic number. And nor should there be. Campaigning is about taking people on a journey, engaging them in conversation and making them think about what they’re doing.

Read More Here: theguardian.com.

The post Learn How to Start Your Own Online Petition appeared first on Follow My Vote.

To make matters worse, all of the commotion occurring in Washington D.C. seems to have created a lot of confusion among Americans with respect to what raising the debt ceiling actually means.

To be clear, raising the debt ceiling in the United States would only allow the federal government to pay its outstanding bills, for things like military pay and Social Security. However, it does NOT give the government authority to increasing spending.

The harsh reality is that if an agreement can’t be reached in Washington D.C. by October 17^th, the United States debt ceiling will expire, our nation will default on our outstanding loans, our credit rating will be lowered, and our currency will be devalued.

Being that such an event would have catastrophic effects on the United States economy and the global economy at large, Congress has raised the debt ceiling a total of 94 times since 1940 without much of a fuss. But, for one reason or another, this time is different.

Since the shutdown began, talks between President Obama and top GOP officials in the House of Representatives went virtually nowhere. As the deadline grows near, however, “We the People” are actively exercising our right to speak freely.

Yesterday, crowds gathered in Washington D.C. to speak out against the federal government’s inability to work together to reach a resolution. Both liberal and conservative demonstrators held protests at many of Washington D.C.’s landmarks, voicing their frustrations with the current situation. Tea Party enthusiasts were even seen toppling barricades and stacking them right in front of the White House lawn. Generally, it seems the consensus among citizens of the United States is that the federal government is broken and something must be done in order to fix it.

At this point, it seems that our best chance to reach a resolution lies in the hands of the United States Senate, with talks between Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell scheduled to resume today. Although Harry Reid was recently quoted as saying “I’m optimistic about the prospects of a positive conclusion,” senators seem to be squarely divided over how much federal spending should be permitted in a budget extension that would reopen the federal government and how long any new borrowing limit should last. The thing is that. even if the Senate reaches an agreement in the next few days, there’s no telling how the House of Representatives will respond.

With the debt ceiling deadline swiftly approaching, one thing is clear: “We the People” are running out of patience.

Some Americans have even taken matters into their own hands and have chosen to pick up where the government left off. John and Laura Arnold, for instance, have donated $10M to Head Start, where their doors have been reopened and children are now getting the education they need.

We at Follow My Vote believe that “We the People” should be able to take all governmental matters into our hands at all times, especially to prevent situations like this from occurring in the future.

We envision our mobile app, which is currently in development, as being the only viable long-term solution for true accountability in Washington D.C.

Our journey through the long and winding road to true freedom will not be easy and will likely be a costly endeavor.

On that note, we recently launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise money for the continued development of our mobile application beyond the initial version, in order to support much more functionality and an improved user experience based on customer feedback.

If you’d like this to be the last shutdown “We the People” in the United States are forced to go through, please contribute to our crowdfunding campaign today!

The post Shutdown Showdown appeared first on Follow My Vote.

Regardless if it does or not, here are 7 ways “We the People” could be affected by a government shutdown:

1. Taxes
   • Naturally, we would still have to pay our taxes.
2. Mail
   • Depending on how long the shutdown lasts, we may stop receiving our mail.
3. Loans
   • That house that some of us have been saving up for, if we were planning on applying for a government-backed mortgage to make it happen, we’ll have to put those plans on hold.
4. Guns
   • If any of us were thinking about getting a license and becoming a gun owner, we’d best get our twiddling thumbs ready because we’re going to be waiting a long time.
5. Jobs
   • Most of us that are federal government employees will be forced to take unpaid leave from our jobs. Others will be forced to work on federal IOU’s until a new funding bill can be drafted, approved, and signed by the President.
6. Tourism
   • Our national parks, museums, and monuments will shut their doors to the public, which will prevent our government from generating the money it needs to keep the lights on.
7. Social Security
   • New memberships for this and other entitlement programs, such as Medicare, will be put on hold.

Believe it or not, our government has been through a shutdown before; the United States federal government shutdown of 1995 and 1996 happened during Bill Clinton’s first term as President of the United States.

We survived as a nation, but our economy suffered, as it cost the government $3.7 billion. This time around, if we don’t demand a speedy resolution from our government, it could end up costing our government much more than before.

On the other hand, some of our elected officials in Washington D.C. argue that a government shutdown could actually save our government money, preventing government dollars from being wasted on unnecessary government programs.

We at Follow My Vote don’t have an opinion on this issue or any other political issue for that matter, as we are and will forever remain a nonpartisan organization. However, we do think it’s high time that “We the People” decide on which government programs should be considered necessary or unnecessary.

One thing we do know for sure is that we will always have a need for some level of government in the United States and abroad in order to keep the peace, which is why we’re here.

If you want to be considered part of “We the People” please register for our site and join us in our quest to ensure our elected officials in Washington D.C. stop playing political games and start working for us!

The post What will happen if a government shutdown occurs? appeared first on Follow My Vote.