Thursday, January 15, 2009

Baldwin: No Modern Convention

Chuck Baldwin, the Constitution Party's Presidential Candidate in 2008, is railing against the idea of a modern constitutional convention, which he says is only one or two states' votes shy from actually happening. The latest state to favor the convention could be Virginia.

From Third Party Watch: “If called, a modern Constitutional Convention could declare the U.S. Constitution to be null and void, and could completely rewrite the document. For example, former U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren Burger once declared, ‘There is no effective way to limit or muzzle the actions of a Constitutional Convention. The Convention could make its own rules and set its own agenda,’” Baldwin wrote.

Read more here.

Your thoughts?

Monday, January 12, 2009

Winners Announced

The five winners of the summit are listed below along with a description from their project proposals. Details of grant amount are coming soon.




Civic Spark: To build CivicSpark, a scalable online legislation tracking and communications toolkit for local legislatures, designed to meet civic participation and governmental transparency needs of local legislative bodies and the citizens who elect them. As a nonpartisan, nonprofit service integrated into Knowledge As Power’s (KAP) suite of tools, CivicSpark will allow cash-strapped local governments to take a big leap forward in technology, increasing their transparency and efficacy without bloating their budgets. For citizens, CivicSpark will provide unprecedented online access to the local lawmaking process, increasing civic participation and dialogue between citizens and electeds.




Young People First: Mobilize young Americans around critical long-term problems in order to hold America’s leaders accountable to building a prosperous future for all generations and to inspire each other to challenge ourselves and each other to come up with creative solutions for long term problems.



Youth Civics 2.0: Youth Civics 2.0 is a new incentive-oriented project to encourage youth to answer their own questions about civics. Youth Civics 2.0 is a project that combines elements of collaboration and competition. Youth compete to complete a series of civic minded / youth nonprofit supporting tasks, to win one of 100 Flip video cameras.



School Board 2.0: The Pike County Youth Coalition submits the project School Board 2.0 as a youth-led initiative to bring transparency and accountability to the Delaware Valley School Board of Pike County, Pennsylvania through modern technology. This effort will simultaneously seek to engage more voices, particularly young voices, in school board deliberations using the latest in Web 2.0 tools and social networking .

School Board 2.0 will be an online platform, branded differently and hosted externally from the Pike County Youth Coalition’s own Web site, that will offer the opportunity for any community member to fully witness and understand the issues before the school board at any given time from a remote online location. Funding will pay for necessary equipment and stipends for local students who will operate the system.



Only Up: The only way is up. OnlyUp.org, a membership project of young people interested in nonprofit service, seeks to support young people and nonprofits by advocating for the needs of young nonprofit employees. The project will also address barriers currently discouraging young people from choosing careers in nonprofits.

Friday, January 9, 2009

VLOG: Welcome to CC Summit

Only a few hours away from the Constitutional Convention:Building Democracy 2.0

It is Friday January 9, 2009 and we are only a few hours away from the inauguration of the Constitutional Convention:Building Democracy 2.0. We are in one of the most beautiful places I can imagine, where history mixes with reality and today for the first time in my life I will see how more than 100 millenials gather to discuss about issues such as creating social capital, civic currency, and Democracy 2.0.

I am personally very excited about the outcome of this Summit.

Join Us Online: Calling the Convention to Order

Greetings from Philadelphia!

The Mobilize team arrived last evening in this historic city, ready to join with young leaders from across the country for a groundbreaking summit about our founding document and how the Constitution is a framework for building Democracy 2.0. At this hour, over 75 participants, including 11 teams, are en route to the National Constitution Center to join this conversation and compete in a Democracy 2.0 grant competition.

But there is no reason why YOU can’t join us.

This morning, we launched a new home page at www.democracyupgrade.com that will give you the chance to know what is happening at the summit up-to-the-minute and allow you to participate in the conversation. We invite you to join us this weekend as we bring Constitutional Convention: Building Democracy 2.0 to you through various Web 2.0 platforms, from Flickr to UStreamTV and You Tube to Cover It Live.

The latest schedule of events is available (http://www.mediafire.com/?nliofmt2mdx) if you wanted to drop in during certain times. Tomorrow, for example, Congressman Murphy will be speaking at 9 a.m., and you can follow along on the live video stream and ask a question through the live blog. As our declaration states, democracy is an unfinished project.

Through the 2008 election, we, the Millennial Generation have been telling different story about civic engagement and what it means to be a citizen. This weekend, we have come to a place where “We the People” first began, to upgrade our democracy. We hope you will join us. - The Mobilize.org Team

Monday, January 5, 2009

Book your rooms before Wednesday!

The rate below will expire on Wednesday. Participants should make sure they book their rooms before then.

Accomodation
Price per night, $ 119 plus tax.

RESERVATION PROCEDURE: Individual Call In-

Attendees must call the Hotel reservations department at 1-800-THE-BELL. To receive the contract rates, the attendees should identify the group as a part of Mobilizing America's Youth. All reservations should be made by 01-07-2009.

Guaranteed by individual - Rooms can be guaranteed for late arrival to an individual’s credit card or by advance deposit. A guaranteed room reservation assures a room for your attendees regardless of their arrival time. Any guaranteed reservations not canceled prior to 6PM one day prior to arrival date will be billed to the credit card or against the advance deposit.
METHOD OF PAYMENT: Individual guests will pay own charges upon arrival. If other payment arrangements are required for guests of Mobilizing America's Youth, please contact us prior to guest arrival.

PARKING - Current parking rates are $22 per car, per day for registered guest of the hotel.

Parking spaces are based upon availability Vans/ Vehicles over the height of 6'6" will need to find alternative parking
Parking is also available to non-registered guests, at hourly rates
Parking is not permitted in our driveway


Please note that our check-in time begins at 4:00pm and our checkout time is 11:00am. Upon request, we will be happy to arrange for baggage storage for your attendee luggage until their actual departure from the Hotel.

The Hotel will not assume the responsibility for personal property and equipment brought on the premises. Damage to or loss of any merchandise/equipment or articles left in the Hotel or unattended by the members of your group is not the responsibility of the Hotel.


The Hotel may request that you obtain and pay for bonded security personnel when valuable merchandise or exhibits are displayed or held overnight in the Hotel. The Hotel will assist with making these arrangements as necessary.