Campus Progress

I wasn't able to make it down to the Campus Progress National Conference this year. My travel schedule has been such that something had to give, and unfortunately, this was the event I had to scratch.

But it's an important event and I was highly impressed last year by the diversity of the participants and quality of the programming (even as I was disappointed that the participants and the event seemed entirely divorced from the blogosphere and netroots).

Reports about the conference are coming out and here's what they're saying:

• The Washington Post highlights the pragmatism and policy knowledge of the participants, as well as the need to expand youth activism among non-college youth.
• The Politico focused on the keynote address by John Edwards and how his poverty agenda resonates with young people, even if he did not gain their support in the primaries.
• The Chronicle of Higher Eduation has an excellent rundown on the youth-vote panel at the conference featuring Ben Adler of The Politico, Heather McGhee of Demos, Maria Teresa Peterson of Voto Latino, and Biko Baker from The League.

Update: Jesse Singal from Campus Progress writes in to tell me that they will be shutting down the old CP community blogs and that PushBack Blog Network (PBN) will be a slightly edited, technologically superior version. Makes sense. More when PBN officially launches in the next few weeks.
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Campus Progress just launched PushBack, a new blog community dedicated to giving Millennials a voice in politics. The idea seems to be that the mass media chronically gets the youth vote/activism story wrong and they oftentimes fundamentally misunderstand the habits and trends of Millennials. Pushback will, well, pushback against those narratives through a new blog network run by and for Millennials.

I'm entirely in agreement that the mass media narratives about Millennials need to be challenged vigorously and corrected at every turn. I'd say that's a good portion of what this site has been about these past years, and I certainly welcome the company. At the moment, though, it's not entirely clear to me yet how Pushback is different from the community blogs at Campus Progress. Many of the same names are blogging and the content is far broader than a rapid-response vehicle might suggest.

But the site looks great and the content is interesting so far. I've added them to my RSS feed and to the "Breaking News" feed. Looking forward to seeing how this develops.

A few announcements about opportunities with six great orgs:

• The annual Campus Progress national conference is just around the corner (July 8th). Check out conference info here.
• The Nation and Brave New Films are teaming up to recognize outstanding, under the radar activism by young people. You can find out more - including how to nominate someone - over here.
• Democracy for America is offering scholarships to Netroots Nation. Apply here.
• Mobilize.org is gearing up to award a number of $3 - 5k grants to Millennials working on projects supporting clean elections. If you can't make Netroots Nation, they are holding a conference on the subject in Denver in July (The Democracy 2.0 Grant Summit, Money in Politics). More info here.

Last week, Alica posted about a video created by YAF alum and conservative "All-Star" Jason Mattera. Pretty much nothing he said in the video - about young voters or the conservative youth movement - was true.

Campus Progress just released a great video taking down Mattera point by point:

How could this be?! This is indeed breaking news, because it may very well be the first time FoxNews has done something right - er... correctly.

This comes on the heals of the CNN blunder in reporting a lot of misinformation about young people and the youth vote in 2008. Add to that Naomi Wolf and Courtney Martin and you're ready for your own nuclear meltdown of frustration.

There's been a pretty substantial rapid response linking to a brilliant post by Mike that details data and a fact sheet for reporters who can't bring themselves to research - and the response has been tremendous!

Rob Anderson from CP went after Naomi at the Washington Post, we hit CNN on FM, and Campus Progress nailed Courtney here.

After posting Mike's piece everywhere and emailing it to CNN, NPR, and all of my own local news and radio stations I figured the last to talk about young people would be a Republican News Network who so clearly excludes young people. But they did. As you can see they addressed all of our main issues.

The only fault I have with this is that the piece likens youth to phrases like "Yo Dude" when, shocking as it may seem, young people do have a capability to converse like adults and understand complex topics.

Alexandra Acker ED of the Young Democrats of America was interviewed in the piece and later commented to me

"One thing that stood out was Frank Luntz’s outrageous statement that young people want to be addressed as “Yo, dude” whereas I had spoken about the need for candidates to take young voters seriously and talk about issues they care about."

Another interesting thing to mention is the ways in which FoxNews reaches out to young commentators like Acker when CNN's and the piece on 60 Minutes was largely dominated by older generations who are out of touch with the reality of the Millennial Generation.

Fox is notorious for connecting with younger demographics (see MySpace, the Simpsons, and FoxNews Porn) - CNN's only got Anderson Cooper and Soledad O'Brien. Let's face it almost 3/4 of their airwaves are full of old angry Lou Dobbs, Larry "he's still alive?" King, and the Jack/Wolf Playdate (and my TV is always on CNN!)

The reporter doing the piece seemed young. Probably not 25, but she's definitely younger than Lou Dobbs. And Acker said she made a real effort to understand the issues:

She "went to resources like YDA and YVS, did follow-up with me after the interview to make sure she had the Harvard quote right, but CNN just recycled the same old, tired storyline."

Acker goes on to speculate that the youth friendly ways in which FoxNews and its family targets young people is perhaps because they are more aware of our generation's purchase power. And I think she's got something there.

While I agree that Fox is bad, evil, worse than bad and evil, I think if they could make more money by supporting Democrats they'd flip parties in a heartbeat. By targeting young people, regardless of party affiliation, with products, musicians, and the like their advertisers make more money and thus the network banks a pretty sweet deal.

In many ways we're being used - but at the same time, they're the only ones talking about the importance of young people in the first place - so what do ya do?

Until we can get mainstream news sources to report these facts correctly, you have to give props to the ones who do, even when they're traditionally crazy nutbars.

Cross posted to Kos, please recommend

Rob Anderson, the editor of Campus Progress has an editorial in today's Washington Post responding to an earlier editorial by author and activist Naomi Wolf:

In Sunday's Washington Post Outlook section, Naomi Wolf argued that most young people today don't understand how democracy works and that even those who do are too cynical to get involved in our country's democratic process.

We'd all have something to worry about if Wolf's argument were true. America's youth today are coming of age at a time when one group of extremists has launched a violent attack on liberal values abroad, and as another seeks to roll back our civil liberties at home.

Fortunately, Wolf's depiction of my generation is supported only by anecdotal evidence, off-topic research and a faulty analysis of recent history. In reality, we young Americans are reshaping the political landscape with our activism and innovation. And we're working to increase our influence on the issues we care about most.

Two things. First, to Ms. Wolf: Fact Check; There Is No Crisis among American Youth, as Rob Anderson ably demonstrates in his piece.

Second, I just want to note that there has been a lot of really great push-back from progressive youth organizers against misleading and downright inaccurate narratives in the press about American youth participation in politics. Between the retorts to Adam Nagourney's reporting, corrections to a piece by CBS, smackdowns to 60 Minutes, reactions to Courtney Martin's piece in the American Prospect, rebuttals to Tom Freidmans' condescending and hypocritical "Generation Q," the creation of the Journalist "Cheat Sheet," and now this, it seems like progressive youth organizers are getting their sea legs when it comes to engaging in rapid response. The narrative is already much improved over what we saw around this time in 2003 or even 2005, and after the caucuses we'll have a big chance to reshape it even more. Until then, it's good to see such strong pushback. It's likely priming the pump for better coverage as we get deeper into the election cycle.

So I'm finally at Yearly Kos. Sitting around waiting for General Wesley Clark to speak, stewing in my juices and waiting for my panels. I hate public speaking, and yet that's basically all I"m doing today.

The word is that yesterday Howard Dean delivered a keynote address in which he talked about the importance of engaging the youth vote.

Ben Adler from Campus Progress has the goods. I particularly like that last bit. Yay on you for brining up the topic Howard, but not exactly the best way to talk about demographic diversity and tolerance among Millennials:

DNC Chair Howard Dean just gave a rousing address here at Yearly Kos to the 1400 minions and hundreds of members of the media. He focused in large part on the importance of progressives appealing to young people. He noted the 20% increase in youth turnout between the last two midterms and noted that voting patterns get locked in for life at a young age. He admonished activists to always focus on the young as an investment in the future. He also rather comically pointed out that "there are white kids running around malls with pants around their ankles" as evidence that the hopes of the civil rights movement have been achieved. And Dean pointed to the long enduracne of civil rights leaders as a reminder that activism is a lifelong commitment.

The words are a bit indelicate (as Dean is often want to do), but the point is sound, and Republicans are getting scared.

Over at Campus Progress, Ben Adler takes issue with what I wrote yesterday about the Campus Progress blog. I'm well aware that some of the paid staff at Campus Progress are also contributors at Tapped, and that folks like himself are engaged in the blogosphere. However, I also read the Campus Progress RSS feed and my comments were directed toward the user-generated content coming in over that feed. Ezra Klein may write about health care on the Campus Progress magazine, but I don't see Campus Progress members/users then blogging about health care and quoting what Ezra said about the latest proposal, (let alone what it means, and how to take action on the issue). I don't see Campus Progress users quoting those other cultural and policy blogs that Adler claims close association to either. This is what I was getting at. The users do not seem to be engaged in a conversation with those blogs. Maybe that is a too narrow definition of engaging the blogs. If so, I'm more than happy to have a discussion about that.

It's worth noting that Adler is picking a nit. He doesn't address the central thesis of my post - about youth participation in online activism via SocNets vs. blogs - and doesn't dispute the main point I am making when I mention Campus Progress: that blogs run by youth organizations, and the conversation about how to use the blogosphere to serve activist goals, could be dramatically improved to the benefit of progressive youth movement.

Contrary to what Adler writes, I do not think that means that youth organizations and their blogs all need to be "mini-Kos." I'm well aware of the restrictions placed on an organization like Campus Progress as a 501c3, and I don't think a series of Kos Jr. websites would be all that valuable anyway. As I mentioned very briefly in my piece, and plan to elaborate on next weekend, I would much rather see these organizations use blogs to report on their own activities and the activities of other progressive youth organizations. I would like to see them become a way to educate young progressives about the broader progressive youth movement. I'd like to see them become a place to share success stories and failures; to spread best practices and warn others of failed tactics. That is well within the mission of Campus Progress and I think would be a valuable goal for a healthy progressive youth blogging community. In that, at least, we don't seem to be in disagreement.

I couldn't even last a day.

I'm at the Campus Progress National Student Conference in DC all day today. It's part of book research, but since I'm sitting around listening to speeches, I might as well blog it as well.

Lately I've been hearing a lot about how Campus Progress is building some bridges in campus activism/politics. Getting folks to work together where for decades now the movement has been fragmented between establishment groups like Young and college Democrats and issue groups like Campus Greens or the folks that are now reinventing SDS. I'll let you know how it goes.

I've got some pics on my Treo, but there's no cell reception in the main hall. I'll upload them later.

Update: Here are some pics. So far it's somewhat interesting. There are some dread-locked folks and some blue blazer folks, but by far there's more gray area between the two. Is it telling that both Nancy Pelosi and Ralph Nader got enthusiastic ovations, while folks struggled to stand up for Seymour Hersch? Maybe the real tell-tale is in the Agenda, which includes panels on corporate responsibility and Darfur alongside identity politics panels, some voting/electoral panels, and a session on Katrina with Van Jones, Congressman McGovern and M1 of Dead Prez.

I will say that the morning was mostly a wash. Lots of big names talking at the crowd. People paid attention (except the dude passed out on the table in the back), but these types of things should really be run more like workshops. RootsCamp is definitely the model that we need to be following. Getting talked at for 3 hours, even by the likes of Nancy Pelosi, Seymour Hersh and Russ Feingold is just too much a waste of time for a one day event. People here are engaged. They are the uber activists that motivate others on campus. They don't need to be motivated, and most will probably forget what Nancy Pelosi said today before they wake up tomorrow. I know I already have.

These people need to be brainstorming, networking, and sharing best practices. That's how they'll get the most out of the day. Let everyone mix with the big names during the cocktail hour at the end of the day.

Update II: So here's something interesting. I'm sitting in the "how to start an online revolution" panel. This crowd is definitely more blue blazer than the previous two panels I've sat in on. Both of those other panels were more social-justice oriented and they were packed. This panel is not well attended at all. It's in the same room as the Nader panel and there are less than 1/3 of the people here.

This needs a lot more discussion. Is it that everyone is so immersed in online media that this is uninteresting to attendees? Is this related to the fact that Millennals don't participate in politics through the progressive blogosphere as much as older generations? Or is it just the (bad) luck of the draw and folks wanted to see another panel?

Update III: This tech panel is winding down and not one person had mentioned the netroots or blogs. It's all social networking with a few tidbits about email lists and conventional websites.

Main Hall - Opening Session

Corporate Accountability - Ralph Nader is Second from Left at the Front

Two quick hits today that I won't be able to fully blog but you should definitely check out:

• Looking Out for Number One: Campus Progress asks why young people are ready to organize on behalf of everyone but ourselves.
• Who's Ahead? No, Seriously . . . : Uncle Jay at Press Think has a must read about the master narrative in our political campaigns and why our public debates are no longer a war of ideas, but a battle of polls.

And something to make you laugh this morning:

• FaceBook in 40 years.