I subscribe to a few mailing lists, both liberal and conservative. This came from a liberal mailing list. I passed it on to my son and then decided to post it here. One could quibble over a few of these, but most of them hit home. Author unknown.

Note: I know this is mostly a cut-n-paste diary, but it's far too long to go into a comment thread. It's mostly meant in fun. (Sure it is...)

To be a Republican you need to believe that:

1. Jesus loves you, and shares your hatred of homosexuals and Hillary Clinton.

2. Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him, a bad guy when Bush's Daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney did business with him, and a bad guy when Bush needed a "we can't find Bin Laden" diversion.

OK, politicians are ambitious, they want more and more power.  Also, some of them actually believe in something.  And this is the bottom line problem with Senator Obama.  

So, I've been writing a lot about immigration, mainly because I've been frustrated with how the immigration debate has been framed these past few years. In my last diary, I posted a video about an undocumented immigrant named Juan.

I was particularly interested in the comments that stated that Juan should "wait in line" and get his papers.

At what point did we as a nation decide to pick and choose who to grant opportunity? At the Fair Immigration Reform Movement (FIRM) Summit this year, I was deeply moved by one story of an undocumented youth --- a story that shines a harsh light on our nation.

Juan came to this nation as an immigrant from Colombia, believing instead that his family was visiting Disney World. Now at 18, he is told that when he graduates, he will be deported, that he will no longer exist.

Juan dreams of becoming an aerospace engineer, to work at NASA. And, because of a broken immigration system, Juan's dream becomes more fantasy than reality.
How is this fair?

Have we become so removed from our values of love and compassion that we turn a blind eye on Juan and thousands of youth like him?

I hope not.

Barack Obama has promised "change we can believe in" and to "turn the page" in American politics.  His critics accuse him of tempting voters with inspirational rhetoric and the vagaries of hope without a strategy for turning words into real and meaningful change.  Naturally, all campaigns can be criticized for this failure - the best that can be said of political campaigns is that they set the stage for change by shifting the balance and dynamics of politics.  Few candidates actually deliver all of the change they promise because, in the end, few campaigns change the dynamics of politics. Most don't deliver change at all.

Yet, what distinguishes the Obama campaign is that it actually is changing political dynamics and that it actually has a strategy for change.  It is the Clinton campaign that actually lacks a genuine strategy for change any deeper than the candidate's pledges to "fight harder".  Obama's special gift is that he is able to reframe issues in ways that make intuitive sense to the best parts of most Americans.  The result has been that he's consistently found ways to use the values that unite the country - fairness, decency, justice, freedom, creativity, compassion, high aspirations, and (yes) hope - as frames for policies to which he's committed and for building new and more inclusive political unity.  As a result his campaign has activated and mobilized vast numbers of people across age, gender, race, class, and, to some extent, ideological lines.  They attend rallies, volunteer, contribute, caucus and vote.  Instead of PACs and lobbyists establishing their dominance within the campaign, more than a million individual contributors, most quite modest, have financed its operations.  

This values-based mass mobilization is a fundamental paradigm shift in Democratic politics, and it is what is changing the political dynamics of this election. It is a strategy for change.  If the mobilization can be sustained beyond the election, it will change the political dynamics that determine the country's future.  It is a new and powerful catalyst that will fundamentally shift the balance of power and the conventional dynamics of politics.  

Originally titled Analysis: Honoring Key Values in the Nominating Contest but that wasn't very sexy.

This diary isn't intended as a research document or finished product, just a springboard for ideas and vehicle to reconcile dueling thoughts.

After several spirited threads, a few ideas have crystallized for me. The overriding theme seems to be that any Democratic nominating process should, in my opinion, value a few complementary and competing key principles:

partisanship: Democrats get to select the Democratic nominee; all Democrats get to participate; strongest Democratic areas get more votes.

diversity and respect for key constituencies: Each constituency gets represented at the convention.

proportional representation and participatory democracy: All geographic areas are represented proportionally, all candidates receive delegates proportionally, maximum participation is encouraged, majority rules, minority gets representation.

fairness and transparency: The rules are set in advance, the rules count equally for everyone, entire process conducted in the open.

Now, in more depth, here's how I see each respective value currently represented in this cycle's process:

I've got two, semi-connected threads in my head at the moment that I'm mulling over that have to do with how younger voters are/might influence the Republican Party.  The first has to do with what we normally think of as "moral values," and how young evangelicals might reshape the debate.

Over at Revolution in Jesusland, Zack Exley points to some very interesting data from the Pew Center on Faith and American Life:

Of all the people who say moral values are very important in deciding how to vote, less than a third (30%) are referring to the candidates' positions on issues, with by far the largest number (14%) referring to abortion. In addition, they mention gay rights (3%), that  marriage is between a man and woman (3%) and gay marriage (3%).  A few, but only a very few, mention homosexuality (1%), and stem cell research (1%).

The greatest majority (78%) of these voters mentions personal characteristics of the candidates including their honesty (28%), integrity (11%), ethical values (8%), and someone who does the right thing (8%), is trustworthy (7%), truthful (6%) or keeps his/her word (6%).

So there's that - a clear opening to recapture the meaning of "values" in our public debate.  I don't have statistics, but I'm willing to bet that this is reframing of values tends to play especially well among younger evangelicals, whose support for Bush, and the Republican Party, has dropped significantly in recent years, even as Bush has been very supportive of Christian Right culture-war issues like gay marriage, stem cells, and abortion.  

Instead, of supporting that agenda, what we've seen so far is young evangelicals supporting Mike Huckabee, a candidate who preaches something of an anti-poverty agenda, and wants us to be "good stewards of the earth,"  by 2 - 1 among young Republican voters.  Huckabee may have some hard-core christian conservative values, but he's also talking about faith and issues in a way that speaks to concerns beyond the culture wars.  These young, conservative evangelicals don't seem to care about culture war issues the same war their parents/elders in the church do.  Rather, they are much more interested in a different conception of faith in public life, particularly what it means in a social justice context.  So Huckabee's message resonates with them more than someone like, say, Fred Thompson.

The second strand is that this leftward movement on some issues isn't limited in scope to young evangelicals.  The 2006 American Freshman survey (pdf) revealed that there is considerable support among young conservatives for traditionally liberal positions on a number of issues, particularly the environment and health care reform (see the chart below).  

This has tended to manifest itself in two ways, I think.  First, in the support of young people for the candidacy of John McCain in New Hampshire, where 27%, a plurality of young voters chose his candidacy, and in the creation of new organizations like the Republican Youth Majority, a newish GOP youth group supporting a pro-choice, pro-environment, fiscal conservative platform.  

It's important to note that prior to Huckabee's surge in December and McCain's resurgence post-Iowa, Rudy Giuliani was consistently the favorite choice among young conservative voters (pdf).  Probably because all anyone knew about him was "9/11."  Now that Huckabee has gained some traction and media attention, and is actively courting younger voters, and John McCain is perceived to be back in the race, Giuliani's support among younger voters seems to have dried up.  

So here's a thought - could the Millennial Generation conservatives move the Republican Party to the center/left?  Probably not anytime soon; with young voters choosing Democrats by a 2 - 1 margin, there are far too few of them to be all that influential right now.  But it will be interesting to see how they shape the GOP as they grow into power.  

Thoughts?  I don't have this worked out yet - not by a long shot - and this is probably an oversimplification of a number of trends among conservative youth and evangelical youth.  I'm interested in seeing/hearing people reinforce or tear down this idea.

I thought this was interesting.  Check out this piece by Sally Kohn on the Iowa caucuses over at the Movement Vision Lab (www.movementvisionlab.org):

A recent poll from the Des Moines Register found that many voters are still undecided as we approach the Iowa caucuses [this] evening. But on the issue of values, voters have already made up their minds. Community values are the top priority in this year's election.

Particularly among likely caucus goers who were registered Democrat (the majority of those polled by the Register), bread-and-butter issues that affect all of us such as the Iraq War, healthcare and the economy are more important to voters than divisive issues spread by fear-mongering. Issues like terrorism, immigration and religious values are really stand-ins for exclusion, isolation and discrimination. But the vast majority of voters --- and caucus goers --- reject the scapegoating politics of us-versus-them. The majority of voters know we're all in it together, that we all do better when we all do better, that when we work together to help everyone in our nation and our world, we all benefit. This is the message of this election.

Community values beat strong in the heartland of America. Family farmers know that corporate factory farms hurt local growers in Mexico and in Iowa. Factory workers know that free trade policies have only helped big business but hurt workers in China and in South Carolina. Parents know that the greed of HMOs and drug makers is limiting access to health care in Africa and in Arizona. Across the country and the world, we know that our problems are the same --- and so our solutions: to put people before profits and communities before corporations. These are the values Iowans will bring with them to the caucuses Thursday night.

Verne Tigges, a caucus goer from Carroll, Iowa, and a leader with Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement, summed it up best: "It's time to put the common good first." On Thursday, Verne Tigges will caucus for community values.

The Des Moines Register poll indicated that Independents will decide the outcome of the Iowa caucuses. These are the voters who have rejected the divisive mud slinging by political parties bought and sold by the corporate elite. These are the voters who have resisted the myth that the only values are discriminatory, hateful values. These are the voters who have refused to believe that the private sector can solve all our problems and government has no role to play. What do they stand for...

Read on here:  http://www.movementvisionlab.org/blog/no -matter-who-loses-iowa-community-values- win