Unity '09: Dem groups quietly align

By BEN SMITH

A broad coalition of left-leaning groups is quietly closing ranks into a new coalition, "Unity '09," aimed at helping President Barack Obama push his agenda through Congress.

Conceived at a New York meeting before the November election, two Democrats familiar with the planning said, Unity '09 will draw together money and grassroots organizations to pressure lawmakers in their home states to back White House legislation and other progressive causes.

The online-based MoveOn.org is a central player in the nascent organization, but other groups involved in planning Unity '09 span a broad spectrum of interests, from the American Civil Liberties Union to the National Council of La Raza to Planned Parenthood, as well as labor unions and environmental groups.

The group is still in its early stages, and its organizers have adopted a secretive posture: Several of the people involved did not respond to emails over the last two days, even though one of them, former MoveOn executive director Eli Pariser, has programmed his MoveOn email account to assure correspondents that he is using the account for messages "including Unity '09 work."

People familiar with the planning said that the White House is not directly involved in the group's formation, though Unity '09's main day-to-day staffer, Aaron Pickrell, was a senior aide on Obama's presidential campaign. Aides to Obama and to Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel didn't respond to inquiries about whether they were familiar with the group.

Unity '09 comes at a time of increasing coordination on the left, including an effort this week by the Democratic National Committee, Obama's grassroots network and other groups to defend Obama's budget and attack the GOP as obstructionists.

But Unity '09 is setting a broader, and longer-term agenda, aiming to exert grassroots pressure on lawmakers in their home states over the next several years on the entire spectrum of political issues.

"When progressive activists are working in concert and the right is forming a circular firing squad, you know it's a new day," said consultant Paul Begala, who said he's not involved in the new organization.

Unity '09 is, informally, the field organizing compliment to another new organization, Progressive Media , which launched a month ago to coordinate the liberal groups' messages and their attacks on Republicans and on critics of Obama's policies. That group's 8:45 a.m. daily conference call has helped bring such unlikely groups as the League of Conservation Voters into an effort to cast Rush Limbaugh as the leader of the Republican Party, and has coordinated attacks on two leading critics of Obama's health care plans.

But while Progressive Media is an in-house project of two existing organizations, the Center for American Progress and Media Matters.

Unity '09 requires more commitment from its members in the form of a $25,000 contribution to the group's future organizing campaigns, a source said.

Unity '09 is conceived as ultimately including 20 to 30 organizations, people familiar with the planning said.

The groups have overlapping, but different, groups of members and financial resources at their disposal, and the idea behind the organization is that they can share resources to fill in geographical and organizational gaps. Labor unions could, for instance, put their weight behind environmental campaigns in regions where environmental groups are relatively weak, and vice versa.

Along with the groups previously mentioned, others involved in planning discussions include the Sierra Club, Media Matters for America, and Health Care for America Now.

Unity '09 is not to be confused with Unity '08, a bipartisan group of political operatives that sought to nominate New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg as the top of an independent presidential ticket last year.

The new organization is likely to stir fears among conservatives already feeling organizationally outgunned and flatly alarmed by the new progressive infrastructure.

"This, ladies and gentlemen is, a threat to America," Fox News's Bill O'Reilly said, responding Saturday night to POLITICO's report on the birth of Progressive Media and its morning conference call. "The Obama administration would be wise to avoid this crew. If the new administration gets involved in this, it would be like the Nixon dirty tricks squad."

Is OU Buying Condom with our Tax $?

Hat Tip to Oklahoma Beagle

Just last week David Boren was at the State Capitol looking at getting more of our TAX $$$ for stuff like this?

OU Students Celebrate National Condom Week

Planned Parenthood and the OU Women's Outreach Center teamed up to host the annual National Condom Week at the University of Oklahoma by handing out free condoms and information promoting safe sex to students.

Every year universities across the United States celebrate National Condom Week in order to educate students about safe sex. The event started at the University of California-Berkley in 1978 and made its way to OU in the mid-1990s. Terry Dennison, director of education services at Planned Parenthood, said he has participated in National Condom Week ever since it made its way to OU's campus. Dennison said National Condom Week happens every February prior to Valentines Day and its purpose is to inform students.

Dennison sets up a table in the student union that offers students an array of information, lubricants and, of course, condoms. University of Oklahoma sexperts hand out condoms on the south oval to students passing by. Political Science major Nick Beckworth helps out by offering students information at the table set up in the student union. Beckworth said he decided to participate in the event because he feels it offers students vital information.

"Safe sex is the best sex," Beckworth said. "I do this to spread awareness. Condoms are important."

Dennison said he plans on participating in Condom Week next year at OU.

Communist Party USA Endorses Barack Obama

Hat Tip to RED STATER

Communist Party USA
PAC Endorses
Barack Obama

by Margot Schulzke

Communist Party USA (CPUSA) PAC Chair Joelle Fishman has published a glowing, near Messianic endorsement of Barack Obama.

Fishman is also Chair of the Connecticut Communist Party.

In the June 21 edition of Peoples Weekly World, Fishman wrote:
Big political shifts are under way. . . Thousands of grassroots union volunteers are already in motion as part of the largest-in-history labor mobilization, visiting co-workers to talk about the issues . . .

The Obama campaign, drawing upon the candidate’s community organizing experience, is also looking toward the grassroots. Unity for Change house parties across the country on June 28 will bring neighbors together for voter registration and getting out the vote.

A national coalition of peace and economic rights organizations is also gearing up for grassroots voter registration and mobilization.

Planned Parenthood Action is launching a One Million Strong Know McCain campaign with house parties June 14-20. . .

All these efforts can involve new activists, build for the landslide and take up top issues of concern.

As AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker told the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists convention, “This election . . . must be about working people’s vision — our vision of a new direction for our country. A vision that includes universal health care, the elimination of poverty, good jobs and the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act … [W]e are going to spark a movement of those who are ready to make their voices heard in shaping the new America . . .

The Communist Party USA’s emergency program to repair, renew and rebuild America is a contribution toward this effort. . . .

Fishman’s endorsement speaks for itself. Yet Fishman is but one of a growing army of Barack Obama’s CPUSA, Marxist, and socialist supporters from the halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli and beyond.