Important Update

Hi again everyone. It’s Cenk. It’s been 7 weeks since I announced Operation Hope, and I have to say that I’m impressed with the wide range of responses. From those of you trying to keep the conversation going and on track from what I originally asked, to those of you sticking around to engage with one another in interesting and important conversations – all of you are important to making this community into what we’re building together.

I want to begin by apologizing for not being available as much as I originally intended. Obviously, running for President of the United States is no small task, but it has made me far less available than I expected.

I’ve learned a few things over the years, one of them that’s really true is - it takes a village. Thank you for being that village. Thank you for being here, whether you are excited no matter what we do, or you are frustrated with the pace of things. I can relate to all of it and truly believe that all of you are necessary for our progress.

That said, we are going to continue with the original plan of coming up with ideas together, but I’m bringing in some extra help to guide us along. What I’d love from you is…

  1. Agree on the top three pieces of legislation for our community to organize around in order to create real change in the real world.
  2. Explain (a) WHAT the legislation is, (b) whether it’s at the federal level or other, and (c) WHY you think it should be the one we focus on.
  3. By Friday, December 1, have one person post this list and tag @Alison Hartson. She’s going to help support you as you self-organize. I will be looking at your work and popping in from time to time.

After December 1, we’ll figure out the next steps together.

I want to finish with my heart-felt thanks to all of you. There are a few ideas that some of you have put out there, from a letter writing campaign, to focusing on Michigan’s minimum wage ballot measure, to a hunger strike, to designing a mobile app for exposing corruption, to collaborating with celebrities (that one is really hard), among so many other ideas. No matter which of the suggestions seems the most doable to you, I absolutely love that people are willing to take risks and present their ideas. I also love how the vast majority of conversations have been productive, welcoming, and collaborative even when you disagree with someone. THAT is how we move forward together.

Let’s keep it going!

Cenk

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I am willing to sign on to this effort.

I am Civitasvox.

I have skills in logistics and research. I have consulting, project management, & agronomy expertise. I have past work in consensus building amongst my cohort.

I could help people gain insight on questions they may have, but not enough time to gather the information.

I would love it if we could help Cenk by generating this list!

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As Doc would say - “Let’s get it!”

Top 3 legislation for real change, what it is, how sweeping it is, why it’s most important-

  1. Stop increasing the military budget, possibly reducing it.
    What- A call for stopping military spending without clarity of objectives, and showing how this new spending will be paid for.
    Coverage- Federal
    Why- This is something that most Americans can get behind without any culture war nonsense gaining traction against it. Poor and middle class people from all sides hate hearing how bloated the military is and want to get it under control. If successful the money will be a windfall to the entire country.

  2. Immigration Reform
    What- Major overhaul. Reassigning courts in all states to work immigration cases, transporting people to cities where they can be at the court dates assigned, allow temporary work permits.
    Coverage- Federal and states, including the use of current CBP and ICE employees and equipment (minus detention centers) for protection and transportation. Federal funds already go to states and should be distributed according to who welcomes the immigrants.
    Why- Immigration is important for every person and desperately needs to be reworked in the US. The bussing of migrants to other cities has brought attention to them being people who ALL Americans need to help with and not just border states (not that they’re alone, but they cry like they are).

  3. Energy Infrastructure
    What- Create federal and state solar and wind farms.
    Coverage- Both federal and state governments
    Why- We need more energy and better transmission, create more jobs and good paying transfer and training for energy sector workers. Get America’s energy sector out from under the thumb of private sector.

These aren’t what I feel is most important, but the top 3 most presentable issues for Cenk to destroy opposition on a debate or social media blitz. They do offer to create real change.
Let’s get some ideas out there and vote, people, Cenk needs us to whittle it down to 1 by December.
Love you all

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I think what a reasonable way to approach this is for everyone to brainstorm here for a bit then poll the top results.

Maybe do several rounds until 3 winners are clear?

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Absolutely, that’s how I read Cenk’s message. My response was lengthy, but I figured I’d start it out as best I could.
Everyone will be busy over this holiday week, so hopefully people will be positive about those whose lists of top 3 are concise and less in depth than mine.

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Your input is very welcome and much appreciated. Don’t mind of the length: your input and the rest are to be synthetized for easy polling of the community. It is complete with the field that Cenk pointed out and that is very important. Please stay tuned

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We should have legislation centering the “deep capture industry”, which when not actual conspiracy outright, is mostly “stochastic conspiracy” (based on systemic alignments of crony market incentives).

The legislation could include aspects for: campaign bribes, corporate propaganda, academic capture, supreme court illegitimacy, other captured regulatories such as EPA, DOT, etc. But, the legislation is not centered on any of those aspects, rather the primary target is the industrial infrastructure of networked operations responsible for the capture and corruption. To clarify the public’s understanding of such a cloaked primary target, we could specify key villains of those networks, (whom I consider enemies of our democracy worthy of war-like mobilization); maybe starting with Koch. Bringing the Koch operatives and allies into questioning is needed for dismantling their vast operations networks.

Addressing such corruption in Cenk’s campaign would be supported by independent and republican voters; (after all, this legislation targets actual deep state capture, and should be campaigned on and named as such). Corruption is a bi-partisan issue within which other political issues could be contextualized.

Cenk’s campaign can show why he is well positioned to oppose Trump in ways no corporate politician can (ie. the corruption of democrats like Biden empowered the likes of Trump). Cenk can move current politics in general to include if not center corruption. Going forward, if Cenk loses, having pointed at such a campaign pillar will empower future politics; and if Cenk wins, this legislation will greatly improve future politics by empowering effective democratic function.

EDIT

WHAT the legislation is
It addresses symptoms of the issue in order to illustrate the primary target of deep state capture (eg., perhaps ban corporate pac bribes). After such illustrations, the legislation addresses the primary target directly, perhaps by defining their operations networks as our enemy (for their leveraging of wealth to corrupt our otherwise democratic regulation of said leverage). Experts in our enemy’s operations, (such as, ideally, Jon Hanson, Nancy MacLean, Senator Whitehouse, etc.), would also have other ideas of how to target their operations directly. Finally, this legislation directs future legislation to continue dismantling the tendrils of our primary target, including by forcing such enemies to reveal the extent of their still concealed operations, (eg., question leaders and key members of already revealed operations, like federalist society, etc). Beyond this legislation, as further corruption is revealed, we would continue legislating against the corruption.

Federal level or other
Seems federal to me, though, it is not so singular. States could contribute.

WHY it should be focused
As explained.

PS. Please consider my other topic thread, running progressive republican

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Not sure if this refers (at all) to my suggestion, but it certainly is related: my idea is to leverage & make viral the Pro Truth Pledge & I will ensure that at least one AI-based tech solution (an app & site for people to find who is signed up & reply with an AI context + fact-check & perhaps an auto post so nobody needs to choose who to reply at, based on known disinfo/conspiracy/etc). It will help ensure all those who sign up are held accountable & expose who is unwilling…the concept just needs to go viral. We put pressure on politicians & news media sign it & then expose untruths, forcing either admission the untruths were wrong or proving they are indeed correct.

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What:
SBA and community college partnership initiative to allow people to get gain access to capital. This should focus on under met communities especially rural areas. Liaisons should be a part of this with outreach funding, training, and oversight for the purpose of starting a small business. This has been done in successfully in several countries. The program should emphasis traditional native craft skills, along with value added agricultural, and food products.

Modeled here with Bamboo School:

Why:
Immigration also happens inside a countries boarders and is a cascading issue which seems less interconnected to the larger economy then it truly is. The pressure in a cities labor market has to do with pressure it receives from economically depressed rural areas. This in turn promotes downward pressure in the cities labor market causing the so called brain drain effect due to patriots leaving.

Geographical target:
Where this could start locally at a small scale however it seems like a direction the federal government should pursue potentially.

What:
Community college prison training programs and liaisons. We need more mentorship in jails and prisons they must receive job skills training. There should also be career placement staff trained specifically to help these incrassated students. Incentives to business to hire them should also be in place.

Why:
Young men are dangerous to themselves and others if they aren’t given proper opportunities to be part of society in a meaningful way.

Geographical target:
Where this could start locally at a small scale however it seems like a direction the federal government should pursue potentially.

What:
Temporary housing for immigrants and homeless. There are many derelict motels and malls around the US. These structures could be converted to housing communities. I know some will think of the projects in the north east. I think we could avoid this fate by designing smaller communities and putting more money into small business initiative outlined in solution 1).

Why:
The better we integrate immigrants into the healthy aspects of our society the better off the world is as a whole. Immigrants are often the smartest most driven amongst the populations they are leaving. It is a disgrace to ignore their actions and not reward them with opportunities when possible.

Geographical target:
Federal.

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I think we need to issue a vote with all the options outlined on this post. Maybe we could have a deadline soon to allow for extra voting if needed. @fourthwall_dragon could we get a poll with all the options purposed in the next couple days?

I think we need a sort of a straw poll process here.

So far, few votes have been casted, so we cannot assert that those polls would be, at this point, an acceptable gauge of the community’s priorities and favorite ideas. It has been proven in the past that this community responds to @cenkuygur 's call to action via TYT’s live main show(there was considerable increase in engagement).

I would suggest an extended deadline for that list to be sent to @alison_hartson , since the holidays were in the middle and people is returning to activities on Monday. But we will have to wait on their input for this.

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Your points are well taken. I will make an observation that it is a bit of a timidity issue but it also maybe a bit of a conceptual misunderstanding behind supporting a user vs their idea.

I am not sure if this would solve it but I think this next vote should strip out users identity, and place the ideas in competition with one another. Maybe at which point we could discuss ideas that could merge or be reformed. I think it would be great if we could work with ideas without having to defend a reputation of those whom purposed them.

What do you think of that?

We do have an engagement issue it would appear. I am maybe that is what we need to brainstorm on.

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I think the move is we make an aggregate poll as I purposed, but we also mash your idea for more time, and a boost from Cenk with a shout out.

So maybe we ask for a bit more time to do final vote. We aggregate the list by Dec 1. Then Cenk could give it a little boost, and he could hype that fact we crowd sourced the contents. This would possible work well to get voting engagement.

I agree that a call out on the main show, possibly a mention on TDR and Indisputable as well, would vastly boost involvement. I think that having these topics detached from any user’s name is a great idea as well.
It is a short window Cenk was asking this to happen in, but I think we should see what the end of the week brings. We definitely want more engagement, but he probably asked for the Dec 1 deadline for a reason.
I’ve asked in a couple other conversations, is there any inclusion or talk of this call to action on the other social media platforms that include TYT members?
After the vote happens and the list is posted we should keep it going in perpetuity, especially since people can go back and change their votes. Good way to help keep a narrow focus.

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Alright let me take a swing at the assignment here since we’re two days from deadline lol. Been lurking around and most of my priorities have already been said in much more articulate ways so hopefully this a list people can agree on. I’m not a lawyer so I was kinda shying away from writing “legislation” but for the sake of the mission here goes…

  1. Priority: Anti-Corruption Measures

A) Spotlight Bill - Any group, organization, or non-profit donating to any federal, state, or local election must disclose the identity of any donor, funder, or corporate entity who’s funds have been bundled for their donations or operations.

B) Federal

C) While I would love to ban the use of PACs and all that nonsense. That’s step 2. I think we should focus first on bringing to light all this “dark money”. I wish to know whose money is going to which politician because when you know who’s bought them the reasons for their actions are easier to highlight. I firmly believe the term dark money has no place in our political discourse. If we can get this small win I think we can use it as a building block to hopefully overturning Citizen’s United and the such.

  1. Priority: Economic Reform

A) Federal Minimum Wage/Paid Family Leave

B) Federal

C) While I can’t be the one to determine the actual number we should land on. My ideal legislation would tie the minimum wage to inflation in some way like how I believe Social Security recipients get cost of living adjustments. As measly as they might be so I’ve heard. I think Bernie is at 17 now but we’re not even at 15. So I think this is just simple populist logic. Same with paid family leave. We have the polls. Get the workers and mothers behind us. That’s always the way to winning no?

  1. Priority: Healthcare Reform

A) Medicare/Medicaid negotiate on ALL drugs.

B) Federal

C) Honestly I think there are probably a million ways to improve our healthcare system whether it is within the confines of capitalism or a complete overhaul of it with M4A. Since I am trying to focus on wins that get the ball rolling on our priorities I think this is a fight we can pick back up. Then maybe loftier goals like the public option.

In conclusion I presented things with priorities in mind because I think the synergy of these three is what is gonna result in the most people joining our fight. The legislation resulting from them is but a shot on goal. We miss? We just come back from a new angle. A new play. A new strategy.

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@alison_hartson Can you answer a couple question regarding the submission tomorrow?

I’ll do my best - how can I help?

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Hello @alison_hartson ,

I don’t know if this was one the questions @enduser intended to make but it is one we have been entertaining as we have been interacting. I tried to reach him on discord but to no avail.

We were wondering if there was the possibility of a shout out from Cenk on the live show for people to come and vote for legislation ideas that were requested. I say that because there have been little votes/activity on the forum and last time Cenk made a call to action via the show it proved to be highly effective.

Is that something that is in the realm of possible?

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