Vote!

Posted by Christopher S Penn on Nov 2, 2010 in Politics | 0 comments

Regardless of what you think of (party) or (candidate) or (incumbent), regardless of how badly broken you think (political body) is or how corrupt (government process) is, go vote. Not sure who to vote for?

• Vote for people who support the things you support.
• If you like things more or less how they are now, the people who are marked Incumbent on your ballots are in part responsible for that. Vote for them.
• If you don’t like things how they are now, vote for someone who doesn’t have Incumbent next to their name.
• Vote for people who participate in the communities you care about – local communities or digital ones.
• Virtually every politician out there is running a Twitter account now. @reply to the ones on your ballot and see who responds. If they’re not listening now, they won’t be listening in office either. Let that guide your vote a tiny little bit.

Whatever your methodology, whatever your choices, exercise them. Unless you’re a wealthy old white male landowner, chances are once upon a time in this nation you would not have had the right to vote. You do now. Use it.

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The genuine absence of leadership

Posted by Christopher S Penn on Oct 26, 2010 in Politics | 17 comments

Dear politicians:

I have watched with interest, mostly feigned, at this season’s political advertising, and I applaud you for being incredibly effective in your attack ads, which seem to be 99% of your advertising spend. You have done an amazing job of convincing me of this simple fact:

Not one of you corrupt morons should ever be allowed in office.

As a marketer, I get that you need to contrast yourself with the other folks running. In regular marketing, some contrast is mandatory. But by spending all your time telling me why I shouldn’t vote for the other guy or gal, you’ve convinced me you’re all a bunch of corrupt morons, regardless of party or affiliation, because I’m sure there’s a grain of truth in each of your attack ads somewhere in there.

Let me give you a comparative analogy. Pretend we’re all on a desert island somewhere, and most of us have survived a plane crash. As the survivors gather and figure out what’s going on, we start the inevitable discussion about who should lead us and what roles we should take to help the community survive until we’re rescued.

What you’re doing by throwing as many attack ads is effectively having two or more people on the desert island screaming at each other: DON’T FOLLOW HIM! HE’LL EAT ALL THE COCONUTS! That’s not leadership. If government were a matter of desert island life or death, the rest of us would leave you on the beach to starve and die.

Wait a minute. Government is a matter of life or death, for our society as a whole. Take a look around. 14.7 million people are unemployed. 26.4 million people are underemployed – that’s nearly 1 in 5 working Americans. The desert island is the entire country, and a good portion of us are hungry, if not starving while you spend all your time screaming why the other guy/gal/party is a bad choice, while stealing as many coconuts as you can.

Our only hope is that the citizens of America do as the desert island folks would do: leave you idiots to starve to death on your own and run this place ourselves. Call social media a fishbowl, call it frivolity or time wasting, call it narcissistic, but PodCamp Boston 5 raised $7,000 towards the Greater Boston Food Bank’s Kids Meals program. One silly little conference started by Chris Brogan and I a few years ago has done more real good for people with immediate need than all of your political campaign spending combined.

So politicians, congratulations. Your attack ads have achieved their goals: you’ve convinced me that the other guy or gal shouldn’t get elected. Unfortunately for you, they’ve convinced me the same about you.

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Watch me speak: Attend virtually!

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You are independent, right?

Posted by Christopher S Penn on Jul 4, 2010 in Awakening, Politics | 5 comments

For my American friends, happy Independence Day!

You are independent, right?

• You read multiple news sources from around the world, different nations, different viewpoints
• You read multiple different viewpoints in commentary, even writers whose politics and perspectives you disagree with
• You listen and watch trending topics in social media broadly as well as have a selected set of trusted friends
• You use sites like Open Secrets and Bloomberg to follow the money whenever something in the news doesn’t make sense
• You read a wide variety of blogs on different subject matters across the spectrum
• You subscribe to as many free trade publications and magazines as practical to see what hot issues are in different industries
• You do your part to act when you see obvious threats to everyone’s independence and liberty taking place

Independence is as much a state of mind as it is a political state. Celebrate your independence today, and commit to reinforcing and defending it by doing one or more of the above if you don’t already.

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Want to influence China? Forget Olympic Torch Protests!

Posted by Christopher S Penn on Apr 8, 2008 in Politics | 14 comments

China’s power today is driven by economics first and foremost. Want to lead the charge, make a difference, influence their human rights policy? Forget the Olympics, forget Olympic Torch protests. The Olympics are symbolic, and while as a Buddhist, I certainly acknowledge and applaud any attention given to the plight of Tibet, protests will accomplish very little in the long run.

Want to really make a change?

Every time you go to the store, check to see where a product is made. If you have a choice between goods made in China and any other nation (and you may not), buy the product made somewhere else as often as you can.

Commit today to buy 25% fewer goods made in China, and 25% more goods made in the USA or other countries that support the human rights initiatives you value.

Economic power made the giant, and economic power can change its course on human rights – but only if you have the will as a consumer to vote with your wallet, no matter how great the sale is.