First off, the post to view the original information regarding the start of this blog can be seen here.
The new United Liberals blog is a concept I created to make a one-stop-shop for swing voters, Red Tories, and centrist NDPers to get their information and hear the Liberal message. An election is coming and it is coming soon. We need to get in early and start changing people’s minds to get them to vote Liberal before it is too late.
The blog will start with a small group chosen by me, that is if they accept the offer. They have been chosen for their ideas, the way they communicate their message, and for some of them, popularity in the blogging community. My only thoughts on this was we need some people with name recognition, and we need an articulate, concise message that will help convince people to switch their vote to the Liberal Party. There were 11 out of the 25 positions that I gave open invitations for. Of those, I only expect half of them to actually say yes. Seriously, do you think Warren Kinsella will be doing posting on this blog. Jason is most likely too busy, CalgaryGrit probably is too, and I don't think anyone even knows where Scott is. Even if I left it completely open, Rob probably would have asked to join and Dave would have joined. So that would leave 4 people that I chose. The reason I chose them is their abilities as bloggers and the respect I have for them. Of those 4 people, none of them have said anything yet....so that leaves......nobody. This was a dream group, if they wanted it, the position was theirs, if not, there is a strong pool of bloggers that could take their position.
If you decide to become a member of the United Liberals blog, you will be screened by the current members of the group for 2 reasons. 1. To see if you are truly a Liberal, 2. To see if your writing style would be a good fit for the blog. (For example, if I applied, the consensus would be to decline me because I am very immature on my blog. On the United Liberals blog, I will be a lot more professional, and I promise I will not use profanity in my posts.) We want good, strong people to write in the blog so we can convince as many people as possible to vote Liberal.
All decisions on the blog will be a consensus up to and including the colour of the blog. Since we have to start somewhere, I made the first few appointments to get the ball rolling. After today, the rest of the bloggers will be chosen by the group with priority given to the people on my dream list. If they don't want to participate, then we will choose someone else to participate. Even everything I say now, will end up being up for debate so when we officially launch the site, it may not resemble what I have posted here.
All of the bloggers that will post on United Liberals will still be posting on their own blogs as usual. United Liberals will be used to post the views of regular Liberals on current events and Liberal ideas on the major issues Canadians are facing. On the latter, United Liberals will be used as a think-tank to come up with new ideas to the problems facing all of us. One idea will be to post a topic of a major issue, and have all the bloggers post ideas on possible solutions to that problem, come up with a consensus, and propose it to the Liberal Party of Canada.
This seguway's to the next idea for the blog. Once we get big enough, we could petition the Liberal Party to get official recognized status and be the first daily Liberal Party blog. With the LPC's backing, we would reach a whole new audience and really show the power of the blogosphere. As I said earlier, this is just an idea and will be voted on by the panel once it is assembled.
One person asked, how would this affect Liblogs? The short answer is very little to not at all. The long answer is that postings on Liblogs would scroll through a little bit faster as there will be several posts going on throughout the day. It would be like 25 new blogs posted on Liblogs a day. Of course I will recommend that we join Liblogs and if we get too big, we may leave it so the smaller blogs will have the opportunity to post. The downside to this will be lower traffic to Liblogs, but that would level out in time.
As I have said, all final ideas will be the consensus of the members of the blog and only a consensus. There will be nobody with any additional power. It will truly be a collective of ideas and ideals to help the Liberal Party during the next election.
If I missed something, or if something is still unclear, just post a comment and I will try to answer it as quickly as possible.
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
United Liberals Blog-The Details
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
The New United Liberals Blog
After watching the Liberal Leadership Convention and the calls for unity, I have decided to make a very ambitious undertaking. (Hopefully) with the help of the other Liberal Bloggers, I want to spearhead a new United Liberals Blog designed to be one voice for the blogging community. My goal is to have 25 Liberals from across
***And then there were seven, Rob Edger is now an official Saskatchewan blogger, Dave Monroe is now the official Northwest Territories blogger, Ruth Ellis Haworth is now an official Ontario blogger, Audacious Ontology is now an official British Columbia blogger, Sebastian Jodion is now an official Quebec blogger, and Darren McEwan is now an official Ontario Blogger for the new United Liberals Blog. Scott Robarts has confirmed interest but has not yet been approved by the current members***
**Update, I have decided to change the format of the contributors of the blog. It will now be based on provinces and not cities. See below for the values for each province. People in brackets are confirmed, quotations are for people I wish to have.**
1.”Women in Politics”
2.(Audacious Ontology)
3. (Me)
4. “
5.
6.
7. (Rob Edger)
8.
9.
10. (Darren McEwan)
11. (Ruth Ellis Haworth)
12. "Jason Cherniak"
13.
14.
15. (Sébastien Jodoin)
16. "Fuddle Duddle"
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23. (Dave Monroe)
24.
International
25.
Alternates that I don't know where they are from: Warren Kinsella, A Canadian Leaf, Scott Feschuk.
Now, there are still some bloggers I want to contribute, but I don't know exactly where they live, so they may conflict with my choices. The people I posted up top are my first choices for those areas/cities but you are still welcome to put your name in the hat for those areas if they decline. As I said, this is a very ambitious undertaking and the contributions by the bloggers I stated, will definitely help bring a strong voice to the blog and get people to listen to the Liberal message.
I also want to get Liberal MP's, both current and former to be a part of this blog as well. As this will be a major Liberal Blog, having their voices will help them reach the common people and in some cases show a softer, more natural side of them. If any Liberal MP wants to be a part of this blog, send me an e-mail at unitedliberals@gmail.com using your parliamentary e-mail address. This way, we can make sure that you are who you say you are and we don't have people posting using your name and tarnishing your image.
Once somebody accepts the invite, they will be involved in the selection process as well. Once you are in, you get to decide who else gets in...if you are number 25, then you don't get to use that decision until somebody drops out and we go on the hunt to replace them. We will try to make this completely bilingual and hopefully, we can find a person who knows something about html scripting so we can have a pretty site as well. If all goes well, we will consider a petition to become the first full time Liberal Blog. This will also be a group decision with a majority rules vote.
I hope this interests a lot of you people out there as this can potentially be the biggest thing to hit Canadian politics since my blog.....or something that actually has had an impact on politics. Once again, if anyone is interested in joining this blog, please e-mail me at unitedliberals@gmail.com and we will all join together to bring a strong United Liberal voice to Canadians.
Thank You,
Saturday, December 02, 2006
I Called It!!!! I am the Greatest!!!!
Well, like every other Liberal blogger has posted, Stephane Dion has won the Liberal Leadership. To this I have to say....You're Welcome. If it wasn't for me, and only me, Dion wouldn't have won the vote. Not the delegates, the campaign staff, not the candidates who threw their support behind Dion, and not Stephane himself. It was all me!!!! If it wasn't for my Official Anyone but Rae or Iggy campaign that reached tens of readers, Stephane Dion wouldn't have won the election. It just shows how powerful my blog truly is. GO ME!!!![proceeds to do a bad robot dance]
So, as I said Stephane Dion is now the official Leader of the Opposition, and the next Prime Minister of Canada. His policies that he ran on are a stark contrast to the narrow view that the Cons have put out and will show the world that Canada is back and we have recuperated from our drunken one night stand with our "New Canadian Government"
I would like to congratulate Mr Dion and all of his campaign staff that worked so tirelessly to get him to where he is today. He is truly a deserving person with the drive and the intelligence to make this country the great bastion of social ideals and progressive intellect that we truly are.
I would also like to thank the other candidates for a great job rallying Canadians across the country and re-introducing them to the Big Red Machine. Gerard Kennedy, Scott Brison, Martha Hall Findlay, Bob Rae, Ken Dryden, Joe Volpe, and Michael Ignatieff were all great icons in helping re-energize the Liberal Base and all of them ran great campaigns. Your work to bring life back to the party is greatly appreciated. This spring will be a great time for the Liberal Party of Canada as we WILL retake our rightful place as the true voice of