Speaking Out

Had some friends over for dinner last night. My sister is also in town and earlier that day she came across a website (www.americaspeakingout.com) that was created by House Republicans. The site invites everyday americans to become part of the policy making process. According to the site, it is "your opportunity to change the way Congress works by proposing ideas for a new policy agenda. Republicans have offered solutions, and we have our principles, but this is a new venue for us to listen to you. So Speak Out."

I think the republicans who came up with the site underestimate the political leanings and overestimate the basic maturity level of the people who use the internet. And just because comments can be voted on with a digg-like thumbs up or down does not make it a state-of-the-art social media site as one republican representative purports it to be in a press release.

Not surprisingly, hilarious ideas from all corners of the web have been flowing and last night, we took out the laptop and submitted some ideas.

I found it to be a good creative exercise to write in the voice of a narrow-minded conservative. The idea had to be ludicrous but it had to plausibly come from a conservative. The tone had to be categorical and adamant. The more sweeping it was, the better. And the shorter ones get more traction.

Here are three that i submitted:

1) "Make future presidents submit MULTIPLE backup AUTHENTIC birth certificates!!" I wrote this statement under American Values. As of this morning, this idea got 54 votes and 3 responses.

2) "Why can't NASA come up with an American version of Karate?" This one was submitted to the National Security category. I particularly like this one because it challenges a government agency to come up with a better form of self-defense and it has all the necessary nationalistic undertones. Unfortunately, it received the fewest votes as of this morning with 9 votes.

3) "The US military should adopt the mullet as the official haircut of the armed forces. Symbolically, this style tells Al Kaida that we're protected from the back. Practically, it offers sun protection and less time on barbershop chairs at military bases and more time kickin' butt." This one has had the most momentum. Twenty votes in less than an hour.

These were ok but some of the ones i've read on the site have been inspired.