This is a short, personal statement of political intent.
I believe that the key to politics is connection, both connection between participants and connection between an ideological position and real world experiences. My hope for this site, as it evolves, remains the creation of a positive and irrevocable change in the way we discuss politics in this country.
I believe that this change is accomplished first and foremost through understanding why another person holds a particular set of beliefs. Our primary goal must not be to convince, as is the political tradition, but to empathize. In doing so, we are more likely to find commonality and ground our solutions in the concerns of this community.
Further, I believe that statements should be well-supported by artifacts in the real world. That includes academic studies, statistical data and -- most importantly -- examples of how political issues materialize in local communities. We need to move our discussion from the abstract world of media-driven jargon into something tangible and accessible.
My focus for the short-term is to help create the environment to seed political change. The PoliticWiki experiment will continue to be iterated until it can find a place in this conversation space. The structure and process of exchanging perspectives will be of greater concern to me than the outcome. I want to tend to the ground before tending the crop.
We are hardwired to be connected with each other. It is a basic need that weakens us by its absence. This is not Politics As Usual. It is Mutual Politics, relating our power with each other.
Kevin Makice
But DEBATE is also essential . . .
Debate and the effort to convince others through arguing is the other side of the coin to empathy. If no one is trying to convince you through arguments, then there is nothing to empathize with.
Therefore debate is also primarily important.
The truth is that there is very little real debate in our society. There is a lot of one-sided propaganda, such as the radio political talk shows, but there is very little debate. At least 90% of the callers to those shows agree with the host of the program. Such "debate" as there is is usually just meaningless slogans shouted back and forth between the two sides, plus name-calling.
So part of the 3rd Party's function is to inaugurate a true debate environment in the U.S., where issues are truly debated, in depth, and answers or solutions are sought after. This will be a debate which goes beyond just bashing rival politicians or celebrities who are on the other side of the Red-Blue divide and probably leading to an end to the nonsensical war of the Reds vs. the Blues.
Leonard Garland / Freetrader