ted kennedy
GRITtv: Should We Do Away With the Senate?
With the election of Scott Brown to Ted Kennedy's former Senate seat, Democrats in DC seemed to give up on getting any major legislation passed. 59 votes (well, 58 and Joe Lieberman) was just not good enough. The blame has been flying -- it's Obama's fault, Rahm Emanuel's, Harry Reid's -- but what if the problem simply is the Senate? What can we change? Would eliminating the filibuster -- the so-called "nuclear option" back when Republicans were suggesting it -- be enough, or is the Senate, with its two-Senators-per-state-regardless-of-population mandate, just too fundamentally undemocratic? We ask the New Yorker's Hendrik Hertzberg, author of OBAMANOS!: The Rise of a New Political Era, Lawrence Lessig, Harvard professor and author of a new Nation cover story on the subject, and Nancy Scola of the Personal Democracy Forum.
Email this pageGRITtv: The F Word: Coakley DID Define Herself; More's the Pity
I hate to nit-pick, but is it possible that Martha Coakley lost not because people knew her too little but because they just might have know her too much? I didn't follow the race super closely, and I certainly haven't studied the exit polls, but I have heard an awful lot about Coakley's failure to define herself. It's certainly possible that the entire debacle turned only on national politics, Democratic arrogance, Massachusetts sexism, and Tea Party backlash, but just on the off chance it swayed some of those 100,000 voters who made the difference, is Coakley's actual record worth a peek? -- Laura Flanders
GRITtv: F Word: Telling Your Healthcare Story
Enough! When it comes to the debate around health care, we've heard the same voices -- mostly pundits and politicians -- on every channel. We've seen a small group dominate the airwaves and we've even seem some health seekers wield guns. Well last week, I had occasion to suggest to Ed Schultz on MSNBC that what was needed were more everyday people. 'Fewer pundits, more people? You mean right here?', asked Ed. I said yes...
And what do you know, here's an exciting new citizen journalism project that aims to make life really easy for reporters seeking to break through the guff.
It's called MyRapidReport.com. And it's all about making sure some real people's real health care stories get told. How does it happen? You become a GRITtv citizen journalist.
How about doing one or all of these:
1) Videotape the proceedings of a health care town hall - and don't only talk to the screamers.
2) Interview your friends and neighbors about their experiences.
3) Tell your own personal healthcare story.
Once you've shot your video you can upload it -- by following the instructions at our website -- and what will happen? Like YouTube, your videos will be open for the public to view. But because this effort is being organized by the Media Consortium, a whole network of reporters, editors and organizers will also have access.
Senator Kennedy's voice may have been silenced on the life or death issue of healthcare, but yours needn't be. By the way, if you happen to live in New York City, GRITtv has generously offered their studio space for you to come in and tape your own personal story starting on September 11 and every Friday afterward. Email grittv@grittv.org to get more information and reserve your time to tell your healthcare story!
