As us older people say, OMG.  In 76 days, after eight years of decaying, destructive conservatism in Washington, a fresh progressive President and Administration will take the reins. 

Campus Progress is ready to work with you, starting right now, to turn this immense promise into lasting positive change.  We can be your gateway to participating in critical efforts ahead.  Read on to see how we can work together.

Today’s young people have lived much of their lives under the fiercely conservative, cynical, and incompetent regime of George W. Bush.  The current administration has stomped on our values and done tremendous harm to our society. 

But the thousands of young people who have worked to build a resurgent progressive youth movement never lost hope.  You have organized effectively around the urgency of progressive change, on issues from economic opportunity to global warming.  Now you have a chance to come to Washington, and to organize on your campuses and in your communities, to make that change a reality. 

It will not be easy.  Powerful interests will be working to block progress. The conservative movement may be intellectually bankrupt, but it still has plenty of cash at its disposal.  Millions of dollars also will continue to flow from entrenched special interests to K Street to pay lobbyists and lawyers for efforts to halt reform.  

That’s where you come in.  If you are young and progressive, you now have a chance to take over the world.  Join with Campus Progress and our partner organizations, and let’s see what we can accomplish. 

Work with us and our partners on our national efforts to generate alternative energy and halt climate change; to make education affordable, health care accessible, and good jobs available; to strengthen civil rights and liberties; to bring our troops home from Iraq and advance a smarter foreign policy.  Work with this Administration when it leads for progress, and hold its feet to the fire if and when it disappoints.  Apply for a Campus Progress Action Grant, so we can help you win an issue campaign in your own community.

Express yourself and reach a national audience for your journalism and multimedia by contributing to our CampusProgress.org web magazine or Campus Progress Action’s Pushback blog.   Apply for a Campus Progress Publication Grant to start or advance a progressive newspaper, magazine, or website on your campus.

Work with us to create events on your campuses and in your communities, with speakers, performers, and films that address the issues that matter most and inspire attendees to take action.

The Bush Administration has left a big mess to clean up.  But few previous generations of young people have had such an opportunity to participate in the reinvention and reinvigoration of this country.  You have done much to get us to this point.   Here at Campus Progress, we can’t wait to be part of what you do next.

David Halperin

Director, Campus Progress

A C-SPAN clip from this week’s Young America’s Foundation conference came to my attention.  YAF VP Patrick Coyle gave a speech claiming, astonishingly, that progressives are intent on stifling the speech of conservatives, and he specifically mentioned Campus Progress.  If progressives, Coyle asked, are “so truly confident of their domination of the college campus, they would not try to stop speakers. They would say that we should go ahead and bring in their one conservative speaker… but they are so threatened.”  Coyle continued by noting that Campus Progress is seeking “to train a new generation of so-called progressive leaders. Each year they hold a conference much like this one, and they have also started a campus lecture program to bring in even more liberal speakers to college campuses.”  Coyle said that conservative students should go to progressive events and speak out. 

Patrick, get real.  Who is confident, and who is threatened? 

Campus Progress invites conservative speakers to speak at our events -- like TownHall’s Amanda Carpenter, who appeared at our annual conference this summer, and Trent Lott, who spoke at one of our campus events this year with Tom Daschle. We invite conservatives to be interviewed on our website, like David Horowitz.  Our interns cornered Ben Stein and convinced him to make a promo video for us.  All these conservatives were gracious and interested in genuine debate on important issues.  We admit young conservatives to our national conference as attendees, and we admit reporters from conservative publications like National Review to cover our conference.  We have repeatedly denounced actions by people on the progressive side to shout down conservative campus speakers, throw pies in their faces, or otherwise interfere with honest, open debate.

Meanwhile, what has YAF done?  The very YAF conference at which Patrick Coyle was speaking has repeatedly shut out Campus Progress-affiliated young people as attendees and journalists.  This year they refused to admit our intern Chenwei Zhang, even after Amanda Carpenter herself called YAF, cited her positive experience at the Campus Progress conference, and urged YAF to be open minded.  In 2006, when pressed after excluding a CampusProgress.org reporter, Julie Siegel, YAF said it would not admit a reporter from The Nation, whose contributors since 1865 have included Albert Einstein, Martin Luther King, John Steinbeck, and Franklin Roosevelt.  YAF also ejected a reporter from the venerable Washington Monthly for the crime of also posting on the CampusProgress.org blog.

Patrick, do you actually believe what you are saying?  Have you checked in with your colleagues Mr. Custer, Mr. Mattera , and Mr. Robinson, who have repeatedly barred Campus Progress from the doors of your events?

Who is confident, and who is threatened?  Mr. Coyle also repeated the same tired argument conservatives have trotted out since we launched, that Campus Progress is unnecessary, because colleges themselves are the progressive organizing institutions: “What I think the leaders of Campus Progress are forgetting is that if you think about it, there is no reason for them to exist…. Typically, the counterpart to Young America's Foundation is usually the college itself.” 

We’ve addressed that argument before.  If there was no need for Campus Progress to exist, why do thousands of young people attend our events, participate in our campaigns, contribute to or visit our websites, apply for our action grants and publication grants?   We’re not necessary?  Yes, Patrick, it is the market working – supply and demand. 

Campus Progress and our partner organizations are growing and gaining influence because young people are smart, engaged, and progressive.  Working together – progressive groups and young people – we are getting things done: like making college more affordable, preventing efforts by conservatives to regulate the free speech of students and professors, moving campuses and communities toward clean energy, keeping the pressure on to halt genocide in Sudan, working for a stable outcome in Iraq, seeking to end government interference with freedom to marry.

YAF’s budget is seven times that of Campus Progress, but heaven knows how you are spending all that money.  My guess is big fees to your speakers and consultants.  If I were a donor or board member of YAF, I would start to wonder what the staff was actually getting done to make a difference.

Who is confident and who is threatened?  We invite conservative voices, your ideas, and your participation.  We want debate and dialogue. You lock the doors and keep us out, all the while muttering about George Soros and announcing, against all evidence, that Campus Progress has no reason to exist.  You aren’t fooling anyone.  And your movement is in shambles.                  

On behalf of our team at Campus Progress, I want to thank everyone who made our fourth annual Campus Progress National Conference a success: our USSA-US PIRG-Campus Progress Grassroots Training Day; the advance screening of the new HBO series “Generation Kill” with David Simon and HBO; the main conference day, with John Edwards, Ryan Gosling, Keith Ellison, Linda Sanchez, Julian Bond, M-1, Ted Leo, and many others (you can watch the morning session courtesy of CSPAN); the Capitol Hill lobby day on climate and economic issues; and, finally, the Campus Progress/ The Nation National Youth Journalism Conference, with speakers including Seymour Hersh, Katrina vanden Heuvel, David Corn, and Asra Nomani. 

See our conference press page to see what people are saying already.  We’ll post photos, videos, and more press coverage soon.

With every national conference I sense that we are building a real community of young people and organizations who return each year, while also bringing in a diverse array of new people.

On a sad note, just as our first conference attendees were arriving Tuesday morning, a young recent college graduate, biking to her job at a DC international education nonprofit, was killed on the road after colliding with a truck.  In my own remarks at the conference, I talked about the injury I received at the hands of a vehicle while biking to work in DC two months ago.  I did not know at the time that Alice Swanson had died two hours earlier, just a mile from our conference venue.  Our hearts go out to her parents, Brian Swanson and Ruth Rowan of Northborough, MA.  As I said in my remarks, I hope we can all work to make our communities safer for biking.  Let's do that for Alice Swanson, for my late friend David Baer, and for all of us.

See this great clip of Senator Obama speaking at Campus Progress's 2006 National Conference, discussing the challenges of community organizing. There are still spots available for this year's Campus Progress National Conference, set for July 8 in DC. Watch the video, see how great the conference is, and apply today.

Ramya Raghavan left the Campus Progress staff this week after two years here.  Thousands of young people across America know Ramya because she did an amazing job working on Campus Progress's communications, media, outreach, organizing, issue campaigns, events, trainings, etc.  Because I am temporarily sidelined, recovering from a bike injury, and because Ramya is headed to San Francisco to work at YouTube, I will type no more but will let this homemade video (made for Ramya's going away party), do the talking.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=CrXqS5VQM5U

The Supreme Court took one of its many wrong turns this morning, this time with a decision that will make it harder for people to vote.  The result means we all have to work harder than ever to promote voting this year.  Luckily, some terrific organizations are revving up.  Some of us from Campus Progress were lucky enough to join Rosario Dawson, Maria Teresa Petersen (both pictured below), and others for an event on Saturday to support Voto Latino, which has been doing great work with new technology and young people since its founding in 2004.  We’re also glad to be working with HeadCount, which signs up voters at concerts and festivals – we at Campus Progress are not averse to these kinds of events, and we’re discussing new ways to work together.  Our good friends at Rock The Vote also deserve a mention, as well a voter registration button on our home page – they are doing a fantastic job this year.  Every one of us knows someone who really seems engaged and smart and all, yet somehow did not vote when last given the chance.  Point them in the direction of these organizations, or march them to a voter registration table or polling place.  Elections and change – they go together.  Please vote.

He had "other priorities in the '60s than military service." But our Vice President got to play one on TV the other day at CPAC, where his defiant remarks seemed to borrow freely from Jack Nicholson's Colonel Jessup.

Speaker Pelosi held an event at the Capitol yesterday to sign and send to the President very important legislation to make college more affordable.  Here's an excellent quality cell phone shot of the Speaker, Senator Ted Kennedy, Rep. George Miller, Rep. Joe Courtney, and others -- all leaders in this effort to stop the shameful government handout to lenders and use the money to help students afford college. There’s also video of the event. 

 None of this would gave happened without the efforts of young people, through Campus Progress's Debt Hits Hard Campaign, through our Campaign for College Affordability coalition, and other efforts, to demand change.  The efforts of New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, a number of journalists, our own Pedro de la Torre, and others to investigate and expose bad practices and shady dealings between lenders and financial aid offices were also critical. 

The work is by no means done.  College is still out of reach for far too many young people.  One area that needs reform now is private loans, the ones not guaranteed by the government.  Lenders need to present clearer information to students about loan terms – and about the fact that students are better off obtaining all the federally guaranteed loans they can before seeking private loans. 

Right now you can weigh in on this debate, expose more bad behavior, good behavior, or other key facts about financial aid and the loan industry, get your work noticed, and potentially win $2500 to pay tuition or pay off student loans.  It’s our College Affordability Essay Contest – deadline October 29.  Enter now!

This week two long-time Campus Progress staff members are departing for new challenges.  Keisha Senter, who has been with Campus Progress for nearly three years, since our launch, first building our events operation and then recently as deputy director, is leaving today for the Clinton Global Initiative.  Ben Adler, who worked for two years on CampusProgress.org, first as associate editor and then as chief editor, went to Politico.com.   Emily Hawkins, who also was with us from the start, and led our outreach, campus publications, and issues work, left earlier this summer for a leading campaign for public office.  These were our senior staff members -- all in their 20's.  They did an amazing job, and we will, and I will, miss them a lot.  But Campus Progress will continue to grow and thrive because of everything they and others did to build this thing.  With some of our great veteran staffers still in place, and with a whole bunch of talented new team members on board, we are more excited than ever to work with you all out there -- on our programs in activism, journalism, and events -- to help make your voices heard and change this country forever.  Check out the links on the right side of our homepage to see how you can get involved.

David Halperin, Director, Campus Progress

via AP:

President Bush announced today that he would leave the Bush White House, effective August 30.  He cited his desire to spend more time with his family.  At a tearful event in the White House Rose Garden, Bush told reporters, "If Karl can leave, why shouldn't I be able to?"  Shaking his head, he added, "This was all Karl's idea." Bush said he would remain a consultant to White House chief of staff Josh Bolten, "as my times permit."  Bolten was not available for comment.

Fifty years ago tomorrow -- July 6, 1957 – two music-crazed teenagers met for the first time, at a “Garden Fête” in Northern England.  Paul McCartney, 15, checked out the band performing there, led by John Lennon, 16.  Afterward, the younger boy showed the older one a few songs on the guitar.  Lennon was impressed, and asked McCartney to join up.  The rest is … you know. 

What made them revolutionary?  Certainly Lennon and McCartney’s remarkable talents as songwriters and vocalists.  But also, like their heroes Elvis and Little Richard, it was their determination, much of the time, to break through barriers – through musical genres, fashion trends, social niceties.  Once the leering Rolling Stones showed up, the Beatles were seen as the cuddly, safe franchise, but the Beatles were radicals, pushing the envelope, unveiling a bold surprise every few months.  And they did it in service of an excellent cause: Occasional cranky fit aside, their basic message was -- love and peace.  They made that message cool.  And they did it all before any of them turned 30.  

With Samuel Alito replacing Sandra Day O'Connor last year, the Supreme Court's right wing is a solid four person block, and this term Justice Kennedy has lined up with them in most of the key cases.  It's bad news, including today for  equality and opportunity in education.

Thanks again to all the students who stood with us to speak out against the nominations of the smiling, All-American ideologue John Roberts and the most right wing federal judge in America, Samuel Alito. 

About the only campaign promise that President Bush kept was to appoint Justices in the mold of Scalia and Thomas, and a range of conservatives who now have split with Bush on other issues continue to praise the Roberts and Alito confirmations as a key accomplishment by the administration. 

Progressives, and other supporters of a reasonable interpretation of the Constitution and laws of the United States, have a lot of work to do.  They need to persuade elites about the bankruptcy of the right wing vision of the law.  They also need to persuade the public on the controversial hot-button issues that underlie critical Supreme Court decisions -- issues like free speech, government surveillance, detention of alleged terrorists, criminal justice, tort lawsuits, and discrimination/ affirmative action.  Until the public sees that a right wing Supreme Court is undermining their values and interests in the day to day world, voters won't see Supreme Court appointments as an election issue, nomination battles will continue to favor the conservatives, and the right wing extremist block may grow even bigger.

Staff members described a celebratory mood inside the World Bank's headquarters near the White House, with people embracing, singing songs and hoisting flutes of Champagne.

It being Friday, your Campus Progress team will be heading down Pennsylvania Avenue to party with these boisterous Frenchmen.

Our friend Marc Rotenberg, Executive Director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), says:

We're coming down to the wire on a campaign to encourage public comment on the Real ID proposal, and we need folks to tell the Department of
Homeland Security that it is a really bad idea.

Real ID will create a massive national ID system without adequate
security or privacy safeguards. It will become more difficult for people to get licenses, and it will become easier for identity thieves to access the personal data of 245 million license and cardholders
nationwide.

More than 50 organizations and 100 bloggers have joined
this effort. But we only have until May 8 and we need your help.

To learn more and take action, visit the Privacy Coalition Stop 
Real ID page,
send in comments, blog the page, watch a video, tell your 
friends.

The data you save may be your own . . .

The disclosures surrounding the Bush Administration's firing of eight U.S. Attorneys around the country keep getting worse.  Claims that these top federal prosecutors were poor performers have added insult to injury; in fact the circumstances appear to reflect badly not on the fired prosecutors but on the Administration that fired them: One prosecutor was fired to make way for a Karl Rove protege; one had spearheaded the political corruption investigation around former Rep. Duke Cunningham, etc.  The latest comes from the fired U.S. Attorney in New Mexico, David C. Iglesias, who says that two members of Congress, so far unnamed, tried to pressure him to hasten an investigation of Democrats just before last November's election.  Iglesias suggested that his refusal to do so may have led to his termination.

Not enough yet for cable news to push aside Anna Nicole for three minutes?  Well, the Washington Post told us this morning:

 Iglesias, 49 and the son of a Baptist minister, is a Navy Reserve commander whose role as a defense lawyer in a famous military hazing case was the basis for the Tom Cruise character in the movie "A Few Good Men."

Time for the White House and the Justice Department to 'fess up -- they ordered the Code Red.