'Nonpartisan' Vote iQ - - the establishment's answer to Tea Parties?
RenewAmerica staff
RenewAmerica received a mass emailing last week asking RA to publicize a new "premier nonpartisan social networking site providing civic services and connecting politicians, voters, and political causes across the U.S."
The website, which is meant as sort of a politically-oriented Facebook, is called VoteiQ.com and is touted as a "groundbreaking one-stop platform that arms people with the information they need to make political choices."
Ostensibly, by participating in the site's "one-stop" social networking (rather than doing their own homework as citizens), voters will become politically smart.
The site's intent
By all appearances, the site is the political establishment's response to the Tea Party movement. Given the site's stated purpose to "revolutionize" politics through internet-spurred citizen activism — and given the make-up of the site's central leaders — such a comparison is inescapable.
Here's the posted list of the site's Board of Advisers, nearly all of whom are career political, media, or government professionals:
Frank Luntz — A pollster and political consultant known for his televised "focus groups" following presidential debates. His company, The Word Doctors, "specializes in message creation and image management for commercial and political clients," according to Wikipedia. Clearly a political insider.
James Carville — Billed by VoteiQ.com as "America's best-known political consultant," but viewed by many conservatives as their least favorite political operative. Carville guided Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential win.
Richard Dreyfuss — Eccentric, liberal-leaning actor who supports same-sex marriage and universal health care, and who publically lobbied for the impeachment of President George W. Bush in 2006.
James Fallows — National Correspondent for The Atlantic, a liberal political magazine whose editor served in the Carter and Clinton administrations and as White House correspondent for the New York Times. Fallows himself spent two years as chief White House speechwriter for Jimmy Carter.
Lynne Munson — Education lobbyist and former deputy chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Rick Perlstein — Former writer for the liberal Village Voice who recently was a Senior Fellow at the "Campaign for America's Future" — an advocacy group within the Democratic Party that seeks to advance the progressive agenda, particularly national health care and environmental controls. In 2004, he published a pamphlet describing a 30-year plan for "How the Democrats Can Once Again Become America's Dominant Political Party."
Diane Ravitch — Co-chair (with Lynne Munson) of the curriculum standards advocacy group Common Core and former Assistant Secretary of Education under President George H.W. Bush. In 2005, she received the John Dewey Award from the United Federation of Teachers of New York City, named for the atheist-socialist philosopher known for his subversion of American education.
Lorena Chambers — CEO and co-founder of Chambers Lopez & Gaitán of Arlington, Virginia, a consulting firm that specializes in political and social marketing campaigns that target minorities. In 2008, Chambers led an advertising campaign aimed at mobilizing Hispanic voters to elect President Obama.
Mindy Finn — An establishment Republican consultant who served as a strategist for Mitt Romney's 2008 presidential campaign.
Andrew Rasiej — Founder of Personal Democracy Forum, an annual conference and website that follows how the internet is changing politics, advocacy, and governance. The Personal Democracy Forum conference is an annual event held in New York City since 2004. According to Huffington Post's Marcia Yerman, attendees at the 2010 conference, held in June, were mainly progressives who had to be admonished to be civil when Newt Gingrich took the stage. Attendees were greeted at the doors with buttons saying, "My brain scares politicians," handed out by VoteiQ.com.
Anthony Bontrager — A media executive who most recently was president of Onecast, Inc., which provides broadcast news and video clips of headlines in business, politics, sports, technology, and entertainment — in partnership with NBC, FOX, BBC Worldwide, and others.
A very disturbing line-up, if the goal is to "revolutionize" American politics. These spin doctors and political insiders can hardly be expected to make the site "non-partisan" and "unbiased," as the site assures voters it will be.
It should be noted that RA did a bit of Googling and fact-checking to come up with the above information about the site's main advisers. The site itself provides almost no meaningful background about these key consultants.
Instead, what's posted under "About" at the site appears to be deliberate obfuscation, to keep voters in the dark about who's behind the site.
The brains behind Vote iQ
Why the veiled lack of "transparency" at a political website that claims to "educate" voters so "they can confidently make up their own minds" — unless its creators plan to engage in pulling the wool over those minds?
Amazingly, there is virtually no significant information anywhere about the site's founder and president, James A. Tisch.
Not only does the site gloss over, in vague, brief language, who is principally behind the site (see Tisch's bio), but Googling Tisch's name yields almost no information about him.
When we typed in James A. Tisch at Google, pictures of James S. Tisch appeared near the top, labeled James A. Tisch. James S. Tisch is a central figure in New York's billionaire Tisch family, and in fact is CEO of Loews Corporation, which controls Lorillard Tobacco and Loews Theatres, among other major holdings. His father was head of CBS in the late 80's and early 90's.
Not to be confused with this powerful individual, James Arnold Tisch is apparently from the West — having lived in Alaska, Colorado, Idaho, Hawaii, and Utah, and now living in Gig Harbor, Washington, according to our web search. Gig Harbor is the headquarters of Vote iQ.
Tisch's alma mater is Brigham Young University, we learned. He received a BA degree from BYU in 1991. Beyond that, we were unable to determine what other degrees he may have — although he attended Boise State University in Idaho at some point.
He's married, has four children, and sounds like a down-home kind of guy.
Esoteric bio
Then why the incomprehensible bio of him at VoteiQ.com? Here is what the site curiously says, under James A. Tisch:
"President and Founder of Vote iQ. A technology and strategy authority with 20 years ofexperience[, he] has provided enterprise technology solutions for Microsoft, Apple, and 3Com while working for companies such as FranklinCovey, eCollege.com, Pacific Edge, and Robbins Gioia consulting."
A "technology and strategy authority"? — one who has "provided enterprise technology solutions" for several companies?
To the layman — that is, most everybody — such esoteric jargon tells nothing about the man.
By all appearances, this vague bio was meant to do just that.
How do we know? Because we found a more discernable bio in an earlier PDF draft available on the internet. Here's what the earlier bio said:
"Jim has over 18 years of leadership and management experience in technology solutions and best practices. He has established a record of building and leading teams providing productivity solutions in time management, learning management, project management, portfolio management, as well as new media.
"Jim has provided enterprise technology solutions for Microsoft, Apple, and 3Com while working for companies such as FranklinCovey, eCollege.com, Pacific Edge, as well as Robbins Gioia consulting. He is an authority in supporting, extending, and implementing productivity and knowledge tools and has a national reputation for bringing products to market successfully.
"Jim is considered an authority on social media strategy, collaboration, and knowledge management. He has been published in various trade magazines and has spoken at various technology conferences."
Not totally clear to the average person — but not as utterly indecipherable as what was finally chosen. At least it sounds like a professional trying to explain his background, unlike what's posted at VoteiQ.com.
What's there appears meant to hide behind, to avoid openness with the public.
Why such opaqueness at a political website that claims to be unbiased, nonpartisan, and reliable? One might reasonably conclude that the single most critically-important page at the site is deliberately deceitful.
Wait — there's more!
All this is disturbing enough. What about the "fruits" of the site — that is, the way it fulfills its promises?
The site promises to provide voters "in-depth profiles of the candidates running for election in state and federal races, and ... unbiased accounts of the hot topics in the news."
On the basis of this front-page promise, voters can expect that write-ups of individuals and controversies in the divisive world of politics will be reasonably accurate — or at least presented in a way both sides will find fair and instructive (as in a pro/con format).
Not so, if the site's summary of Barack Obama is any indication.
Here's what grassroots Americans are supposed to take at face value as accurate, fair, and balanced regarding the enigmatic man whose Marxist policies and extreme, partisan agenda threaten to destroy America:
"Barack H. Obama is the 44th President of the United States.
"His story is the American story — values from the heartland, a middle-class upbringing in a strong family, hard work and education as the means of getting ahead, and the conviction that a life so blessed should be lived in service to others.
"With a father from Kenya and a mother from Kansas, President Obama was born in Hawaii on August 4, 1961. He was raised with help from his grandfather, who served in Patton's army, and his grandmother, who worked her way up from the secretarial pool to middle management at a bank.
"After working his way through college with the help of scholarships and student loans, President Obama moved to Chicago, where he worked with a group of churches to help rebuild communities devastated by the closure of local steel plants.
"He went on to attend law school, where he became the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review. Upon graduation, he returned to Chicago to help lead a voter registration drive, teach constitutional law at the University of Chicago, and remain active in his community.
"President Obama's years of public service are based around his unwavering belief in the ability to unite people around a politics of purpose. In the Illinois State Senate, he passed the first major ethics reform in 25 years, cut taxes for working families, and expanded health care for children and their parents. As a United States Senator, he reached across the aisle to pass groundbreaking lobbying reform, lock up the world's most dangerous weapons, and bring transparency to government by putting federal spending online.
"He was elected the 44th President of the United States on November 4, 2008, and sworn in on January 20, 2009. He and his wife, Michelle, are the proud parents of two daughters, Malia, 10, and Sasha, 7."
Of course, in fine print at the bottom of the page — where many will miss it — is attribution of the summary to the White House.
That's reliable information on which to make intelligent judgments? We think not!
Predictably, the write-up is full of "hope" in the absence of verifiable facts (a result largely of Obama's refusal to make public many relevant documents — beginning with his long-form birth certificate and his school records).
Conspicuously missing from the above write-up is any mention of Obama's communist upbringing under the tutelage of family and close friends; his participation in Marxist training sessions in college; his longstanding attendance at an anti-American church run by the controversial Rev. Jeremiah Wright; his close affiliation with avowed communist and unrepentant Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers, when both ran the day-to-day operations of the multimillion-dollar Annenberg Challenge in Chicago; his Marxist-oriented community organizing alongside ACORN; his refusal to vote for the Born Alive Infant Protection Act as an Illinois state senator; and his repeated lying as both a candidate and a sitting president, just for starters.
Throw in the utter lack of an informed and accurate description of his 21-month tenure as president — which many knowledgeable Americans would characterize as fraught with unlawful, even treasonous behavior — and you would have to conclude, in the very least, that Vote iQ is a platform for the liberal D.C. establishment, if not for the Obama administration itself.
By the way, the notion that Obama was ever a "teacher of law" at the University of Chicago is misleading. He was merely an "adjunct" instructor — that is, someone who is untenured and who fills in only as needed. He has significantly exaggerated this part of his resume for years.
A look at Nancy Pelosi's bio reveals another write-up of critical importance that is equally biased, supportive, and inaccurate — being prepared solely by her staff.
To VoteiQ.com's credit, the site does post the public's "rating" of Obama and Pelosi — both of whom garner low opinions. Obama's ranking is 2.65 out of 5, and Pelosi's is 1.63 of 5.
Note that at Vote iQ's Facebook page, participants have expressed disappointment in the publishing of such unflattering facts at VoteiQ.com.
Wrap-up
There's more to critique, of course — such as Vote iQ's "Campaign Across America," in which an Obama staffer from the 2008 election, Jason Karsh, sets out to "understand politics at a grassroots level" by visiting battleground states throughout America, a preposterous idea if the goal is unbiased accuracy — but we've already touched on the most glaring shortcomings of VoteiQ.com, we believe.
Again — as we surmised at the outset — the site appears to be an establishment, "D.C.-insider" response to the amorphous, leaderless Tea Party movement — using social networking, manipulated by political experts, as the basis. Will it succeed? We sincerely hope not — not in its current scheme.
The site's overseers need to drop all dreams of transforming politics in America through orchestrating "technology" or the internet. Much better to let Americans themselves decide what they want out of government, in a climate of truly objective discourse.
In the meantime, we invite interested Tea Partiers to do all they can to steer the site, and its fledgling Facebook page, toward the kinds of truthful information and desirable outcomes that are essential to keeping America free, godly, and materially viable in the critical days ahead.
November 1, 2010
RenewAmerica received a mass emailing last week asking RA to publicize a new "premier nonpartisan social networking site providing civic services and connecting politicians, voters, and political causes across the U.S."
The website, which is meant as sort of a politically-oriented Facebook, is called VoteiQ.com and is touted as a "groundbreaking one-stop platform that arms people with the information they need to make political choices."Ostensibly, by participating in the site's "one-stop" social networking (rather than doing their own homework as citizens), voters will become politically smart.
The site's intent
By all appearances, the site is the political establishment's response to the Tea Party movement. Given the site's stated purpose to "revolutionize" politics through internet-spurred citizen activism — and given the make-up of the site's central leaders — such a comparison is inescapable.
Here's the posted list of the site's Board of Advisers, nearly all of whom are career political, media, or government professionals:
Frank Luntz — A pollster and political consultant known for his televised "focus groups" following presidential debates. His company, The Word Doctors, "specializes in message creation and image management for commercial and political clients," according to Wikipedia. Clearly a political insider.
James Carville — Billed by VoteiQ.com as "America's best-known political consultant," but viewed by many conservatives as their least favorite political operative. Carville guided Bill Clinton's 1992 presidential win.
Richard Dreyfuss — Eccentric, liberal-leaning actor who supports same-sex marriage and universal health care, and who publically lobbied for the impeachment of President George W. Bush in 2006.
James Fallows — National Correspondent for The Atlantic, a liberal political magazine whose editor served in the Carter and Clinton administrations and as White House correspondent for the New York Times. Fallows himself spent two years as chief White House speechwriter for Jimmy Carter.
Lynne Munson — Education lobbyist and former deputy chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Rick Perlstein — Former writer for the liberal Village Voice who recently was a Senior Fellow at the "Campaign for America's Future" — an advocacy group within the Democratic Party that seeks to advance the progressive agenda, particularly national health care and environmental controls. In 2004, he published a pamphlet describing a 30-year plan for "How the Democrats Can Once Again Become America's Dominant Political Party."Diane Ravitch — Co-chair (with Lynne Munson) of the curriculum standards advocacy group Common Core and former Assistant Secretary of Education under President George H.W. Bush. In 2005, she received the John Dewey Award from the United Federation of Teachers of New York City, named for the atheist-socialist philosopher known for his subversion of American education.
Lorena Chambers — CEO and co-founder of Chambers Lopez & Gaitán of Arlington, Virginia, a consulting firm that specializes in political and social marketing campaigns that target minorities. In 2008, Chambers led an advertising campaign aimed at mobilizing Hispanic voters to elect President Obama.
Mindy Finn — An establishment Republican consultant who served as a strategist for Mitt Romney's 2008 presidential campaign.
Andrew Rasiej — Founder of Personal Democracy Forum, an annual conference and website that follows how the internet is changing politics, advocacy, and governance. The Personal Democracy Forum conference is an annual event held in New York City since 2004. According to Huffington Post's Marcia Yerman, attendees at the 2010 conference, held in June, were mainly progressives who had to be admonished to be civil when Newt Gingrich took the stage. Attendees were greeted at the doors with buttons saying, "My brain scares politicians," handed out by VoteiQ.com.
Anthony Bontrager — A media executive who most recently was president of Onecast, Inc., which provides broadcast news and video clips of headlines in business, politics, sports, technology, and entertainment — in partnership with NBC, FOX, BBC Worldwide, and others.
A very disturbing line-up, if the goal is to "revolutionize" American politics. These spin doctors and political insiders can hardly be expected to make the site "non-partisan" and "unbiased," as the site assures voters it will be.
It should be noted that RA did a bit of Googling and fact-checking to come up with the above information about the site's main advisers. The site itself provides almost no meaningful background about these key consultants.
Instead, what's posted under "About" at the site appears to be deliberate obfuscation, to keep voters in the dark about who's behind the site.
The brains behind Vote iQ
Why the veiled lack of "transparency" at a political website that claims to "educate" voters so "they can confidently make up their own minds" — unless its creators plan to engage in pulling the wool over those minds?
Amazingly, there is virtually no significant information anywhere about the site's founder and president, James A. Tisch.Not only does the site gloss over, in vague, brief language, who is principally behind the site (see Tisch's bio), but Googling Tisch's name yields almost no information about him.
When we typed in James A. Tisch at Google, pictures of James S. Tisch appeared near the top, labeled James A. Tisch. James S. Tisch is a central figure in New York's billionaire Tisch family, and in fact is CEO of Loews Corporation, which controls Lorillard Tobacco and Loews Theatres, among other major holdings. His father was head of CBS in the late 80's and early 90's.
Not to be confused with this powerful individual, James Arnold Tisch is apparently from the West — having lived in Alaska, Colorado, Idaho, Hawaii, and Utah, and now living in Gig Harbor, Washington, according to our web search. Gig Harbor is the headquarters of Vote iQ.
Tisch's alma mater is Brigham Young University, we learned. He received a BA degree from BYU in 1991. Beyond that, we were unable to determine what other degrees he may have — although he attended Boise State University in Idaho at some point.
He's married, has four children, and sounds like a down-home kind of guy.
Esoteric bio
Then why the incomprehensible bio of him at VoteiQ.com? Here is what the site curiously says, under James A. Tisch:
"President and Founder of Vote iQ. A technology and strategy authority with 20 years of
A "technology and strategy authority"? — one who has "provided enterprise technology solutions" for several companies?
To the layman — that is, most everybody — such esoteric jargon tells nothing about the man.
By all appearances, this vague bio was meant to do just that.
How do we know? Because we found a more discernable bio in an earlier PDF draft available on the internet. Here's what the earlier bio said:
"Jim has over 18 years of leadership and management experience in technology solutions and best practices. He has established a record of building and leading teams providing productivity solutions in time management, learning management, project management, portfolio management, as well as new media.
"Jim has provided enterprise technology solutions for Microsoft, Apple, and 3Com while working for companies such as FranklinCovey, eCollege.com, Pacific Edge, as well as Robbins Gioia consulting. He is an authority in supporting, extending, and implementing productivity and knowledge tools and has a national reputation for bringing products to market successfully.
"Jim is considered an authority on social media strategy, collaboration, and knowledge management. He has been published in various trade magazines and has spoken at various technology conferences."
Not totally clear to the average person — but not as utterly indecipherable as what was finally chosen. At least it sounds like a professional trying to explain his background, unlike what's posted at VoteiQ.com.
What's there appears meant to hide behind, to avoid openness with the public.
Why such opaqueness at a political website that claims to be unbiased, nonpartisan, and reliable? One might reasonably conclude that the single most critically-important page at the site is deliberately deceitful.
Wait — there's more!
All this is disturbing enough. What about the "fruits" of the site — that is, the way it fulfills its promises?
The site promises to provide voters "in-depth profiles of the candidates running for election in state and federal races, and ... unbiased accounts of the hot topics in the news."
On the basis of this front-page promise, voters can expect that write-ups of individuals and controversies in the divisive world of politics will be reasonably accurate — or at least presented in a way both sides will find fair and instructive (as in a pro/con format).
Not so, if the site's summary of Barack Obama is any indication.Here's what grassroots Americans are supposed to take at face value as accurate, fair, and balanced regarding the enigmatic man whose Marxist policies and extreme, partisan agenda threaten to destroy America:
"Barack H. Obama is the 44th President of the United States.
"His story is the American story — values from the heartland, a middle-class upbringing in a strong family, hard work and education as the means of getting ahead, and the conviction that a life so blessed should be lived in service to others.
"With a father from Kenya and a mother from Kansas, President Obama was born in Hawaii on August 4, 1961. He was raised with help from his grandfather, who served in Patton's army, and his grandmother, who worked her way up from the secretarial pool to middle management at a bank.
"After working his way through college with the help of scholarships and student loans, President Obama moved to Chicago, where he worked with a group of churches to help rebuild communities devastated by the closure of local steel plants.
"He went on to attend law school, where he became the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review. Upon graduation, he returned to Chicago to help lead a voter registration drive, teach constitutional law at the University of Chicago, and remain active in his community.
"President Obama's years of public service are based around his unwavering belief in the ability to unite people around a politics of purpose. In the Illinois State Senate, he passed the first major ethics reform in 25 years, cut taxes for working families, and expanded health care for children and their parents. As a United States Senator, he reached across the aisle to pass groundbreaking lobbying reform, lock up the world's most dangerous weapons, and bring transparency to government by putting federal spending online.
"He was elected the 44th President of the United States on November 4, 2008, and sworn in on January 20, 2009. He and his wife, Michelle, are the proud parents of two daughters, Malia, 10, and Sasha, 7."
Of course, in fine print at the bottom of the page — where many will miss it — is attribution of the summary to the White House.
That's reliable information on which to make intelligent judgments? We think not!
Predictably, the write-up is full of "hope" in the absence of verifiable facts (a result largely of Obama's refusal to make public many relevant documents — beginning with his long-form birth certificate and his school records).
Conspicuously missing from the above write-up is any mention of Obama's communist upbringing under the tutelage of family and close friends; his participation in Marxist training sessions in college; his longstanding attendance at an anti-American church run by the controversial Rev. Jeremiah Wright; his close affiliation with avowed communist and unrepentant Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers, when both ran the day-to-day operations of the multimillion-dollar Annenberg Challenge in Chicago; his Marxist-oriented community organizing alongside ACORN; his refusal to vote for the Born Alive Infant Protection Act as an Illinois state senator; and his repeated lying as both a candidate and a sitting president, just for starters.
Throw in the utter lack of an informed and accurate description of his 21-month tenure as president — which many knowledgeable Americans would characterize as fraught with unlawful, even treasonous behavior — and you would have to conclude, in the very least, that Vote iQ is a platform for the liberal D.C. establishment, if not for the Obama administration itself.
By the way, the notion that Obama was ever a "teacher of law" at the University of Chicago is misleading. He was merely an "adjunct" instructor — that is, someone who is untenured and who fills in only as needed. He has significantly exaggerated this part of his resume for years.
A look at Nancy Pelosi's bio reveals another write-up of critical importance that is equally biased, supportive, and inaccurate — being prepared solely by her staff.
To VoteiQ.com's credit, the site does post the public's "rating" of Obama and Pelosi — both of whom garner low opinions. Obama's ranking is 2.65 out of 5, and Pelosi's is 1.63 of 5.
Note that at Vote iQ's Facebook page, participants have expressed disappointment in the publishing of such unflattering facts at VoteiQ.com.
Wrap-up
There's more to critique, of course — such as Vote iQ's "Campaign Across America," in which an Obama staffer from the 2008 election, Jason Karsh, sets out to "understand politics at a grassroots level" by visiting battleground states throughout America, a preposterous idea if the goal is unbiased accuracy — but we've already touched on the most glaring shortcomings of VoteiQ.com, we believe.Again — as we surmised at the outset — the site appears to be an establishment, "D.C.-insider" response to the amorphous, leaderless Tea Party movement — using social networking, manipulated by political experts, as the basis. Will it succeed? We sincerely hope not — not in its current scheme.
The site's overseers need to drop all dreams of transforming politics in America through orchestrating "technology" or the internet. Much better to let Americans themselves decide what they want out of government, in a climate of truly objective discourse.
In the meantime, we invite interested Tea Partiers to do all they can to steer the site, and its fledgling Facebook page, toward the kinds of truthful information and desirable outcomes that are essential to keeping America free, godly, and materially viable in the critical days ahead.