Moderator's welcome

[Taylor Willingham <taylor@bwillingham.com>]

Hello and welcome to the very first online National Issues Forum on Money
and Politics. While there has been no shortage of fire around this issue,
our goal here is to shed light by deepening our understanding of the role
money plays in our political and civic life. In your opening statements,
many of you expressed concern that citizens have been shut out of the
democratic process. This online forum will provide you the unique
opportunity to practice deliberative democracy - the coming together of
citizens to think, talk and work together in their common interests. The
goal of this conversation is to move beyond fact wars, debates, and
accusations toward a shared understanding of the issue.

Although you each come into this conversation with your own unique
perspective, your introductory comments revealed some common themes.

Many of you entered this conversation because you are hungry to learn about
the issue and how others feel about it. Something you have heard, read or
discovered about our political system has stimulated your desire to develop
a deeper understanding of the issue. Listen, consider, imagine, deliberate
the choices, struggle and talk through your thoughts with your fellow
participants. Expertise on the subject is not expected, required or even
desired. Instead, a willingness to learn, think, deliberate and share
openly will lead to the most powerful and provocative contributions to our
shared understanding of the problem.

Some of you enter this conversation well versed in the facts of campaign
finance reform. You may even be actively engaged in advocating particular
positions. You may find during this conversation, however, that others have
valid, but divergent perspectives. "Listen" diligently to those
perspectives that may not fit your opinion. Try to find merit in those
ideas and, more importantly, try to understand the values that lead others
to hold a very different perspective than you. You may be surprised to find
that your divergent views are rooted in common ground.

Some of you are simply curious about the process of online deliberation and
its possibility for future forums. Feel free to lurk, but please also feel
free to contribute and to share some of your own challenges in sorting
through this issue.

Another theme that you all share as is evident by your participation, is
the desire to revitalize our political life and a willingness to engage in
a deliberative dialogue with fellow citizens. As you come together, I
challenge you to be willing to ask and to answer tough questions, ask them
of yourselves and of each other. Always be willing to ask "why?" and "what
if...?"

1. "Why might that person feel that way about this issue? What might have
been their experience that led them to that conclusion? What values are
reflected in their understanding of the issue? How do those values coincide
or collide with my own?"

2. "What if we followed that course of action? What might happen? What
would be the best-case results of that choice? What is the worst possible
outcome? Am I willing to live with the results?"

As the moderator, I will take responsibility for asking some of those tough
questions. That will be one of my roles. However, it is not my role alone.
You, too, must talk to each other. This format affords some sense of
anonymity, but it must not deteriorate into single postings that promote
one ideology without any consideration for other postings. This is more
than just a soapbox. It is a conversation, a deep conversation among people
who are affected by this issue in different ways, but who must learn to
work together to begin crafting possible solutions that take each other
into account. We are in this together. So let the conversation begin...

Enter the Dialogue through the Agenda page
http://www.info-ren.org/network-democracy/map/about/agenda.shtml on the Web site.
Follow the flag to join today's conversation.

Taylor