Ned Resnikoff

Name:	Ned Resnikoff
Location:	Middletown, CT
Where I blog:	Veritosity NYU Local

My Experience in progressive politics:

At my high school, I helped found a political discussion/activism group called ThinkLeft and was co-president for the first two years of its existence. I was also an active member of the school's Gay-Straight Alliance and a communications intern and volunteer organizer for the Ned Lamont for Senate campaign.

In college I became an active member of the NYU Democrats, the NYU ACLU, the Roosevelt Public Policy Institute and the Students for Sensible Drug Policy. I was an intern at TPM Media for my fall semester, working mostly on TPMCafe.com. Later on I started my own blog, Veritosity.com, and became the op-ed editor of NYULocal.com. I was also a finalist in The Nation's 2007 student writing contest.

My personal volunteering highlight:

On the Ned Lamont campaign, I was put in charge of reading as many blogs as I could each day and writing summaries of the online buzz about the campaign. At first these emails went only to the communications director and a handful of other staff, but soon almost all of the staff was reading them, including the campaign manager and Ned Lamont himself. It was really rewarding to make that small daily contribution, and whenever I went to campaign headquarters it was always funny to see how many people on the campaign I had never met knew me from my daily summaries.

Steps I've taken to combine on-line and off-line action:

I've experimented a little bit with attending political events and doing originaly reporting for my blog, but the best example of my combining online and offline action was my work for the Ned Lamont campaign, in which I was charged with both monitoring the blogs and organizing Middletown volunteers offline.

Why I want to attend Netroots Nation:

I really want to be part of my generation's progressive movement and use my own writing and blogging as a vehicle to bring about substantive change - attending Netroots Nation will help me learn a lot about how to do this. On a less ambitious note, it also sounds like a lot of fun - I know from experience that there's little that's more exciting and rewarding than being surrounded by passionate, like-minded people.

What I want to get out of Netroots Nation:

At Netroots Nation I'll be able to learn about progressive blogging and citizen journalism from the experts, and that will make me both a better activist and a better writer. Netroots Nation is also an excellent place to network, and form lasting partnerships and friendships with fellow travelers. I would also like to learn some more about career opportunities and ways to actually make a living doing what I love and helping to fix our broken democracy.

What is a progressive activist:

Despite the right's efforts to marginalize and demean progressive activists, we're a crowd that really can't be crammed into any specific categories. A progressive activist is simply a strong, principled progressive who is willing to actually DO something to try and improve the political situation on the local, state or federal level.

How I think blogs fit into the progressive movement:

The great thing about blogs is that they're so democratic - although organizing the blogs into a movement is a great idea when it comes to organizing for candidates, I feel like one of the things that's great about blogs is the potential for dissent. Blogging about one's grievances is a great way to keep the politicians we elect honest and is a much more effective tool than mere cheerleading - fortunately, the progressive blogs in general have been infinitely better than the right-wing blogs on this front.

How I think Democracy For America fits into the progressive movement:

DFA is a great progressive engine for organizing volunteers for the candidates we want and for getting a progressive message out there. One of the wonderful things about DFA is that because it is not a part of the Democratic Party machinery, it can also hold the party accountable when it deviates from a progressive platform, and help out superior primary challengers across the country.

In 10 words or less, create a bumper-sticker slogan against John McCain:

The McCain Doctrine: More War, Fewer Benefits