Organizing for Freedom: American Majority and The New Leaders Project

Yesterday, in a bold move that directly addresses the need for unity and a true bottom up leadership approach to the problems facing America, American Majority and American Majority Action unveiled  an ambitious plan to take back America.

“On the heels of an historic mid-term election, and amid speculation about the future of the Tea Party movement, American Majority along with local Tea Party leaders from across the nation, announced today the launch of The New Leaders Project and the drive to identify 10,000 new, credible candidates in advance of the 2011 and 2012 elections.

American Majority believes that this project, when combined with policy education and grassroots infrastructure development, is the surest way to sustain Tea Party momentum across the nation.

This first of its kind national effort will seek to have 1,000 local Tea Party leaders sign onto The New Leaders Project, committing themselves and their groups to identifying 10 new leaders in their local community to run primarily for state or local office in 2012.  Representatives from Texas, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Colorado, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Florida, Virginia, Arkansas, and Ohio on hand at a press conference this morning to be the first signers of The New Leaders Pledge.”

American Majority president Ned Ryun delivered a powerful statement about the overall mission of the The New Leader Project:

“At American Majority, we have believed since the Tea Party movement began that in order for it to remain a potent force for real and lasting change, it must grow from the ground up.

American Majority, and the Tea Party movement, are not interested in change for one or two election cycles. It is interested in generational change, but for that to happen, the work must begin as locally as possible.

Today, we are here to send a message – that 2010 was just the beginning.

The next cycle begins now. This year’s elections were just the opening salvo in the long war that will determine who will control America’s future: the American people or a ruling class of elite incumbent politicians who have driven this nation down the road to statism for too long.

The future of our Republic, our democratic process, the free enterprise system and the power of the individual are all dependent on activated citizens committed to accountability.”

According to Ryun, over 80% of incumbents at the federal level won –  and over 1,000 state legislators were not even challenged in the 2010 general election. The New Leaders Project takes a page directly from the Left’s playbook. Groups like ACORN, SEIU and even Obama’s Organizing for America have long realized that all politics is local.

Over the past four decades the left has systematically installed handpicked politicians like Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villagairosa and the ethically challenged Congresswoman Maxine Waters across the country. As noted earlier this year in California, corrupt local politicians can easily become a national problems as they seek higher office.

Not surprisingly, mainstream media outlets like Politico have completely ignored the true significance of this initiative and choose to instead use it as another opportunity to bash Sharron Angle and Christine O’Donnell:

“No more Christine O’Donnell’s or Sharron Angle’s.

That is the implicit goal of a million-dollar program intended to build a farm team of tea party candidates that was announced Tuesday morning by a pair of linked non-profit groups called American Majority and American Majority Action.”

A Tea Party leader tried to set the record straight about the goals of the New Leader project:

“Voters will have the ability to not choose (between) the lesser of two evils, but to champion a genuine candidate who believes like we believe; that is detached from the political class, because they didn’t come from the political class,” said Chris Littleton, co-founder of the Ohio Liberty Council…”

However, the question remains, is our traditional two party system is ready for this new movement? American Majority aims to take the movement away from DC-centric orgranizations and place it back in the hands of the local leaders. Power brokers and pay-to-play politics are not as easy once people realize that change can happen outside of Washington, DC.