Power Vote

On October 29th at 8pm Eastern, Al Gore will be speaking to Power Vote groups across the country in a live webcast!

This is huge.



Gore will be acknowledging your incredible work on the Power Vote campaign, driving home the extraordinary importance of young people taking action to halt our Climate Crisis, and calling us to hold our elected officials accountable for repowering America through our voice and our VOTE on November 4.

One of the biggest events in the Energy Action Coalition's short history happened a couple weeks ago in New York at the Clinton Global Initiative. The annual meeting is regularily attended by such distinguished guests as The Honorable Al Gore, His Excellency Ban Ki-Moon, Bono, Queen Rania of Jordan, Tony Blair, Felipe Calderon (President of Mexico), Madeline Albright, 10 of the last 16 Nobel Peace laureates and many more.

At this years gathering, immediately following an address by Presidential candidate John McCain, the Energy Action Coalition was commended by former President Bill Clinton for its achievements and announced Power Shift 2009 as an official "commitment" of the Clinton Global Initiative.

Some mid-afternoon thoughts from Power Vote leaders in the midst of the Hofstra Power Vote debate storm.

From Zo Tobi, SSC organizer extraordinaire: The "Clean coal" lobby was handing out BAND AIDS as a solution to our energy crisis. We couldn't make this up. Since we've seen them at every debate- we were ready for them this time. As soon as they set up their table to give out stickers and pens we got a whole crew together to march over to the table and stand next to it with the truth about coal. Our homeless polar bear even had a little chat with the coal execs.

The Power Vote debate wind turbine tour is making it's final stop today at Hofstra. And today promises to be bigger and badder than ever.

The student leaders here at Hofstra have pulled together a huge team of rad people to storm the campus today.

The discussion of clean energy in these debates has been really alarming and incredibly disappointing. To hear our candidates publicly supporting lies like "clean coal" and "safe nuclear" instead of real, safe, healthy, renewable energy has given us all the more reason to mobilize our peers to fight for our future. We refuse to allow the coal, nuclear, and oil industry dictate our energy future.

Updates from the field: This just in from Dan Cannon, NWF Power Vote organizer, in Austin concerning his recent encounter with T Boone Pickens:

"Oil tycoon T-Boone Pickens made an appearance today at University of Texas-Austin, to no surprise Power Voters were there to address Mr. Pickens. After a video was sent out by Michigan Power Voters, last week, asking Mr. Pickensto sign the pledge, here in Texas we felt he had enough time to look it overto make a decision. So Texas Power Voters were at the event asking Mr. Pickens questions.

This was just sent to me from Alayne Chapman and Michael Collins who are traveling around MI with 11 ft tall wind turbines...




The winds of Michigan blew a mighty tempest our way again today, but that was no challenge too large for the Power Vote crew at Albion College! Despite the heavy rain, the team erected wind turbines, had conversations with hundreds of students, and got nearly five percent of the campus signed up! We trained some great new leaders who were out for their first canvassing experience, and recruited several new volunteers. All in all, it was a wonderful, albeit soggy, day of Power Voting.

Pledge on Facebook

You’ve been poked, bitten, pet, and maybe even hit by an errant thrown sheep.

It’s not unlikely you’ve been hugged, handed beers, or recruited by werewolves, pirates, and Corey Haim. We also suspect a few of you ambidextrous MyBookers and FaceSpacists may have been given gifts and played some poker.

We’re not exactly sure how, but Facebook applications have become a ubiquitous part of most of our lives. Sometimes fun. Sometimes annoying. But if two guys from India can give Scrabble a 21st century hipster edge and simultaneously reunite me with my grandmother and my 7th grade girlfriend, we think the oft-bizarre Facebook application might also be a tool to help us create a clean energy future.

So we’re getting a little Scrabulicious with Power Vote, and asking folks to do their online part in saving the world: install the new Power Vote “I took the Pledge” application. If you don’t, we will surely concede the future to vampires and ninjas. And they don’t much care about green jobs.

The Power Vote debate windmill tour rolled into Blacksburg, VA this morning to team up with the awesome Environmental Coalition student leaders. We set up the windmills in the grand drillfield and have been talking to hundreds of students about clean energy and the VA Power Shift summit they're hosting this weekend.

We've already gotten over 300 Power Vote pledges today and people here are stoked! The students here are bring young people from all over VIrginia together this weekend for clean energy education and action. It's gonna be great! If you're in the area stop on by! More info at www.vapowershift.org

Students in Eugene have been rocking Power Vote in class, at concerts and on the streets gaining momentum and energy. A great boost to our campaign came last Friday when a local union endorsed the campaign at their General Membership Meeting.

The Graduate Teaching Fellow Federation, local 3544 - AFT - AFL-CIO, passed the endorsement for Power Vote pledging their support for clean energy and good green jobs.

GTFF and Power Vote crew memeber, Ryan Wishart proposed the endorsement to an overwhelmingly supportive crowd. After they chose to endorse the campaign, teaching fellows signed up to allow the PV crew to give class raps in classes the GTFF members teach. Later in the evening PV crew collected individual pledges from graduate students hovering around the keg.

Go Eugene Power Vote Crew!

Challenge week has started with a bang! Maryland and Michigan are revving up their pledging engines, but that doesn't mean other states should miss out on the fun! We've been hearing that folks in the field want some airtime to talk about their rockin' Power Vote Challenge Week goals, stories, and throw downs.

So, come chime in with your Power Vote Challenge Week brawls on our National Power Vote Call Tomorrow! Wednesday October 8th, at 9:00 pm EST. RSVP here: http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/614/t/7636/event/index.jsp?event_KEY=45441