MoveOn.org: member priorities

On December 17th, MoveOn members began 2 days of voting to decide our top goals for 2009. Each member was able to vote for 3 goals. Here are the final results, with the percentage of members who included each goal in their top 3. The graph below shows how many votes each goal received, as a share of the total.

Goal

  1. Universal health care 64.9%
  2. Economic recovery and job creation 62.1%
  3. Build a green economy, stop climate change 49.6%
  4. End the war in Iraq 48.3%
  5. Improve public schools 21.6%
  6. Restore civil liberties 16.8%
  7. Hold the Bush Administration accountable 15.2%
  8. Gay rights/LGBT equality 8.6%
  9. Increase access to higher education 7.6%
10. Reform campaigns and elections 5.7%

I'm impressed with this ordering. The list itself came from MoveOn. I had put Reform campaigns and elections and Improve public schools higher on my list. But I can't argue with health care, economic recovery, and environmental issues. One of the questions I considered was whether MoveOn could make a difference. It's not that civil rights isn't important. But I think Obama will do all right there without MoveOn. Also, even though ending the war in Iraq is important, I suspect that will happen at its own pace. I'm glad to see that the spirit of vengeance was way down on the list. The Bush administration should be held accountable. But that's not the most important thing to do. Let the historians worry about that. With Gay rights, I think that's important, but it's much narrower and more parochial than the other issues.