That's the message former Senator Alan Simpson has for young people in this (probably soon-to-be viral) video, which also features the 81-year-old dancing Gangnam style. What people won't do to capture millenial mindshare these days...but we're not here to judge, just gawk...
Posted this morning, the video promotes The Can Kicks Back, an online petition movement demanding a bipartisan solution to the debt crisis and endorsing the Simpson-Bowles commission's reform proposals. It's the latest example of a continuing trend: politicians and former politicians are reaching out to an online audience using video and social media to address fiscal issues. Last week former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich, who is now a professor at University of California, Berkeley, posted this video which promises to explain the fiscal cliff in less than three minutes:
Then, on Monday, President Barack Obama hosted a Twitter chat to discuss middle class tax cuts. The chat used the hashtag #My2K, which the president is using to promote his position on tax cuts, and it included White House Tweets about the president's fiscal plan.
.@pmmckenzie we can reduce deficit in balanced way by ending tax cuts for top 2% + reforms that strengthen safety net & invest in future -bo
— The White House (@whitehouse) December 3, 2012
Will online outreach serve to convince young voters that they should take action and lobby Congress? That question still needs to be answered.