If you’re like us, you watched every second of the Big Game on Sunday, enjoying a not just the game and the food, but the commercials!  And no commercial from yesterday landed with as much authority than Jeep’s ad featuring Bruce Springsteen.    Take a look here:

The Boss shared a message that really resonated with the Upstate Jobs Party, because we’re an organization dedicated to helping nudge elected leaders and the political process away from the extremes and towards the middle.  

For far too long in politics, candidates and elected officials have tried to win votes not by lifting up and calling to our greater angels, but rather by sowing fear and distrust – telling us who’s to blame for our problems and driving a wedge between divergent policy interests of both left and right.  But as Bruce so rightly proclaimed last night, “Fear has never been the best of who we are.”

Of course, social media was ablaze with reaction to this ad.  The outraged Right complained that Springsteen has been a vocal critic of the former President, pointing out that he said he’d leave the country should he be re-elected.  The righteous Left was offended that the ad used the symbol of a Christian house of worship to speak of unity.

As political reformers Katherine Gehl and Michael Porter outline in their groundbreaking book  The Politics Industry, a major issue with our political system is that the extreme elements in each Party drive much of the discourse, funds, and primaries.  This means the great middle – where statistically most of the country would like to vote – is held hostage by ultra-liberal woke activists, or hard core conservatives.  That’s not how a healthy democracy should work.

We agree with the Boss – that’s why in 2021, UJP will be launching a new focus on unity we’re calling Unite NY.  This new focus recognizes that both major Parties have issues to address and have drifted away from the compromise and bipartisanship that truly represents New Yorkers. 

While Unite NY will be a political effort, it will not be a closed system.  Unite NY will welcome Republicans, Democrats, liberals and conservatives, and independent voters in New York that think we can be much better when working together to build something, not working in red and blue boxes to divide. 

Stay tuned for more to come on Unite NY.  It is time.  As Bruce says in the end of the ad – Our light has always found a way through the darkness. 

Let’s unite and seek the light.