Avid voter that I am, I was at my local polling place before work this morning to be greeted by the usual cast of 75-year old women who were "manning" the polling station - a local church in my neighborhood. After signing in (and checking to see if husband had already voted) I was handed a paper ballot at the same time that I was told "the electronic machine has malfunctioned." Surprised, I asked why and how and I was told that when they tried to start it up they "just couldn't get it to work. They say they will send over a new machine later in the day but I don't believe it," one poll worker told me while shaking her head knowingly. I asked the name of the manufacturer and after digging through a stack of manuals that was at least 8 inches thick together we found a manual with the label "Sequoia."
Continue readingCandidates Less Willing to Share Positions
I had lunch a couple of weeks ago with Richard Kimball, the founder and president of Project Vote Smart, the nation's premier information resource about candidates for public office at all levels. If you haven't checked out your lawmakers (whether Congressional, Gubernatorial or state legislative) on their site, you're missing information you need to know before you vote.
Richard related to me a very distressing fact. That in this age of transparency, candidates are less willing to tell the people where they stand on issues.
Continue readingFamily Business — 3rd Update
The basic research is done, and before I begin making the earnest effort to digest the raw results, let me first thank all who participated--especially Beezling, who topped his prolific performance on round one with an incredible turn on round two--he did 319 this time around, doing by far the bulk of the entries. Get that man a fedora and a press pass! More information soon...
Continue readingWill the Levees Hold?
Rain is on my mind these days. Out here on the Oregon coast the seasons abruptly changed last week. We moved from the brisk and sunny days of Septober to the onset of the annual rains. The first wind warning of the season is now upon us. Soon the rain will be slicing down in horizontal sheets, like it often does out here from November to April.
All of which brings to mind, on this election eve, thoughts of Hurricane Katrina. In fact, tomorrow’s election – in the face of a Class IV political hurricane – raises the question that bedeviled New Orleans last summer: will the levees hold?
Continue readingMy Prediction: The Year of the Write In
Canvassing this weekend (in my non-Sunlight role) I knocked on the door of a man who offered to bet me a bottle of Glenlivet that the Democrats, if elected, wouldn’t pursue any fewer earmarks than the Republicans had in the past 8 years. He had recently written his Congressional delegation, demanding to know which earmarks came from which representative, and had yet to get any satisfactory answers. I might as well write in my wife, he said. I will make only one on-the-record prediction this year: there will be more write-ins than at any mid-term election in 20 years. Depending upon who you ask, between 23 and 38% of Americans do not align themselves with either major party. Some fraction of those won't vote for either party, but won't vote for a third party candidate, either. The write-ins won't be enough to tip any election or make any major news stories, but it will be there, a small, quirky fact on the side.
Continue readingFamily Business — Second Update
Nearly 7 p.m. Sunday, and we're through 296 members and 41 states--pretty incredible. To all who've joined this effort, once again let me offer a heartfelt thank you. Some preliminary numbers as we move toward the final leg, but first let me point out that these a). haven't been verified and b). need to be looked at more closely to figure out what they mean. So keep those caveats in mind. Citizen journalists have tentatively identified $480,029 in campaign expenditures going from a House member's campaign to a firms that employs that member's spouse in the current election cycle. Citizen journalists have also tentatively found that organizations for which House members' spouses work have landed a total of $2,788,663,441--that's $2.7 billion--in federal contracts in 2005 (the last full year for which information is available) and $2,649,935,942--$2.6 billion--in federal grants in 2004 (again, the last year for which we have complete data).
Continue readingFamily Business — First Update
Wow. We're a little past the four hour mark, and we're through 24 states and 188 members. I'll continue to keep an eye on progress tonight, but this has once again been an incredible effort. Thanks to all who are making round two as successful as the first go round!
Continue readingIs Congress A Family Business, Round Two
It's your last chance to investigate the 109th Congress before Election Day! Who else besides Julie Doolittle has a company that works for her spouse's campaign? How many federal contractors employ spouses of members of Congress? Have nonprofits that receive part of their funding from congressional appropriations hired spouses of members? It's up to you to find out! Round Two of "Is Congress a Family Business" is now online! Thanks to our too modest Web design genius, it's still as slick and user friendly as round one.
Continue readingUnder Investigation Watch: Do They Really Care About Earmarks?
If there was ever a test case for whether voters cared about the abusive earmarking practice than the race in WV-01 would be it. This year Rep. Alan Mollohan found himself the subject of a federal investigation into his use of earmarks to create a series of nonprofits headed by his real estate partners. Mollohan, like other West Virginians sent off to Washington, is a prolific earmarker and has created an entire technology corridor -- this technology corridor being the reason for the investigation -- in northern West Virginia through earmarks. But will voters punish Mollohan for his earmarking or do they see his perch on the Appropriations Committee as a means of attracting money and jobs to a seriously depressed state economy.
Continue readingDemocratizing Political Reporting
This article in the Washington Post is the political class' (e.g. media, politicians, consultants, pollsters') lament that they've lost control of their candidate's message. But in fact it should be a celebratory piece about the fact that citizens are increasingly using the democratizing world of technology to spread the message about what candidates say and really think. Wouldn't you rather rely on YouTube clips, excerpts from speeches, and candid moments filtered by citizen journalists than political advertisements to tell you what a candidate really believes? No contest in my mind.
Continue reading
59063
