

Votesimple: Direct democracy through congressional proxy - tkiley
http://votesimple.org/

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JimmyL
I think it's one hell of an experiment, but in all honesty I don't wish you
luck. When it comes to many things having to do with politics - and the
clusterfuck that is California in the wake of their ballot initiative system
is the prime example - people are dumb.

For lack of a better word, legislating is hard work. It's complex, it involves
a lot of details about things that most people have no idea about, and it
often involves putting the good of he few about the good of the individual.
Congresspeople have an entire staff devoted to leaning about bills and telling
their bosses how to vote - do we as individuals have enough time and knowledge
to make a meaningful contribution?

You might also consider that if you're trying to represent the views of
"everyday Americans," they're not (in general) the kind of people who will
spend a few hours honestly and impartially considering the pros and cons of a
bill in Congress and then coming to a reasoned decision. The vast majority of
the people you'd get participating would be either political geeks who would
talk forever, or drop-in participants who are only there because the NRA/NARAL
listed you in a partisan mail shot.

I also wonder how you would deal with the speed of Congress - while most
things are scheduled, it's rare to have much lead-time when dealing with floor
amendments or things coming out of Committee. You'd also - especially in the
House - need a solid educational component to explain what's being voted on
(why is a vote on a Rule important and what does it impact, etc.).

I think the system is somewhat broken, but I don't think this is the way to
fix it. Direct democracy works in very few places - Switzerland is the closest
to the ideal you're presenting, I think - and those have very long
participatory democratic traditions, and a high level of civic involvement.
For the most part, it ends up with places having a huge number of specific
budgetary requirements that are good in individuality, but when taken together
hamstring the place from working (and make it issue IOUs).

Lastly, the minute you start dealing with any money, talk to a lawyer who does
FEC stuff. Campaign finance is complex, and you (being pretty much anyone who
doesn't specialize in it) almost certainly don't understand it well enough.

Like I said, I don't wish your idea luck, but I hope it doesn't fail for
simple regulatory reasons.

~~~
gasull
_I think it's one hell of an experiment, but in all honesty I don't wish you
luck. When it comes to many things having to do with politics - and the
clusterfuck that is California in the wake of their ballot initiative system
is the prime example - people are dumb._

The clusterfuck in California proves that the Government is dumb. People did
the right thing voting down on more taxes. California is already among the
most highly taxed states. More taxes would damage the economy even more and
would only extend the agony of the government.

The government has to shrink and cut expenses instead of wasting and taxing
all the way to hell. People voted on letting the government go broke instead
of going broke with government.

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tkiley
Hello News.YCers!

Today, I'm submitting an idea that has been growing in the back of my mind for
some time. The American political system is broken, and it's high time we
apply our hacker creativity and startup ingenuity to reverse the rising tide
of ignorance and apathy that threatens to sweep away any remaining semblance
of informed, rational political discourse in the United States.

The Simplevote website doesn't explain many of the details; I'm still working
those out. There are a myriad of potential objections and pitfalls; some of
them are easily mitigated, some less so. Please ask questions and point out
shortcomings in this idea; feel equally free to suggest solutions.

I'm an entrepreneur and web developer by expertise; I'm currently the founder
of InQuickER, which was discussed here a few months ago. Ultimately, I may not
be the person to spearhead this concept and push it forward over the next
couple of years, and I'm perfectly fine with that. However, I think it's time
for this idea to become reality, and I can't help but commit my time and money
to getting the idea off the ground.

What do you think of this?

~~~
gasull
For some situations, like proposing a law, you might want to consider the
Condorcet method:

[https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Condorcet_met...](https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Condorcet_method)

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vaksel
pretty cool idea

although you need to make a way so that only the constituents get to vote.
Senators/Reps are there to represent their state/district, not the overall
U.S. population

And since the thing will be online, you don't know whether foreigners are
screwing the polls

~~~
tkiley
Good point. Members of congress are supposed to represent their voting
district; unfortunately, this has fallen by the wayside, and now each member
of congress represents a party, an army of campaign contributors and
lobbyists, a set of political ambitions, and occasionally the people of the
district as well.

I covet a congressperson who never acts based on future political ambitions or
campaign contributions; it seems like this is a backhanded way to accomplish
that goal.

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quizbiz
You need to appear extraordinarily legitimate. On the website you need to
refer to backers. As is, this scares me. If I had an agenda, I would pay India
and a proxy to setup accounts and vote, vote, vote.

Simple is good, especially for marketing purposes, but complexity can be good
too.

~~~
tkiley
Good point. Votesimple has gone as far as it can go on an after-hours
shoestring; to take the next steps (backers, detailed plans, some fundraising)
I need to start dedicating a significant amount of time and money to the
project.

~~~
quizbiz
<http://www.govtrack.us/> isn't doing anything similar but it is still
something that might inspire a few additional lessons.

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drcode
It's a good idea: You're competing against "traditional" congressmen by
providing an enhanced service. You may force other representatives to offer
more transparency to compete against votesimple: Even if votesimple loses a
race, that would still lead to a win-win situation.

~~~
tkiley
Exactly! Transparency is key. Our current legislative system is a convoluted
mess that violates all sorts of principles of good design. For instance: The
often-repeated of packing a bill with unrelated provisions to pick up
additional support is positively ridiculous, and leads to inefficient
government by design. I believe this would improve if citizens had a better
opportunity and incentive to know and care what's going on in congress.

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ggchappell
> In 2010, votesimple will run for one congressional seat in one district in
> the United States. If elected, we will establish a website where all
> Americans can read, analyze, discuss, ... each bill that comes before
> congress.

Cool.

> ... and vote on .... If the American people vote "yes" on a bill, our
> congressional representative will vote yes; if they vote "no", our
> congressional representative will vote no.

Not so cool. There are good reasons for having a representative democracy, as
opposed to a direct one. I'd prefer not to head in that direction.

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sp332
"Americans can read, analyze, discuss, and vote on each bill that comes before
congress." What about the cases where the full text of the bill is not made
public until like 2 hours before the vote?

~~~
eli
Even if it was up 48 hours before the vote, how many people are even able to
understand 400 pages of legalese with amendments and appendices?

Bottom line is: Who is going to explain to constituents that the "Blue Skies
Bill" is actually bad for the environment? Some Congressman may just be
serving Big Oil, but at least they usually understand what it is they're
voting on.

~~~
sp332
Yeah, that reminds me of the "Assault Rifle Ban" in my home state of NH, which
actually had nothing to do with assault weapons.

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chaostheory
I think you should get behind Lessig's change-congress.org project too.

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drcode
One important thing is missing from your website: I was looking for a section
called something like "Here's what you can do if you want to help"

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mooism2
How can you hope to change democracy with only 1 member out of 435?

Aren't US Representatives supposed to represent their district, not the
country as a whole? Why would voters in a district vote to reduce their
representation?

This sounds a bit like Jury Team, which fought the recent European elections
in the UK and came 14th, gaining no seats.

~~~
tkiley
Excellent questions. Yes, 1 member out of 435 is a drop in the bucket - the
goal would not be to control the congress, but to give people a reason to care
about the issues, and a reason to engage in discussion and debate that
encompasses all sides of an issue, rather than gravitating to radical punditry
and entrusting the entire decision-making process to politicians.

A friend derisively described this idea as "American Idol for democracy", and
that rings somewhat true, but is it a bad thing? Wouldn't it be a good thing
if the average American knew as much about the current goings-on in congress
as they already know about the current goings-on in American Idol?

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eli
And people will vote for each bill through the web? Doesn't that
disenfranchise the many Americans without home internet access?

Running elections is hard -- you want to do it for each bill?

~~~
tkiley
Running elections is hard, but it's getting easier. If web, phone, and
(limited/proxied) snail mail voting mechanisms were in place, we could reach
out to far more Americans than a traditional congressperson ever does.

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raheemm
Creative idea. But a more compelling and hence considerably harder solution is
to have a viable 3rd party.

~~~
tkiley
I would love to have a third party in the US Congress! However, a more
traditional third party in congress is probably pretty much impossible, thanks
to Duverger's law (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law>).

My hope is that this idea is off-the-wall enough to circumvent the forces that
keep America firmly entrenched in the two-party system.

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skushch
Mob Rule! Mob Rule! Mob Rule!

