Katherine mentioned this guy on the other thread.
Filthy Bushco slander. You have lawyers available. Gain a reputation, become nationally known as the Blog that Knows No Bounds. Can Y'all beat the Rude Pundit? If you make shit up, of course you can.
Just trying to match skills and inclinations to project, and avoiding duplicating another's work.
Not sure, blogs have been good at fundraising but that's not right for the feeling of a having a big project as well as some other reasons. It's not clear to me that this is the kind of thing that can happen inorganically, it may have to be that something specific sounds like a good idea to learn about and try to change, it actually motivates a person or two to start working on it, they mention it on the blog, others put in some hours helping out, etc.
In the alternative, put a thermometer in the side bar with X# of hours worked for Democratic candidates in close races as a goal, and people can pledge a number of hours to work (and possibly to talk others into working) and then self-report whether or not they met their pledges.
These are all just made up ideas with no specifics, but it should be something where there is an actual product at the end, not just a process.
Write an amicus brief and get it submitted somewhere.
Have position papers ready for if we are attacked again and a way to make them heard.
Have a coordinated series of op-ed published in lots of places at once.
Pick one detainee and get him released somehow.
Get specific conditions at Guatanamo improved in measurable ways.
I don't know these issues well, so it is hard for me to have tangible suggestions. But you can get leverage on pieces of things, and then you can change them.
I really do apologize for the earnestness. In person, I can actually be funny, I swear.
Let me give this some thought.
Actually, I really like Megan's second idea, except I'd like to expand it in such a way that doing it would cause lots of fights. We could in fact generate unfogged approved "talking points" on various issues and people, along with where people who don't believe you should look to confirm that what you're saying is true. And then both give them out to people here to use in their day-to-day lives outside the interwebs (because it's hard to remember arguments about every issue) and become known as a clearinghouse for where liberals can go to get accurate and well sourced (brief) information on a number of issues.
Unfortunately, as I write this it sounds like I'm proposing that we create a "liberal wikipedia" but I a) find the idea that such a thing is needed highly disturbing and b) don't think I what I want is nearly so in depth. Pick ten people and issues that we expect people to frequently argue about (insofar as they're discussing politics with other people whose views they want to change to some degree), and write up two-to-three page talking points on those.
We could sell Unfogged sweet-shirts and use the proceeds to start a fund for Iraqi conjoined twins.
"Doing it would cause lots of fights" is meant to refer to the fact that actually generating such talking points would provoke spirited disagreement among the people so generating. Given that it's not a central part of what I'm proposing, I probably should have not put it in the first sentence.
Those clothes are really strange, 'postropher.
I like Megan's op-ed idea, although I'm pretty skeptical about how effective op-eds really are. It seems like the kind of thing that plays to our strengths.
I gotta think that at this point the highest reward will come from supporting (one? many?) Democratic candidates running for Congress. The election is in what... five weeks? Plus, you can make cock jokes about the republican opponent, spread scurrilous rumors, write position papers about how your candidate is the greatest thing since sliced bread, raise money, etc etc.
It's short term, has the chance of well-defined success that could catalyze subsequent efforts, etc etc.
10: Yeah, I'm particularly fond of the Shamrocker.
Plus, it allows those with more money than time the chance to be useful too.
I'm confused, do they in fact sell any of these to humans who in turn wear them?
I'm also confused about why they aren't, given their theme and product line, selling these.
Don't decide or support ideas just yet. Instead, think of things, lots of things to do. Most of them won't work out.
But for real, what could a bunch of very verbal people do that would be concrete and useful and they could be proud of?
They could write model text for new legislation.
They could provide back-up for more organized advocacy groups.
They could gather specific examples where habeus corpus made a difference.
They could do the project mentioned earlier, decide and publish when it is an appropriate time to flee an increasingly authoritarian state.
They could compare international habeus corpus laws and correlate that to something interesting.
Money would be great, if we didn't all blow it on some fake stomach cancer scare.
But really, surely our collective strengths are research and writing. Op eds, coordinated letter campaigns, picking an issue and learning about it and collectively writing about it all seem like natural possibilities.
I vote the upcoming elections first: either pick one candidate and back him, or else we each pick a candidate in our own state and use one another as a kind of support group/brainstorming session to write letters, op eds, whatever. And then we can turn to a longer-term topic, like habeas.
Or we can skip #1 on the grounds that everyone is surely already doing that, and just gear on up #2.
You could try to track down or document cases of innocent or probably-innocent or quite-possibly-innocent people in U.S. prisons.
I could help with that. (I'm working on an article on some particularly egregious cases--six prisoners sent to GTMO from a Taliban prison, no joke. But I've slowed to a crawl on that because I'm waiting for a specific document to be declassified.)
Or maybe do something creative, like writing newspaper ads for some candidate or issue? (This is not entirely a joke, I've seen some very mediocre ads for Democratic candidates.)
I know! Let's just hassle Joe into writing some free speeches for someone and ride his coattails.
it sounds like I'm proposing that we create a "liberal wikipedia"
That actually reminds me a bit of Talk.Origins, an evolutionary biology site that has a bunch of concise articles refuting pretty much any conceivable creationist argument.
It could work well, the scope would just need to be kept to a manageable size.
I say we raise money and invest it in the nuclear plant!
/I like the way Snrub thinks!
#7: it sounds like I'm proposing that we create a "liberal wikipedia"
Liberal Wikipedia = Lickipedia? Sounds like a sexual offense.
Idea: Help the Gitmo detainee whose weight doubled to 410 pounds get back in shape.
As we are a wordy and somewhat erudite bunch, not to mention super-edumacated on the whole, I like the position paper/op-ed idea.
Also, one of our first tangential side projects could be a Modern Love column.
Try to get one of the US citizens here declared an unlawful enemy combatant, then come up with a way to litigate it.
One drawback (or benefit?) to this is that people would feel pressure to keep commenting regularly so that no one would think that they had been detained.
(I'd volunteer, but I've never even met a Muslim, other than Ogged -- and he's not even an Arab.)
26 -- Well -gg-d is certainly providing aid and comfort to the Democrats, I think that might be actionable.
(Or at least "conspiring to provide aid and comfort to the Democrats", which I think is covered by the same statute.)
We want to play to the Mineshaft's strengths: we ought to write variants of "First they came . . ." for a variety of professions and celebrity figures. Meanwhile baa and Idealist may write limericks about detainment.
Like y'mean, "First they came for the freelance art critics, and I did not speak out because I was not a freelance art critic" kinda thing? That could get old while it was still a-borning.
I really have no idea why ogged thought this would be such a disaster.
I was just going to say that a "liberal wikipedia" sounds a lot like "Talk Origins," but I see that 21 got there first. Pwnage-check: Check.
But personally, I think that's the best idea from this thread so far. It doesn't have to be written "for the other side," either. Things like wikipedia are good ways for a group to formally write down what the 'common knowledge' is: fr'instance, yesterday I was reading this Saiselgy post, and I come across this:
"As we now know, soon after the invasion of Iraq, Iran tried to open talks aimed at a broad US-Iranian diplomatic settlement. On the table would be Iran ending its nuclear program and curtailing its support for Palestinian rejectionists, in exchange for the United States lifting sanctions disavowing a regime change policy, and trying to accommodate Iranian interests in Iraq and Afghanistan."
Did that really happen, and I just missed it? Or did I not miss it, but now I've forgotten it? I need something to help me keep track of these sorts of facts... and that place would normally be my "brain," but I've got too much other stuff floating around in there right now...
What I'm saying is, "Help me, Mineshaft." There needs to be a TalkOrigins-like site, but for politics.
Well, if it would help, I for one can promise not to lift a finger to help whatever cause you adopt, and can double my efforts at cock-jokery. I can't promise anything I say will be funny, but I can promise it won't be earnest.
Only, you know, if that would help.
There are lots of great ideas here. And some mediocre cock jokes.
mediocre cock jokes
Maf54 (8:08:31 PM): get a ruler and measure it for me
Xxxxxxxxx (8:08:38 PM): ive already told you that
Maf54 (8:08:47 PM): tell me again
Xxxxxxxxx (8:08:49 PM): mediocre
I like the idea of a liberal talking points wikipedia. Although we probably don't want it to be a straight wiki because then we'd spend our time clearing up malicious changes by winger dickheads.
I'm also down with the writing op-eds thing. I was thrilled when I got one published in the Strib. The bar seems to be surprisingly low.
While not, perhaps, ideologically totally in line with the Mineshaft, didn't pdf236 have some ideas about this sort of wiki? I remember him talking about it.
The wiki idea is a good one. It'd be nice to have stuff like 32 says, and with citations to back it up. Solid work could even become a resource for lawyers, etc., I imagine.
Maybe narrow the scope to cover just the MCA stuff -- which is a lot, really. I would really like to do something besides sitting around feeling hopeless.
Very tentatively, since it's not my country...
Make Ezra happy. Write a book. Seriously.
As we all know, this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered at the internets, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson blogged alone. If ten or a dozen of you picked a topic for a chapter, you could could put together a set of ideas from the liberal grass roots which might stand a chance of actually initiating some positive, rather than responsive, political debate.
From this distance one of the most worrying things about the American political scene at the moment (apart from the fact that it's dominated by homicidal fascists who want to kill us all), is the way that the left has been forced into Whack-a-Mole mode without being able to articulate its own big ideas. Give the chattering classes something to chatter about.
People for the American Way maintains a pretty good wiki focused on "things the Bush administration has touched, and turned to shit."
ideologically totally in line with the Mineshaft
...
That phrase is kind of grating on me...
Is there some way we could distinguish between the Mineshaft, where everybody's more interested in bawdy horseplay, and this other endeavor, which certainly includes a lot of the same people and a lot of the same horseplay, but with more ideological conformity?
("Lickipedia" is a nice name.)
Which candidate has the strongest pro cock-joke platform?
I have to run, but I'd also really like to see something done to keep other people's focus on procedural issues effecting the electoral process, from the big (gerrymandering) to the little (what the hell is the deal with the Presidential Debate Commission?)
The Congressional thing is really frustrating for me. I don't have money to give to candidates, and my state's entire Congressional delegation is Democratic. I'm not too worried about any of them losing his seat.
I went to a talk given by Ben Barnes the other night; he suggested running for office. Anyone want to run? State or national. Everyone else here could throw themselves into being your first supporters.
41: Rightly so -- it was ill-chosen. Cock jokes and witty banter are welcomed here even from people with the temerity to disagree with me about politics.
45: Make phone calls from home for someone? I know you can do it for John Hall, running in NY's 19th, but I'd bet there are other races where you could as well.
Which candidate has the strongest pro cock-joke platform?
Draft Dick Armey!
We could do some work on why electronic voting machines without paper trails are bad.
We could start by mapping out where those voting machines are in operation. Then blitz the areas with letters, op-eds, etc.
This seems to be a big concern of the people here, and habeas might not matter so much if we don't have a legitimate election in 2008.
You could try getting 1000 comments on a 25-word review of the Season 2 Just The Ten of Us DVD boxed set. From 3 people.
We live in the era of the Talking Point, in which large numbers of voters can't be bothered to care about any issue that can't be neatly summarized in one or two sentences. (Note the popularity of the brilliantly phrased but utterly nonsensical "We fight them over there so we don't have to fight them here.") Since it seems the side with the best talking points wins, what say we devote our energies to distilling key issues down to their very essence and focus on drafting the ultimate talking points?
52 -- I don't think that quite works. For talking points to be successful I think they have to be in the context of a working message machine. Granted it could be that a steady line of talking points is the first step toward a working message machine.
54: This blog is only a couple degrees of separation from reasonably 'big media', to coin a phrase. If we came up with a useful source of talking points, it might be possible to insert them into the media.
Hell, how long have we been hearing about the RNC blast faxes? If we worked out the talking points, spamming sympathetic journalists with the relevant ones wouldn't be difficult at all.
For talking points to be successful I think they have to be in the context of a working message machine.
Unfogged gets a fair number of readers, so if we come up with anything really catchy it has the potential to spread quickly. If we consistently come up with catchy slogans and excellent talking points, that influence cannot help but grow.
If we build it, they will come.
Okay, here's an entirely unrealistic, but reasonably small-scale, thought.
Over in the other thread about the Iraq war resolution, people are bitching about how Democratic-friendly issues don't get media attention -- I'm reasonably politically engaged, but I put up a post a few weeks ago whining about why Democrats in Congress didn't introduce a resolution to block an attack on Iran, when they already had. It just hadn't gotten reported on extensively.
Is there any way for us to get on lists of 'people who get sent press releases' (which I assume went out on this story, but were ignored by the media) and then do focused publicity (letters to the editor, op-eds, contacting journalists we know) on stories that should be getting publicity but aren't?
What I'm thinking is specifically "Stuff elected Democrats are doing and saying that is what we want them to do and say, but doesn't get on the front pages for inexplicable reasons."
The Congressional thing is really frustrating for me. I don't have money to give to candidates, and my state's entire Congressional delegation is Democratic. I'm not too worried about any of them losing his seat.
For anyone who hasn't seen them I recommend these two helpful posts by Neil the Ethical Werewolf at Ezra's place. A perfect example of someone else doing the research for you.
I could use some congressional representation, if anyone wants to make that happen.
62: You mean, if anyone wants to help you move out of that swamp on the Potomac?
62. I joined the facebook group. What, you want more than that? You're awfully pushy for a non-citizen.
The District isn't actually a swamp, unless you're referring to the ethical spooge in the Capitol, whom we host for you.
Isn't there a place in the District called "Foggy Bottom?" What else could that mean, besides "built near a swamp?"
59 is a great idea. (Hell, Apostropher has the internet in his back pocket already.)
Starting from a datum like a press release or an important vote, or something, I'm sure this group could chew on it and produce several pithy talking points, ideas for letters to the editor and op-eds, and a number of cock jokes.
The District isn't actually a swamp
Are you saying Laurie Anderson was wrong?
In the middle of the seventeenth century, the only people living in the American colonies were the Indians, a few scattered pilgrims, and lots of British troops. Communication between Britain and the colonies was confused and chaotic. King George told the troops: “Just pick some kind of headquarters and talk to me from there. I don’t care where you put it.”
The logical choice for the headquarters was Philadelphia which had a few brick streets and some picturesque supply stores and nobody has ever been able to figure out why the British troops chose Washington instead--which was basically a few shacks in a swamp.
Recently, historians have discovered two facts that might add up to a possible explanation. First, the outskirts of Washington, D.C. lay just a few yards inside the official subtropical zone of the British Empire. Second, all British troops working in subtropical zones were paid time and a half.
I like stuff that is more active - coordinating a response to voting machines (and I know some statisticians if we need them) - than passive - provide a good resource for people who are really doing things. We could really be doing something.
Overnight I started to like the idea of a coordinated push on op-ed pieces. Like:
See if we can get editorials in 25 newspapers within one week of each other. Theme: Why we need to counterbalance a Republican executive with a Democratic legislature. Or something.
But there must be a million more good things to be done. Other ideas before we winnow them down?
I do intend to run for office for real. But I was thinking of having a technical career first.
mrh, I'm willing to tell you Laurie Anderson's wrong text unseen.
mrh, I'm willing to tell you Laurie Anderson's wrong text unseen.
But, when you're done telling off mrh, you will have to acknowledge to me that Laurie Anderson is frequently quite funny and very unfogged appropriate.
A certain American religious sect has been looking at conditions of the world during the Flood.
According to their calculations, during the Flood the winds, tides and currents were in an overall southeasterly direction.This would mean that in order for Noah’s Ark to have ended up on Mount Ararat, it would have to have started out several thousand miles to the west.
This would then locate pre-Flood civilization in the area of Upstate New York, and the Garden of Eden roughly in New York City.
72 -- I think text should be asking that question.
And: Is Laurie Anderson a mod vocalist or am I thinking of somebody different? I have this song running through my head about sitting in a diner and the name "Laurie Anderson" seems to be loosely attached to it; but you guys could be talking about somebody totally different.
I was talking about Laurie Anderson the irritating performance artist. (I'm not shooting the messenger, mrh.)
She's a performance artist/singer who's been around for decades (irrelevantly, I believe she's currently in a relationship with Lou Reed). Does a lot of stuff with voice-altering synthesizers,
Given my general musical ignorance, I have no idea what idiom, if any, she fits into, or whether she's well thought of. But I am resisting the urge to just start typing big hunks of her 'lyrics' -- they're weird but compelling.
Yeah -- she did a performance art rendition of "Moby Dick" a couple of years ago at BAM, right?
But the only thing of hers that has actually stuck in my consciousness is that "i am sit-ting in a di-ner nah nah nah-nah nah nah nah-nah" thingie.
That's Susanne Vega, isn't it? 'My name is Luka' woman?
("Mod vocalist" was totally imprecise.)
And 79 is correct, I had the two people occupying a single slot in my memory.
My ex used to change the lyrics as he sang along. I didn't get the rest of the verse, but I did once overhear him singing (to Suzanne Vega):
She is sit-ting on the table
It is time for cunnilingus
I shouldn't have interrupted him, 'cause now I don't know what he would have rhymed with that.
'My name is Luka' woman
Overheard shouted by a grown Luka, in an argument with his girfrield.
that "i am sit-ting in a di-ner nah nah nah-nah nah nah nah-nah" thingie
Dammit, that song has now earwormed its way into my brain. Fuck you, Clownae!
I had the two people occupying a single slot in my memory
Were they wearing one of those multi-person sweatshirts that apo linked to?
what he would have rhymed with that.
Charlie Mingus.
I don't know what he would have rhymed with that
Put a nickel in the jukebox
Choose a song by Charlie Mingus
(On preview, apo-pwned!)
I was talking about Laurie Anderson the irritating performance artist.
"[Fisticuffs]"
I learned during my time living and working in the swamp that she's also NASA's first artist-in-residence. Not really a plus, I think.
You should create a campaign to encourage corporations to clearly label items made in sweatshops, and to encourage consumers to help workers in poorer countries by buying them.
91 -- I thought for a minute you were talking about Vega and I thought Sure, that makes sense -- she's named after a star after all...
Draft John Emerson to run for the State Senate?
No, NASA may have been thinking of that '70s Crichton novel about the kiler virus from the Anderson star system that makes everyone talk like robots.
What about working on the problem of electronic voting machines and the question of paper trails? It doesn't seem to me to be getting enough attention, but I don't read too many news sources.
Here's a good idea having to do with a very delicate cultural collective action problem. Read something today about Juan Williams's new book _Enough_, in which he Cosbys blacks for complacency about their self-reinforcing cultural pathologies. Williams of course, like Cosby, has been attacked by the race-baiting cockerel Michael Eric Dyson. It strikes me that Williams and Cosby are attempting to approach and ameliorate perhaps the most important cause of persistent inequality, but make little headway because they are shouted down by thug enforcers of the broken status quo, like Dyson. Now, fancy usually non-black intellectuals stay on the sidelines in these disputes, wary of being tarred as a racist for reinforcing and supporting the Cosby/Williams argument. Self-interest requires silence, which entrenches the problem. So the idea is: fancy usually non-black intellectuals could pledge that they will help heal the inner cities by actively supporting those who are attempting to "bring the stigma back" just as long as enough other fancy usually non-black intellectuals do so as well. We can get picked off as deplorable racists if we defect from the status quo one by one, but if we defect en masse, maybe we could get somewhere. How to do this, I have no idea. Good idea? If you don't think so, I guess you must hate poor black people.
That's actually a good one -- (the voting machines issue, not whatever 97 is on about). I'd be interested in compiling 50 states worth of information on that, and then using it to pressure state legislatures.
You should all join your law school or city's chapter of NAACP or another "black" organization and then run for a position within the organization. If anyone suggests that you shouldn't hold power within the group because of your race, you should angrily storm out of the building and sue them. If you manage to successfully reach a position of power within the organization, obviously the organization is useless and you should try to destroy it from within.
I like looking into voting machines, too. They're such a black box.
One thing some people can do individually about voting is send in a vote-by-mail/early absentee ballot wherever that's available. A better system, which will take the strain down a tiny bit on election day and assure that a paper record of your vote exists.
We should all pitch in to buy togicanker a little button that says 'notice me! notice me!'
I don't have a whole lot of opinions on this, except that whatever we do should be smaller rather than bigger, focused on one or two issues because that's about the size of the blog. Doing one thing better than many things poorly, &c.
102 reminds me that I need to check on my absentee ballot.
I thought absentee ballots were only counted in the case of close elections and shredded otherwise.
What? No, absentee ballots are always counted. At least they should be.
I'm pretty sure that, in Virginia at least, absentee ballots are counted only if their sum total is greater than the vote difference separating the two leading candidates. Which is crap.
Yeah, I think that's PA's state law, too. Unless there's more absentees than the vote difference, shreddity shred shred.
Hm. Or maybe not. Perhaps this varies by precinct, but I distinctly recall reading a reputable story that told me my absentee ballot mattered for shit.
Yeah I think Cala is right im ganzen und grossen. Wikipædia says procedure for when and if to count absentee ballots varies state to state.
Bizarre. Pretty sure NM always counts them.
Laurie Anderson is cool, people. No dissing Laurie.
Re. LB's press release idea, I am confused. Do you want to *receive* press releases or do you want to *send* them? The former is easy to do; the latter probably even easier. I honestly don't know, though, if the specific kind of thing you're talking about got a press release, or if they're even necessary--you could just keep a hawk eye on, say, the rundown of the day's agenda on congressional websites, or whatever.
That said, though, writing press releases isn't a bad idea. Getting them is kind of a pain in the ass, but I'd be willing to bet all you'd have to do would be ask to get them and voila. Shit, I'll happily forward on all the ones I get to you instead of marking them as "spam" in a futile attempt to get rid of 'em.
Receiving press releases seems like the kind of thing that political magazines might do. And if we knew some people who worked for political magazines...
Receiving is what I was thinking. Stories like the amendment I linked in the other post, trying to foreclose the possibility of an attack on Iran. Presumably the Representatives involved were trying to publicize their effort, and failed -- I was thinking that rather than picking up stories from the media, the way we do know, we could try to pick up stories (not thinking about original reporting, just stuff people are trying to publicize) that the media hasn't picked up and work on pushing them into the media. The focus I was thinking of was Democrats in congress, but it could be anything.
Re 99,
Do we have any programmers around that would be willing to build a user-friendly interface on top of Google Maps (or some other application) that would allow us to map out "at risk" areas.
This seems like it would be pretty simple, for the right person. And all it would require of The Mineshaft is phone calls, right?
With a comprehensive list of precincts, we could organize direct mail campaigns (electronic and snail).
Quite seriously, here is my answer, though I know nobody's going to like it. Unfogged is a feeder blog, a kind of semi-frivolous think-tank. We write jokes, muse out story lines, compile research, shoot the shit, and sometimes come up with serious stuff, or seriously funny stuff. ArzE and Sausagely, maybe now rencepS namrekcA, and some of the eggheads read it and steal our better material. They read it in part because it's not infested with embittered do-gooders, like so many other blogs we could name. This is not a totally worthless role for a blog. Maybe it could and should be augmented, but I don't think we're merely chopped liver gadflies.
That's a pretty good idea; after all, there's no real reason to write about stuff third-hand when you can jump up a step.
116 - I've thought that before, and think it is a good summation of what Unfogged does now. This thread is just to see whether Unfogged wants to do more, in a mildly organized way.
I just had to get that in there. Now I'm off to get drunk.
JM, is there any way I can get in touch with you?
I'll send you an email. Is that your correct address, with the two "y"s?
115: At-risk, meaning using bad nasty voting machines?
I'm pretty sure I could whip up a Google Maps application, but I'm not sure what you're proposing that it do. I would have thought indicating what precincts were a problem would be easier than identifying which precincts were a problem.
I think compiling information is probably a first step, before worrying about building a Google Maps interface -- what I think would be useful would be 50 pages, one for each state, covering current voting technology, upcoming changes, the relevant law in that state, and so on.
124.--Ok, sent, though not from a name you'll instantly recognize.
Re: 123
Yes, "at risk" would mean precincts that are vulnerable to fraud. We could hammer what that means, exactly, at some other time.
As for the application, I'm envisioning something that would allow authorized users to flag "bad" precincts by entering the street address, phone number(s), type and brand of voting machine, along with any other notes, and then populate them on a map, so that users could pull up precinct information by city. It would yield results in the same way searching fo Pizza Hut in Waterloo, IA would.
Though, come to think of it, other than the cool factor, I don't know value the map interface would add.
*know how much value, that is.
Or, in other words, LB's 125.
I love voting machines as a pet issue, but I'm a professional nerd.
A map of that sort would be very useful with complementing educational information - why these machines, and I mean Brands X and Y models 1 and 2, are bad - as a way for people who get read up to determine (or report) whether their precincts are using machines that put their votes at risk.
If we find all the educational material is already out there, great, we can link to it or summarize it or add to it.
I really would love to know more about voting machines. I have to go, but maybe a collection of links to stuff that has already been written about them is in order?
That's what I was thinking as a starting point. You'd have to organize it by state to make it useful. I'll put up a post tomorrow, but I think the thing to do would be to hand out states to volunteers, and just have them google up the current state of the law, and any news coverage or blogging on voting machines in that state.
I saw that Moby Dick thing! It was the single worst live performance I've ever seen in my life. But I ran into Cady McLain beforehand, who plays Dixie on All My Children and I got in line for the bathroom behind her just to bask in her presence, and proceeded to say all the wrong things ("I used to watch when I was a kid"; why didn't I say, "I loved you and Tad; you were a formative influence on my idea of romance!") and finally I realized that she might be kind of uncomfortable in a really long bathroom line being stuck in a conversation with a fan, and I admitted I didn't really have to go the bathroom, I just wanted to see if it was really her, and scuttled off. When I sat down in my seat I was trembling and my heart was pounding. That's still the only encounter I've had with a celeb who meant something to me personally.
Minnesota uses optical-scan paper ballots. 4% done!
I also kinda feel like the electronic voting stuff is an area that's already being taken on by many, many other people. Not to say that we can't try and add what we can to an issue that desperately needs addressing, I just wonder if there's another area that's not being addressed.
What about presidential signing statements as an area of focus? Or habeus corpus/torture issues?
You're quite right that a lot of people are already focusing there. For all my voting machine enthusiasm, I will admit that a map project would complement a lot of that information but as an issue it couldn't be wholly owned by the people involved in it here.
The big problem with the voting issue is that it attracts a lot of real loons. There are some serious computer scientists who have voiced their concerns, but it's been portrayed as the cause celebre of a bunch of nutjobs, because tehre have been a few. I remember hearing some bad stuff about Bev Harris.
49: Yes, I'd thought of that, and maybe I still can do that. I was also thinking that it would be nice to do something when I'm free--which might be when I wake up in the middle of the night or at 11PM.
BG, will you please think of logistics? You're thinking about drafting the Dick Armey, but where are you going to billet them all until 11 or whenever you wake up? With this kind of fuzzy planning, you'll never get your hands on the levers of power.
This might not be a group, as opposed to an Ogged endeavor. But I don't get any blogging on Iranian life or culture anywhere else (I know, I'm looking at the wrong blogs). I think we should make a peaceful resolution of the Iran nuclear crisis our project. I'm only half kidding.
That would be appropriate. It would have to be broken into tasks, because "peaceful resolution of the Iran nuclear crisis" sounds big. But if it were more specific, like propose alternative ways to meet Iran's and America's interests, and make those heard, that might be more doable.
LB, I am really interested in the voting machines stuff, but I don't know if we're sold on that. I also don't know if there is really enough conviction behind that (or here in general) for that project. Instead of a post on that, should we (me, if no one else will do it, except that (like asking boys out) I'm afraid that people are just going along with me 'cause I am pushy) synthesize these responses into a few (3-4) proposed projects? Then see if any of those projects inspire fervor from the crowd?
If none of you speak up, I'll pull together what I saw in these answers. But that'll be tomorrow, mid-day for y'all.
I'm most interested in the voting machines project, because while it gets a lot of attention, I haven't seen data organized in a useful way. There's a whole lot of "Jesus Christ, look at another godawful story about those things" but much less of "State Legislature X is making a purchasing decision now. Harass them." I use Diebold as a boogeyman, but I don't know how widespread their touchscreen machines are. So this is something where a reference strikes me as a useful basis for actual action.
And I have the sense that state legislatures are smaller and easier to influence than lots of other things -- we might actually be able to nudge something.
Re: state legislatures being smaller and easier to influence
Probably true, but they also operate outside of the degree of scrutiny that Congress gets and are thus more corrupt. My dad was in the NM legislature for a little while and was pretty disgusted by what went on. His reaction to the voting machines stuff is that it's driven by palm-greasing and sketchy procurement rather than a master plan to steal elections. (Of course, my dad's a die-hard Republican, so he doesn't believe Bush would steal an election anyway, all evidence to the contrary.)
It could be that shedding a little more light on that level of government could make an impact.
That's the thing -- that if we could get on top of when and where the procurement decisions were being made, that that's undercover and sleazy, but small -- it's someplace that we might be able to shine enough light to make a difference.
Are there mechanisms already out there for distributed state-by-state action? That is, are there models we can follow/infrastructure tools we could steal? I'm thinking that some DKos folks were doing something along those lines, or maybe Democracy For America?
This is what I've gotten out of the thread so far:
The leading contender from the Hypothetically Speaking thread was an Unfogged look into electronic voting machines. Sam K. suggested mapping out areas where voting machines are in use and advocating against them in areas that have adopted them. LB suggested a state-by-state response, “covering current voting technology, upcoming changes, the relevant law in that state” and I (Megan) would add prepping a legal response in advance of the 2008 elections, if voting outcomes were significantly different from polling outcomes under suspicious circumstances. Robust McManleyPants got to thinking about interesting layers for an electronic voting machine GIS. Chopper pointed out that other people are already working on voting machines, so that Unfogged would be sharing the field (with crazy people, says Bostoniangirl). LB says, yeah, but we can do it better.
The second idea that got attention focused on using Unfogged’s collective research and writing skills to organize and present information. The media and other bloggers look to Unfogged for ideas, say Jackmormon, LizardBreath, and My Alter Ego. We could create talking points (Washerdreyer, My Alter Ego) or position papers, write op-eds (Megan, Teofilo, BitchPhD, mrh) or better TV commercials (YK). One potential format could be a wikipedia (Washerdreyer, Matt F., Arthegall, DaveB,). LB suggested a more directed focus on getting more media attention on Democratic-friendly issues.
Other persistent themes:
Responding to the upcoming Congressional elections.
Focusing on habeus corpus (maybe with more specific projects and advice from Katherine and others).
My take:
Sustained effort on any of these projects will depend on two or three people getting the fire in their eyes. Medium interest (and peer pressure) from half a dozen other people would be enough to make this very productive. Unfogged would have to want to support it (space on the sidebar, creating pages for results, infrastructure for filesharing, pleas for specific help). But I don’t know that all that energy is behind this project, and without it, Ogged is right that it will fizzle out. I’m willing to be one of the half-dozen, but these projects don’t inspire me to be one of the two or three that live and breathe the Unfogged Collective Action.
Options:
Hear that other people want this more badly than I do, and support them.
Keep looking for bigger projects that do inspire people to put in work.
Drop it, because starting and not going anywhere would be annoying.
Do a smaller project for the upcoming elections, then quit while we’re ahead.
I'm talking myself into being really pretty interested in two step voting machine thing -- Step one, compile information into a useful reference, and then step two, figure out how to pressure state procurement decisions to do the right thing.
We'd need a bunch of volunteers to get it together -- I think splitting up the research by states, and then cross-indexing by manufacturers and models of machine is the way to go. And someone who can actually build the web-pages, which is not me unless someone can point me to a reference for "HTML for people who only know how to make links".
And then once we had the reference together, looking for soft spots to take action would be the way to go. But I don't know how many volunteers there are for a project like this.
Here's where I think a good place to start on a wiki/talking points thing would be. Have a wiki that topically organizes blog posts from all over the web. Somethings along the lines of the Open Directory Project, except oriented towards arguments and information. I'm thinking that the organization would be first by broad areas (voting fraud, habeus, war, election strategy) and then by specific topics. Each topic would contain links to many relevant posts (and other online resources) with an blurb summarizing the contents of each. The links could even be done in a Wikipedia-like way, as footnote links embedded in an article (whose purpose is to summarize all of the resources on the topic). Links would be both opinion and fact links, preferrably heavy on the latter. Some sort of external page grabbing and archiving might be good for future-proofing it all.
Then, besides topic pages, you would have talking point pages, which gathers opinion posts that have made specific arguments, and perhaps how some of those posts address and complement each other.
To expand beyond the web, the wiki could accept signed statements from hand-selected Real People about information that's not available on the web. If someone finds some info in a book, article, or some other resource, or if they have first-hand experience, they can get it included. Their real-life contact info could be made available on request.
To avoid problems with vandals, if it became necessary, all input could be accepted in comments threads on the wiki pages (yes, some wiki software supports comments threads), and be integrated into the page by maintainers.
MediaWiki would probably suffice as a platform.
To make sure the focus is tight enough to begin with, the subject matter of the wiki could be limited to only, e.g., voting machine information, and its scope could be expanded later.
I'm talking myself into being very interested as well, but that would be as much for doing a project with Unfogged people as it would be for getting something done on electronic voting machines. Unfortunately, that kind of motivation dies with the first round of incestuous infighting. So I'm not willing to be the lead, but I am willing to put real work into it.
The voting machine project could be a lot of fun, because there's potential to make a difference. A lot of state-gov stuff happens without notice--it might be covered in a local political journal, but gets no national attention. If we could draw attention to something pretty clearly skeezy, it might matter.
The other reason this might be attractive to some of you, especially you young upstarts, is that you can get state legislators and their aides on the phone, and interview them, real-live journalist style. Unlike a US Senator, they're likely to talk to you, since they don't get much attention, and they like it. That's the kind of thing that can go on a resume.
I'm willing to do some work, but would probably be a tier-3 contributor. I'm over-committed as is (hence the greatly reduced commenting I'm doing here).
I crave approval. So give me a task and I will surely do it, 'slong as you pat my head after.
I hope to contribute time and, for whatever it's worth, have some contacts in the Texas state legislature. Demands on my time change from week to week, but I could lend at least several hours to the project each week. I don't know whether I ought to volunteer for a taskmaster role, as I can't conceive of the sort of work that a wiki (or whatever shape this project takes place) requires.
The other reason this might be attractive to some of you, especially you young upstarts, is that you can get state legislators and their aides on the phone, and interview them, real-live journalist style. Unlike a US Senator, they're likely to talk to you, since they don't get much attention, and they like it. That's the kind of thing that can go on a resume.
You know who would give an arm to talk to anyone that showed some interest? Your county registrar, or whoever organizes ballots and votes for your county. Those are the people who would know what it means to change voting technology at a very practical level. They would love to talk to anyone who cared.
I'll put up an organizational post over the weekend, soliciting volunteers.
I would be willing to provide some initial setup and administration of a wiki, as well as custom programming should it become necessary. I would prefer not to host it, but could do so for a while if necessary.
I could pitch some dollars towards hosting, too.
I literally do not know what I am talking about here, but after all the brouhaha about the comments and the very generous fundraising, Unfogged is on its own server. I suspect that means that there is room for a wiki along with the blog. But I don't know this to be the case.
And pdf -- you're on for setup.
You know who would give an arm to talk to anyone that showed some interest? Your county registrar, or whoever organizes ballots and votes for your county. Those are the people who would know what it means to change voting technology at a very practical level. They would love to talk to anyone who cared.
Evidence against this proposition: I just called my county clerk to check on my absentee ballot, and there was no answer.
I'm in, and am happy to provide technical assistance as well as any more substantive contributions the endeavor requires.
Next steps? (he asks, before ducking away from the INternets for 24 + hours)
We have plenty of space/whatever on the server. The only question is whether we're staying on the current server when our contract comes up in December or whether we're moving to a new host. If we're staying, we can get started. If we're moving, that could mean this will mean some duplication of effort if we're getting started now. However, if we're doing something, I suggest we start it soon while everyone has enthusiasm, etc. if there is any chance of it getting off of the ground.
Also, waiting until December would mean missing the elections and our big chance to possibly make a difference in the short term.