US Opens Portal for Online Comments on Regulations

Judg3 writes " My most recent newsletter from the Center for Democracy and Technology included a link to the newly unveiled Regulations.Gov site that allows individuals to more easily find and comment on proposed rules being considered by federal agencies. Comment on proposed rules ranging from the Secretary of Defense, Coast Guard, Veteran Affairs Admission, to even the Post Office." Here's a newsletter about the site.

Comments

I wonder

[Telastyn]

if they actually check the comments to see if they're made by American citizens... of course they can't really do that, because there's no guarantee an IP's location, and even if you could there's no guarantee an American IP has an American behind the keyboard.

Re:I wonder

[el_gregorio]

But it's not a VOTE, it's a request for comments. Insightful comments could come from anyone, not just Americans. So filtering by location wouldn't really serve any purpose anyway; they're looking for interesting points of view, not just a tally of popular sentiment.

So apathetic, heavy on the pathetic

[stratjakt]

Pretty much every response in this thread is 'they wont do anything', 'they'll just ignore suggestions' etc etc..

This isn't the agencies themselves making a smoke-and-mirrors 'include the public' PR stunt, but a whole new agency which needs to show that it exists for a reason. So the new agency will pester the old agencies at our behest, and so far it's the best solution the public has.

Sure, one suggestion from one geek means absolutely SHIT, not just to the government, but to anyone. But when enough people start saying the same things, it becomes a valid viewpoint. And if the public starts having things to say, perhaps the government will listen.

Right now the only people speaking up are the vocal minorities. Hollywood elites like George Clooney can't keep their mouths shut, and actually presume they're speaking for all of america when they go off on some looney tangent.

If nothing else, the public speaking out can perhaps drown out the lunatic fringe who are actually being heard in Congress.

If someone said you should start going to the gym with him, you'd maybe ignore it. But if everyone you meet starts calling you Fatty Fatty Four-Eyes, you might reconsider that econo-sized bag of cheet-os for breakfast.

So maybe this wont change the world, but so far whining as ACs on slashdot hasn't either.

And we need a congress why?

[DonFinch]

It has been many many years since any politians could be considered public servants. And government does very little to serve the "will of the people". And like was said before elections are heavily influenced by people with money, so my questios is why do we need congress? One of the ideas behind the body was that it would be too hard for everyone to get together and participate in governing themselves so we need a small group of elected people to do it for us. Well now electronically it would be a small matter for people to get involved and propose, debate and vote on new mandates. Granted there would be rampant security conscerns, but it could be dealt with. All that would be needed is a small elected body to control the website and make sure things runs smoothly. Of course to make these kinds of changes to the constitution would take an act of congress...and who's going to vote themselves out of the job? Oh well...I guess we live with misrepresentation and corruption.