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Congress Loves Spam -- If It's From Congress
Makarand writes "According to this NY Times article (registration required), while Congressional members were busy
passing the U.S. anti-spam law that will go into effect on January 1, they were also busy
sending unsolicited e-mail to their constituents. This activity was aimed at growing the subscriber base receiving their political messages because these email lists are not subject to the normal 90-day blackout period before an election where members are forbidden to use taxpayer-supported Congressional mass communications. Consumer advocacy groups say that this policy may be unfair to the challengers because this loophole could be used by elected officials to communicate with voters right up to Election Day."
Yeah, and who thought they were stupid enought to put themselves equally under the law? They are politician's, for god's sake.
A blog like any other.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 27 -- Even as Congress was unanimously approving a law aimed at reducing the flow of junk e-mail, members were sending out hundreds of thousands of unsolicited messages to constituents.
The spasm of activity is aimed at attracting voluntary subscribers to the lawmakers' e-mail lists, which would not be subject to House rules that normally impose a 90-day blackout before an election for taxpayer-supported Congressional mass communications.
In September, the House Administration Committee voted, 5 to 3, along party lines to allow e-mail messages to the subscribers to be sent in the blackout period, but maintained the ban on free postal mail from House members to voters. The policy change affected only House rules and was not part of the junk e-mail legislation.
At least 40 House members have bought or agreed to buy e-mail address lists from at least four vendors. The lists, which each have tens of thousands of addresses, are generally created by a process called e-mail appending, taking voter registration files from a member's district. The next step is to cross match them with large databases of names and e-mail addresses assembled by consumer data companies like Equifax, which has a database of more than 75 million e-mail addresses. E-mail addresses can usually be found for 10 percent to 20 percent of the voter file.
Many members of Congress praise the new policy for allowing cheaper and more effective communications with constituents. But consumer advocacy groups say the policy may unfairly give an advantage to incumbents over challengers because it allows elected officials to use government resources to communicate with voters right up to Election Day. In addition, the consumer advocates say, sending bulk e-mail messages to constituents who have not agreed to receive it is essentially electronic junk mail, or spam.
The ability to communicate with constituents at taxpayer expense, the franking privilege, is one of the most cherished and controversial perks of office. For 30 years, advocacy groups have lobbied and sued Congress to try to close loopholes and stop abuses of the privilege.
Critics say the policy has created a significant new loophole.
"The core value is that you don't want to leverage technology to increase incumbent advantage," said Celia Viggo Wexler, research director at Common Cause, a group that has sued to limit franking. "What is troubling is that essentially the House is saying, `O.K., you can communicate with the constituency up to an election, and we're not really going to check what you are saying with them.' The point is without that kind of oversight, it's ripe for abuse."
Before the change, e-mail was subject to the same treatment as regular postal mail. Correspondence sent to more than 500 constituents had to obtain approval from the franking commission and was subject to a 90-day blackout before an election. But individual responses to citizens were not subject to the restrictions.
Congressional officials said the old policy was too cumbersome.
"Anything over 500 e-mails you had to submit that to the franking commission," said Brian Walsh, the Republican spokesman for the House Administration Committee. "There was going to be a delay of a couple of days to get approved. We didn't feel that was consistent with the technology that existed."
The new policy says that lawmakers can freely send messages to voters who have agreed to subscribe to their e-mail lists. To build such lists, House members are sending huge amounts of bulk e-mail messages to their districts in the hope that some voters will subscribe.
The unsolicited messages go out from Congressional offices as often as twice a month. The unsolicited messages, which have to stop 90 days before an election or a primary, are still subject to approval from the franking commission.
"They are regulating commercial spam, and at the same time they are using the franking privilege to send unsolicited bulk communications which a
Spammers operate on the principle that even though 99% (or thereabouts) of recipients recognize and hate spam, the remaining 1% of fools are enough to make their business model viable. However, would this work for political spam? I mean, if more than 50% of recipients react negatively to it, its bad for the sender, isn't it? (IANAA, so correct me if I'm missing something :-)
SPAM is irritating but how effective is it really? Aside from the occasional well publicised ripoff who reads or responds to it? The US Congress must know something I don't.
Oh yeah, I remember: "Do unto others as you would have them do to you"...
Reminds me indirectly of the Euro-MP who complained that people were contacting her with their views. They ought to have just sat back and been told what they wanted....
Disgusted. Is it any wonder we regard politicians as full of (sh)it ?
Simon.
Physicists get Hadrons!
Just wait till they find out and they'll put an "except for use by political parties" clause. ;)
Video Game cheats, hints a
because everyone knows there's no beef in government ;-)
This shouldn't really come as to big of a suprise. Political acts have been exempted from major laws before. From the DoNotCall.gov FAQs:
The National Do Not Call Registry does not limit calls by political organizations, charities or telephone surveyors.
Political spam isn't to much different from unsolicited political phone calls. And both would surely be of intrest to the politicians, as they seem to have exempted them from the laws. I find political phone calls equally, if not more annoying, then people asking me if I want to save $.13 a year on my long distance bills.
Request: ECM unit, 1000 km fullerene cable, 1 tactical nuclear weapon. Reason: Birthday party for foreign dignitary.
I guess when the first email arrives from my representative or senator I will start using their email address when signing up for free offers and sweepstakes. That should give them lots of input from their constituents.
Following their example: it's ok as long as nobody says it's not.
I think spammers are going to start a bunch of lil grassroots political parties. They will band together and form the penis party, and sell penis creams, pills, and lord knows what else to "support" the party.
The only real solution is to have terrorists start using spam to fund their operations... only with that boogieman out of the closet will congress do anything about spam.
Political spam can be dealt with in a similar manner. "Promise" a vote and then on the day of the election write "Sucka. Did you really think I'd vote for a spammer?"
At the same time, sign these politicians up on mailing lists etc. that guarantee lots and lots of spam. And forward their addresses to those kind Nigerians who have more than enough money to help finance political campaigns.
People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
There is the old story about the guy who takes a stack of bumper stickers for the opposing canidate and puts one on every cars bumper... With political spam it becomes SO much easier and fun. With to a bit of tech savy and good writting a great many fake messages could be sent out. I dare any politican to use this hardcore, because the backlash that could be unleashed against them would be frightfull once people learn that you really CAN get eail from your congresman!
Surely the biggest problem polititians have is, unlike normal spam, the audience they are trying to reach is located in a very specific area. Mass emailing simply wouldn't work - although there may on most spam be a 0.1% response rate, this would be reduced even further to virtually nil when location is factored in. Even "spam lists" would have some degree of innacuracy when it comes to location of the recipitant. Maybe I'm missing something...
..since when geeks (please no offence, myself included) look to the government to legislate our way out of spam?! whats wrong with you people? shame on you, M$ is proving to be geekier than you!..
Next up:
o SCO contributes to the Linux kernel
o the RIAA releases RIAA/Kazaa for file swapping
By the logic of Congress, neither action would invalidate their respective lawsuits.
Are politicians required to send this email from specific email addresses e.g. your_faithful_candidate@congress.wankers.gov? It seems like they should be (i.e. in order to prove their spam is actually "from a political organization", it should at least come from a traceable *and documented* source), in which case a few simple email filters could make the problem essentially disappear.
Thankfully I'm not a US citizen, so my exposure to this sort of rubbish is, oh, probably 2-3 years away...
Spam is generally defined as being `unsolicited commercial email`. How spam from the political wing of the armed forces can be described as commercial is anyone's guess.
This exemption to political organizations could result in similar issues as to the protection that religions get. L Ron Hubbard created Scientology, as he was getting too much flak from the scientific community on his ideas about Dianetics (tm). Laws offered protection to religions, and so Scientology was born. Numerous other 'questionable' activities have been 'religionized' or 'charitized' because of this. So, what next? Could we have penis patch and viagra companies becoming political organizations?
"Presidental candidate Ivor Bigcock believes in bigger penises for all. If you contribute just $9.99 to our campaign, we'll send you a free penis patch!"
Yes, I can actually see this happening!
mogorific carpentry experiments
They will band together and form the penis party
Finally, a party for the small people!
It's the Congressional Members duty to keep their constituents informed. In a representative government, our elected officials must promote two way communication.
The Congress Online Project Nine Benefits of a good web site, number 3: "Targeted communication with key audiences. Web sites can help build ongoing relationships with key audiences by providing targeted features and information. Timely, informative sections of a Web site devoted to a single issue, for example, can attract people who care about the issue and keep them coming back for more. And issue-based e-mail updates provide the opportunity to regularly communicate with people who subscribe."
In order to fulfill the requirements of the Congressional "Franking" priviledge, Members would have to clearly identify emails sent to their constituents, with proper headers, From address, etc.
Also, in order to provide documentation that they are reaching their constituents, they would most likely be required to maintain an email mailing list.
I highly doubt that the Members would use the shotgun email tactic of spammers.
Pete Carr Owner Chatmag.com
Any politician that spams me will most definitely *not* get my vote. I'll vote for Fidel Castro for President before I'll vote for a scumbag spammer.
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
Frankly (no pun), I really do not receive that much unsolicited junk mail from politicians as it is, so why should I fear that they will even begin to compete with the real spammers that send 100+ emails to my public email address?
People have largely accepted their junk mailing privileges as it is. I am a bit more worried about irresponsible emails from so-called political organizations, with the possibility that like soft money, they will be playing by an entirely different set of rules and have little accountability.
There are enough internet rumors- just wait until the political spin doctors step into the game... but actual candidates pose little concern.
Those that suggest you "dance like no one is watching" really want to see you make a complete fool of yourself.
in the recently passed CANSPAM bill, SPAM is explicitly defined as Commercial Email.
So this Political SPAM is perfectly legal.
Not only that, but said bill also legislates opt-out - which means any and every JimBOB spammer has the legal right to SPAM you once (assuming he follows a handfull of basic rules).
So now all spammers need to do is recycle Business Entities like they do ISP accounts, and it's all Perfectly Legal and there's nothing you can do about it.
All the SPAM you can stomach, and then some, for ever and ever.
Visit CryptoGnome in his home.
And why should any of us be surprised by this? The politicians want to regulate it as long as it doesn't apply to them. I think that would cover quite a few things, not just spam.
...we are from the government - we are here to help...
These guys need to go... ALL of them. This country really needs to take back control of itself. Watch some Cspan folks, watch these guys debate in the house, watch the senate, watch all of the other covered events... watch these guys like a hawk. They're all slick, they all play each other for fools. Enough cnn, fox news, msnbc(does anyone watch it anyways?) and hell even the bbc is looking more like cnn these days. They have this game called politics down to a science called bullshit. You linux users know this as FUD :)
During the municipal election in Ottawa, I got a call from Alex Cullen, a candidate for council. Well, I got an ADAD; couldn't even tell him off (maybe I could have if I waited until the end of the spiel, but...) OK, I was going to vote for Blatherwick anyway.
The day before election day, I got an ADAD call from Blatherwick. Oh well, just gotta hold my nose and vote.
You mean that we might see more than 98% of incumbents re-elected?
A 5-1 funding advantage is what does that. Spamming voters can't exactly make it worse.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
If the email is sent using government, rtaher than private or party equipment, doe sthe list become a record that can be obtained using FOIA (Freedom of Information Act?) If so, Congress could very well help spammers harvest email addresses for at lost less than buying an email database that has been matched to records.
If you can get the list, how long before someone spoofs a Congressman's addresse and sends his or her constiuents an email that upsets them and forces the rep to deal with the backlash?
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
I am sure the second some vote buying piece of shit starts to spam, the major blacklists will list them. Nothing like a spews listing to bitch slap common sense into a spammer and his isp.
Lawyers, MBA's, RIAA? A jedi fears not these things!
Please respect copyright by not posting the full text of articles. /. readers can register or not read the Times. It should be up to the Times to decide. /. readers that have chosen not to register have chosen not to read.
If you support GPL, then you need to support the copyright it is based on.
So...
- politicians are targetting their constituents only.
- the unsolicited messages are still subject to the 90-day rule, and only contain an invitation to subscribe to a mailing list.
- politicians are free to send whatever they please to people on the mailing list.
That all sounds fine to me... Congress isn't really placing themselves above the law, and the fact that they can spam those on their subscriber mailing list at the taxpayer's expense, doesn't bother me that much. In truth, they should just get rid of the entire 'franking privilege', not just this minor part of it.
But when all's said and done... if you spam me, I don't vote for you. It is that simple
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
they had actually been ripped off by the spammer, and they sold nothing.
It is time to start suing the people who are advertising via spam AND getting the 4th estate to cover such lawsuits.
Let the 'people who are advertising' know how LOUSY the return on spam is...by costing them $$$.
Congress is full of hooey. They have been for over two hundred years. Why this is newsworthy I don't know, unless it's just because it involves spammers, people most of us respect almost as much as we respect our Congressional representatives. Oh wait ... these spammers are Congresspeople. Now what are we going to do?
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
So, will house.gov be added to the spamhaus lists? :)
" I think spammers are going to start a bunch of lil grassroots political parties. They will band together and form the penis party, and sell penis creams, pills, and lord knows what else to "support" the party.
The only real solution is to have terrorists start using spam to fund their operations... only with that boogieman out of the closet will congress do anything about spam"
Don't be so sure that terrorists aren't already into spam... Or at least into profiting off the fradulent "products" that 99% of spam seems to hawk...
Terrorist groups are the new mafia in the world. The underworld tends to fund itself by the illegal. IMHO, ppammers like Ralsky would gladly sell spam services to Al Queida for a fast buck to hawk fake penis pills supplied from some Palestinian placebo factory, that is, if his observed morals are consistent...
I consider spam ITSELF to be a form of terrorism. It has made my e-mail services virtually useless. Spam is now up to 90% of all the e-mail I receive. That is up from 60% only 6 months ago. As far as I'm concerned, rounding them up and holding them in Cuba without trial and without access to lawyers (while blasting inane commercials at them 24/7) is too good for them.
Corporatism != Free Market
If you support the GPL, you should support the ideals behind it, which are that the concept of copyright is FLAWED, and should be removed.
Stop thinking of information as property. It isn't.
The
It's the Congressional Members duty to keep their constituents informed. In a representative government, our elected officials must promote two way communication.
We are supposed to be having a representational government? Virtually every Congressional action taken in the past three years has been counter-publius.
In this day, the public library system would -never- have been created. (Socialistic, not-for-profit, communist idea of) sharing information with the undeserving unwashed. Hey, who's supposed to -pay- for a library system?!
And look how costs escalate over five years, with "absolutely nothing" to show for it! If someone thinks they deserve to have certain information, they'll hunt it down and buy it --or steal it-- like normal people do in Thunderdome.
Campaign finance reform is national security.
As a SysAdmin I've been studying the DNS-based blocking lists in general and SPEWS in particular. Seeing how they say they operate, how long do you think it will take for the US Government to "win" an escalated listing in the SPEWS database?
"I'm sorry, Congressman, but the reason all your mail is being bounced is that our server IP address is listed in SPEWS. What is SPEWS? 'Spam Prevention Early Warning System.' Because we have been unable to answer complaints to abuse@house.net to their satisfaction, they have put together a 'crimes file' showing that The House of Representatives is a spam-lovin enterprise, have listed our entire netblock, and we've run out contractors to superserve our mail servers -- every time we hire one, it ends up listed in SPEWS, too."
Will the blocking lists work as they are supposed to, or are they going to take the smart path and NOT piss off the one organization who makes the "Laws of the Land?"? I can see it now: it becomes illegal for any operator of a mail server with more than 100 commercial clients to use any DNS- or domain-based blocking list.
Not exactly the death of the Internet, but possibly a case of felony if you do, damned if you don't.
You're on slashdot, you gotta wear that pocket protector with pride!
The penis party
Otherwise known as a Slashdot Meetup.
It goes from God, to Jerry, to me.
...in order to get to the money. The politicians wants votes, so they get to keep their jobs as representatives ($$$) and maybe some campaign contributions to boot ($$$). What the armed forces want, I dunno. But I don't really care if it is commercial or not, as long as it's bulk.
I think the definition of SPAM should be "unsolicitated bulk email" as well as UCE. Whatever your message is, you don't have the right to mass dump it on a bunch of strangers and expect them to carry the cost. It'd be like throwing flyers on the street, so that "anyone can pick it up, and if you don't like it, just ignore it", except that someone has to carry that cost in the end. It's online littering.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
How is the parent a troll? For the love of (insert name of preferred deity here), everything this guy has said in this thread makes sense and should probably be modded up.
vi ~/.emacs
The NYT article says that what they are doing is taking voter "consumer information" (ie credit bureau) companies like Equifax that have email info. SInce chances are both Equifax and your voter registartion info contain your address, they can taget it pretty effectively. This isn't spam in the sense that it's not targeted, just in the sense that it's not wanted.
I have blog like everyone else
As a constituent, one is opted-in to one's representative's messages by default. A civic duty, it is debatable only whether it should even be possible to opt out. It's bad enough not to read an email from your representative, though that is your right. But if you opt out of the direct notification, and opt to get your government info through only, say, Fox News, perhaps you should also give up your 911 phone service, and maybe even your subscription to the police. The fire department will have to keep coming, to protect your subscribed neighbors, but they might not have to rescue you or your pets. We need *more* and *better* government communication, not more constituent alienation.
--
make install -not war
Spam is not the way.
Typical outcome of sending 1.000.000 spam messages is 100 happy (though dumb) customers, 10.000 really pissed off people and mostly indifferent but rather hostile rest. The profit is no loss from those 10.000 and profit from those 100.
But if you send out spam to your voters, divided fifty-fifty for and against, the outcome is 50 votes gained (the other 50 would vote for you anyway) and 5.000 votes lost (people who decide they won't vote on a party that uses spam)
So... feel free to send. Just remember: Winners don't use spam!
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
Phear that. Imagine elected officials actually COMMUNICATING with voters. Doesn't happen.
"Champagne for my real friends - and real pain for my sham friends!" http://ericblade.postalboard.com/
Most people know not to try to use the "opt out" link in normal spam. But I bet most of them would go ahead and try to use it if they got a political spam, assuming either they'd honor it or ignore it.
So if I were a spammer (uck), I'd spend some time formatting a very official looking letter from some national committee with a nice "opt-out" link that would go straight into my "known good" database.
It'd be a dirt-cheap database-vetting move, and probably pretty effective.
Hell, it might even make it past a lot of spam filters; bayesians at least are probably so tuned to BS base64 and HTML-confused stuff that a plainly formatted mail might just sail right through.
After reviewing and crafting a new AUP document for my boss at a Web hosting company, I'm beginning to appreciate how the CAN-SPAM law will get a handle on spam. Let me explain.
There is a lot more to the CAN-SPAM law than just spam. The thing that caught my eye when I read the actual Act of Congress and the law referenced by the Act is that the issue of unauthorized access to computers "used in interstate commerce" (and Web hosting falls into that class) has been clarified, and the penalties for unauthorized access have been strengthened. That means when some twerp uses one of my customer's Web sites to commit FormMail spam, it becomes a Federal matter. Falsified credentials isn't just a civil matter any more -- the Feds have criminalized the offense.
One of the biggest problems that the anti-spam crowd has had is with forgery. I have a domain, fluent (dash) access (dot) com, which has been used as a forged return address in someone's spew for a long time -- I found out when I turned the entire domain into a spam-trap and started getting bounces from all kinds of networks. (Some of those networks are now blocked because of that, but that's life on the Internet these days. Maybe I'll implement a sunset script for my automated access blocking...or maybe I won't.) With the new law, a forged From: line is criminalized. While the law is silent on the matter, forged Received From: lines may also be roped into the "deceit" intent of the law -- but that will have to be tested in a Court.
As a commercial operator of Internet services, it lets me write things into my AUP that now stand a chance of being enforced, and not necessarily on my nickel. Before CAN-SPAM, it just didn't pay to go after a guy who is probing my network looking for broken formmail.pl and formmail.cgi scripts. What CAN-SPAM really does is put the black hats on alert that their activities may attract more attention than they would be comfortable getting.
It also unshackles the programmer in me to write scripts to enforce some of these things using technological means instead of investigative means. For example, if I enforce the From: line restriction, the script person can't complain because it's an enforcement of an AUP requirement -- I'm just making sure that my customers toe the legal line.
For the DMA, it is a win, because it makes more people play by the rules. Consider that CAN-SPAM is also a win for the block-lists like SpamCop and SPEWS, because it reduces the detective work required to recognize the spew just starting from yet another IP address, and it also limits the methods available to the abusers to avoid being caught and blocked.
Perhaps fortunately, there are only some many Congress-critters to account for. Black-holing them should be pretty easy. Add a press release when each is to explain their ethical lapse...
Government officials will be following the rules. You're not going to be getting e-mails with "v0t3 f0r 930r93 6u5h"
If you don't want policitical spam, as soon as one arrives, look for the tell and block it. They're not going to be faking domains and it's going to be professionally written. A preemptive expression block of "vote for" would probably knock out close to 100% of political spam.
The problem with spam isn't spam itself. It's that it's designed to be difficult to filter out.
As long as spammers of any sort follow the rules, I don't have a problem with them. I can filter them out without any trouble if I choose.
Howard Dean is praised for exploiting the internet to build his campaign. Now you're whining that they would dare use e-mail. It's a public medium. Anyone can use it. Calling it "spam" doesn't make it any less e-mail. Politicials will be sending out a few million (if that) not billions. How many voters gave out e-mail addresses? Those are the only people who will be getting e-mails. I wouldn't call it spamming when you volunteer your e-mail address. That's "opt-in."
If they abuse it, don't vote for them. If they use it intelligently, encourage others to do the same. That's what the internet is for.
The only issue is the black out period. And no one has done anything yet. I'd be more impressed if a politician didn't take advantage of a legal situation than if they were forced not to.
Ben
Work Safe Porn
When January 1st rolls around in a few days, anyone who pulls something like that can be tracked down and heavily fined and/or jailed.
And considering it would be against the government, the chances of you getting tracked down are much higher.
You can campaign "for" an opposing candidate to make them look bad but you must not forge any headers or you will be in a deep pile of trouble.
If a candidate were to do something like that against the opposition, they'd likely be kicked out the race. Breaking a brand spanking new federal law to try to win an election wouldn't look very good on one's record.
That may have worked in 2000 (if people didn't mind the trickery which would come to light quickly). In 2004 we have laws against such things.
Ben
Work Safe Porn
I didn't know Congress wanted me to have a larger penis. Berrik
Current karma: Terrible (due to mods without a sense of humor)
Both people running will use it, so then what do you do?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
that almost nobody gets as worked up about spam as the people who post on slashdot.
Most people don't care or mind, unless its porn.
Personally, I have nothing against spam, I just want it clearly marked as such.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
On the contrary, Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107 has repeatedly been held to allow news articles to be redistributed in full for noncommercial and many commercial purposes without permission from the copyright holder. Such 'fair use' of copyrighted material for "criticism, comment, news reporting, ... or research, is not an infringement of copyright."
Complete news articles have always been recognized as exempt under the 'fair use doctrine' for noncommercial redistribution, as well as limited commercial uses, since long before Section 107 was codified.
"Do you complain when your representative doesn't represent you?"
YES I get pissed off when the people I vote for don't get into office.
That means the cretins I did NOT vote for ARE in office, therefore the people I believe best represent my opinions / beliefs / etc are NOT the ones in positions to further those ideals.
YES I complain - it just doesn't do any damned good.
"You're paying for their work, even when it's as shoddy as we're growing accustomed to."
Yes I'm paying for them TO work - unfortunately, they're not doing the work they're paid to be doing. Instead of making America a better place for all American's, they're flushing our Rights down the toilet, selling out our resources to the highest bidders in return for kick-backs & future shares of profits, and generally making life hellish for those who elected them into Office.
"Politicians are different from police and firemen - their job is to talk, and to talk with you."
Then they're not doing thier job. If I wish to speak with my representative, the one I voted for, then it's fairly easy to get in touch, as they ARE interested in what "the little guy" has to say. However, if I want to get in touch with the putz who got elected, "thier time's too valuable" and we get pawned off on some flunky who takes a message and mails us back a boiler-plate reply that does nothing to further the discourse. Unless, of course, I'm going to contribute a massive wad of cash, in which case they're ALL too happy to sit and listen to me, at least until the cheque clears...
"When you ignore them, others like the media move into that power vacuum, totally unaccountable to you."
Except I don't completely ignore them, I merely make sure the message I get from them is the one the World see's, not the airbrushed clap-trap they want to feed me.
And the media IS accountable - if they're proven to no longer be a viable source of data, they tend to get ignored *en masse*, which sends thier ratings into the toilet, thier advertisers stop dealing with them, and they tend to go bankrupt... OR, they clean up thier act, straighten-up-and-fly-right, get-thier-shit-together, and suddenly return to the domain of legitimate news sources.
The Enquirer isn't a good source of political commentary, and you wouldn't use it to gain an idea of how a candidate works/thinks/acts, while CNN would be a better choice, see?
"Of course you're not limited to the messages coming from your representatives, you're much better off triangulating on multiple media sources, especially the Internet with its fast, easy search power."
Ahh, you CAN see reason...
"Global news is more like entertainment when you don't even know how the local school board is spending your money, training your neighbors who are kids in school."
Except my local news doesn't cover such things unless there's blood, money, or corruption involved. "If it ain't bleedin', dyin', or cryin', it ain't news." I already keep in touch with my local schools, as I'm rather fond of volunteering my time to help around campus, attending PTA meetings, helping host Bake Sales, etc; my son doesn't get away with much at school, because all his teachers know me on sight, have my home number at hand, and are perfectly willing to call me at the slightest hint of something out of the ordinary.
I've lived in this community since 1981, am fairly active in it, and attend all the local LAFCO/City Hall style meetings, so your argument is a touch moot... Sorry.
"Politics is not like garbage hauling - leaving it exclusively to the specialists keeps you out of the loop, and therefore expendable."
Unfortunately, it IS like hauling garbage, or have you not been paying attention to all the trash they've been trying to dump down our throats & strap to our backs? Our children will be stuck with the largest bill in history; an environment that is so screwed I'm surprised Mother Nature hasn't tried to exterminate the entire race in disgust; politicians
However I would think that a political email... is probably [more] likely to be read... than something with a subject line like "XXX FREE TEEN PICS", etc.
This message's subject line brought to you by Advocacy Inc. Advocacy Inc.: We put the "OLIT" back in "PICS".
ObObsc: Our internal motto: "To Spam Immortal".