"Wiki the Vote" Project Open-Sources Candidate Info

Gabriela writes "Wiki the Vote was just launched on Congresspedia.org for citizens, professional researchers, and even candidates to collaborate on profiles for each and every candidate for Congress in 2008. The project is non-partisan and, in true open source fashion, is free for anyone to participate — even the candidates themselves. Unlike Wikipedia, people connected to the subjects of articles are free to add to them as long as their contributions are rhetoric-free and comprised of fully documented, verifiable facts. The citizen editors are assisted and fact-checked by professional editors. The project is starting with nearly 300 basic profiles of candidates that 2008RaceTracker has identified as definitely running, and will eventually expand to cover every candidate on the ballot in the primary and general elections next year. When the OpenSecrets.org 2008 congressional campaign contributions database goes online in a few weeks, the candidate profiles will also display live feeds tracking the money race and who is funding them."

Comments

Huh

[MyLongNickName]

Wiki my vote? I though Diebold had a patent on that?

Re:Huh

[Spy der Mann]

Wiki my vote? I though Diebold had a patent on that?

No, their patent is for Search and Replace :)

Wikipedia edit wars redux

[InvisblePinkUnicorn]

I envision each candidate's article eventually looking almost entirely like this...

==Controversies==

Some people say that [candidate X] is misrepresenting [issue A] in order to gain the approval of [group M]. However other people say that this is simply a misrepresentation of the actual issue at hand, [issue B]. However other people say both of these groups are simply resorting to partisan bickering in order to gain approval for [candidate Y], with support from [group N].

These people are all idiots LOL!!11 POOOP

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[Skrynesaver]

Unfortunately politics seem to have been reduced to two different spins on any issue which are wholly unrelated to the facts.

Each side then believes what they wish and objective truth, science or even video evidence are then discounted, the various media channels then publicise the spin of their chosen side and no one even gets to hear the facts.

I'm afraid democracy may not survive, this is not a problem exclusive to the united States but exists throughout modern western democracies.

The demos needs open honest moderated debate, instead we get two groups of PR agencies promulgating their opinions without ever interacting with each other.

I genuinely fear for the health of our democracies</rant>

Or maybe I've become an old fart when I wasn't paying attention and the world is suddenly going to hell in a handcart

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[darjen]

I'm afraid democracy may not survive, this is not a problem exclusive to the united States but exists throughout modern western democracies.

From my admittedly jaded viewpoint, there are some inherent problems with Democracy that really prevent me from appreciating it as much as most Americans. You might be interested in this book from Hans Hermann Hoppe: Democracy: The God That Failed. I haven't read the whole thing, but I have caught parts of it posted as articles on certain blogs and such. I know about the author and am pretty sympathetic to a lot of his ideas.

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[Colin Smith]

Unfortunately politics seem to have been reduced to two different spins on any issue which are wholly unrelated to the facts. A feature of all first past the post electoral systems.

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[Anonymous Coward]

Unfortunately politics seem to have been reduced to two different spins on any issue which are wholly unrelated to the facts.

I disagree. In my view, one side (the neo-conservatives) has taken a number of extraordinarily radical positions that disregard centuries of progress toward effective government and, in many cases, also ignore basic scientific knowledge. They try to give their positions legitimacy by claiming that "honest debate" allows each side to aggressively spin their position (e.g. ignore facts) and requires that, despite this spin, each position is respected as legitimate.

Well, here's the thing. Invading another country for it's oil is not OK. It's so not OK that it's a class A war crime. Rounding up random people and torturing "confessions" out of them is not OK. Centuries of serious judicial thought have concluded that there needs to be a mechanism for a person to prove their innocence in an impartial setting. The Bush administration disregarded this basic well established idea and, as a result, the US military has tortured people who were known to be innocent to death. Whether it's OK for the US military to torture innocent people to death is not a matter of "honest debate". It's a majority violation of fundamental human rights.

I could go on about the Bush administration's reckless fiscal irresponsibility or their scientifically ridiculous claims about Iraq's (supposed) WMD in the lead up to invasion or any number of other claims. But the point is that if you think that when it comes to the question of whether it's OK for the US military to torture innocent people to death that both points of view have validity about which there should be "open honest debate" then you yourself are a fundamental part of the reason that democracy may not survive.

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[RobertB-DC]

A feature of all first past the post electoral systems.

I know you're talking about the advantages of Instant Runoff Voting, but I read your post as:

A feature of all first post electoral systems.

I've been on Slashdot too long.

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[Kandenshi]

eh, my province(Ontario) and my country (Canada) has had a first past the post electoral system. Surprisingly enough, there are four different "major" parties in parliment(Liberal/Conservative/NDP/Bloc) and numerous minor parties(Green, etc...) that get a chunk of the vote too.

The Bloc would need a truly bizarre balance of seats among the other parties in order to become the government, but have served as our Opposition party before. It's unlikely for the NDP to become a governing party in the foreseeable future, but they get significant numbers of seats.

Last night Ontario had a referendum on switching from first past the post to mixed member proportional voting, don't think the results are in from that yet. FPP has some pretty serious issues, but that in and of itself doesn't preclude 3rd parties and alternative viewpoints. There's something ELSE going on that has contributed to that culture of "there's only two, mutually contradictory viewpoints on any issue, and these conveniently arrange themselves such that you'll find all of your policies in one of the parties, and none in the other, such that a compromise party(A from Demos, B from Republicans, C from Demos) is ridiculous" view that the US seems to have.

I don't disagree that FPP tends to foster that sort of thinking/voting, but it's not sufficient. What are the other factors that led to a 2 party system in the states, while multiple parties can exist elsewhere?

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[Kandenshi]

Turns out that Ontario wont be getting MMP. You can read about the results on the CBC website.
Here's the meat of it:

At noon Thursday, with more than 99 per cent of polls counted, the proposal had the support of 36.8 per cent of the vote. Meanwhile, 63.2 per cent of voters cast their ballots in favour of the existing first-past-the-post (FPTP) system.

Only five ridings, all of them in Toronto, showed a majority supporting MMP.

The MMP proposal required 60 per cent support to become the new electoral system. As well, it had to win a majority in 64 ridings.

A citizens assembly was appointed by the previous Liberal government to study the issue. It recommended MMP to replace FPTP, which has been in place in Ontario for 215 years. As a supporter of MMP, let me say "Yay for democracy =\"

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[Colin Smith]

eh, my province(Ontario) and my country (Canada) has had a first past the post electoral system. Surprisingly enough, there are four different "major" parties in parliment(Liberal/Conservative/NDP/Bloc) and numerous minor parties(Green, etc...) that get a chunk of the vote too. From Wikipedia:

"Although four parties are currently represented in Parliament, Canada has two dominant political parties, the Conservatives and Liberals, that have governed the country since its formation in 1867."

That is. The other parties might as well not exist.

You were saying?

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[Kandenshi]

That is, that the other parties have very large amount of influence in how the parliament works during minority governments.
Hint: check out what the current parliament is, and what the previous one was like, and another in my lifetime(1979).

Even during majority goverments, the voting of the minority parties can matter a great deal. Not every vote gets 100% support by every member of the governing party. So the governing party needs the help of the others(eg: the NDP/Liberal coalition of sorts during the previous parliament)

That is, the other parties matter(hence why millions of people vote for them).

That's roughly what I was trying to say anyway. *shrug*

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[iminplaya]

...the world is suddenly going to hell in a handcart

Don't know what country you're from, but in the US we travel in a handbasket, and on very well paved roads, I might add.

As for democracy, there's no saying that majority rule is such a good thing. It should be clear by now that the majority can be wrong. It's more akin to fascism by committee than anything. Merely less efficient, not less fascist. And there's very little hope when 99 percent of the people are only looking after their personal interests, with each trying to vote themselves a little bit bigger piece of the pie while remaining blissfully unaware of what's happening on the other end of America's "big stick". The wiki thing can't hurt.

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[BlaisePascal]

There are other voting systems besides FPP and IRV. Many of them are better than FPP and IRV. I personally like the Condorcet Criterion (a candidate who would defeat all other candidates individually when running in head-to-head contests should be the winner) as an important criterion to apply to voting systems. Neither FPP nor IRV pass it.

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[cheater512]

That sums up politics pretty well doesnt it?

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[Conor Kenny]

Conor Kenny here, creator of the Wiki the Vote project. I agree this is a huge (but perhaps not new) problem in political discourse. One way we avoid having to give respect to all viewpoints, even if they're idiotic, is that we don't have a neutral point of view like wikipedia. If the citizen editors or the staff editors feel that something is obfuscating the facts rather than clarifying them, we'll delete it.

We're not a straight encyclopedia. Wikipedia is great, but is a straight encyclopedia that tries to have "balanced" and authoritative articles on subjects. We don't claim our articles are unbiased in the facts they show or are "authoritative" in that they cover what is important while leaving out what is not. While we'd like the articles to end up that way, all we try to do is have rhetoric-free, verifiable facts. What's important is up to you.

I elaborated on this a little more on a blog posted on the front page of Congresspedia.

Email me or respond here if you'd like to discuss anything.

best,

Conor Kenny,

Managing Editor,

Congresspedia.org

ckenny (at) congresspedia.org

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[doom]

I personally like the Condorcet Criterion (a candidate who would defeat all other candidates individually when running in head-to-head contests should be the winner) as an important criterion to apply to voting systems.

As far as I can tell pairwise voting schemes scale really badly with the number of candidates. Okay, so three guys runnining for president, you need to vote three times (AB BC AC). Four guys running, it's six times (AB BC AC AD BD CD). A dozen candidates it's, what, 78 times?

And the whole purpose of these schemes is to encourage lots of candidates to run, isn't it?

Re:Wikipedia edit wars redux

[DurendalMac]

Yep. Digg is going to completely ruin this idea.

While this is an interesting idea..

[Critical Facilities]

I think this is going to be a shoe-in for "The Greatest Flamewar Ever" Award.

Re:While this is an interesting idea..

[n dot l]

I think this is going to be a shoe-in for "The Greatest Flamewar Ever" Award. No kidding. I give this a couple of weeks before it degenerates into what will essentially be the youtube comments attached to political news clips.

Re:While this is an interesting idea..

[Conor Kenny]

Well, Congresspedia has been up for about a year and a half and we've been doing alright so far. One thing that really helps keep the flame wars down is that we require people to sign-up for a username to edit and require an outside, verifiable source for all information, so it's fairly easy to contest the assertion that Nancy Pelosi is a cyborg. Why not come over and dip your feet it the water? I'm happy to talk to whoever is interested in participating - ckenny (at) congresspedia.org. Conor Kenny Managing Editor, Congresspedia.

Oh great, this will be just great...

[Anonymous Coward]

What are "verifiable facts"?

The conservatives have "factual reports" bashing global warming. The progressives have "factual reports" verifying global warming.

While I do lean leftward, I think this is going to be rife with abuse.

This whole notion of "fair and balanced" reporting of "facts" is balderdash. It operates under the fallacy that there are only two legitimate sides to any issue, and that the truth lies somewhere in the middle. You know what? That's complete crap. Sometimes there is only one position that is purposeful and correct and no attention should be paid to the others because they are flat out wrong.

You can't have two people both waving the same reports and claim they are both fact when they contradict each other. And you can't claim that the truth is in the middle!

This sort of two-dimensional thinking is a blight on society in general. Ugh!

Re:Oh great, this will be just great...

[butterwise]

What are "verifiable facts"?

Facts that are high in truthiness...

Re:Oh great, this will be just great...

[gwait]

I've been wishing a similar thing would be set up for Canadian politics,
but what I see as useful are things like:

- what was politician Bob's vote on bill bla
- what did politician Fred say publicly on issue bla

This way there would be a verifiable public record of the entire career of any given politician, verifiable by other public documents (newspaper archives etc)
so we get no more weasling in or out of campaign promises.

I agree tho, the spin doctors will reduce the overall value significantly..

Re:Oh great, this will be just great...

[Conor Kenny]

Conor Kenny here, I work on the Wiki the Vote project (it's great work if you can get it!)

This is one of the big problems in political discourse, no doubt. People have found that if you create a political debate about the facts, the media will back off and treat it as an open question. "Verifiable facts," for us, means that there's an outside, verifiable source that is credible. We're a little squishy on what makes a credible source, and leave that up to a case-by-case debate. We have a few advantages, though:

We don't have a "neutral point of view" policy - if your point of view is stupid and intellectually dishonest, we don't have to include it.

Because we're part of the larger SourceWatch wiki, we also have a lot of profiles of those fake front groups (remember those ads talking about how carbon dioxide was natural, so why were people concerned about it?), which means that even if someone quotes one of those groups, we can just wikify the link and let people click through to see that the group is a wholly financed arm of ExxonMobil (as was the case in that instance).

Verifiable means verifiable. It actually creates quite a hurdle to have to go cite something if you're just making stuff up.

But, yeah, it's a difficult business. But it's worth doing, so that's why we're here.

Instead of hating, why not come over and try it out? I'm happy to help out if you want to email me.

best,

Conor Kenny,

Managing Editor,

Congresspedia.org

ckenny (at) congresspedia.org

Nancy Pelosi ON WHEELS!!!

[paranoid.android]

Nancy Patricia D'Alesandro Pelosi ON WHEELS!!! is the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives for the 110,234,548th Congress. A Demoncrat, she is the first cyborg to hold the post of Speaker, or even lead a major political party in either house of Congress. She has represented the 8th District of Kaleefornia in the United States House of Representatives since 1887.

Re:Nancy Pelosi ON WHEELS!!!

[Volante3192]

[citation needed]

So, err...

[Penguinisto]

...how on Earth are they going to insure that the "professional editors" don't insert their own not-so-blatant ideological and political slants into the mix?

I mean, seriously; if the Guardian / Independent Washington Post/Times and New York Times / Wall Street Journal editorial (and I daresay even political news) slants have taught us anything, it is that professional editors can be just as slanted as the amateurs, and even more subtly so.

/P

Re:So, err...

[butterwise]

how on Earth are they going to insure

More importantly, how can we outsure the editors aren't in India?

Re:So, err...

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean the Opinion section contains opinions? Say it ain't so!

Re:So, err...

[Penguinisto]

You mean the Opinion section contains opinions? Say it ain't so!

Unfortunately, so do many of the political news articles outside of the op-ed section of these respective papers...

/P

Re:So, err...

[MilenCent]

All writing contains point of view. It's impossible to escape, and it's arguable that it's pointless to try, and that trying produces bland, content-free writing. That's exactly the reason for this project: not to promote the Wikipedia model of inoffensive facts, but to present the facts as they stand as clearly as possible.

Professional journalism cannot be unbiased, but when it works best, the bias is in favor of facts first, and after that individual human beings before authority figures. But unless the facts are put into context they are meaningless. To put them into context requires knowledge, and that implies a world view which has been formulated to fit that knowledge if the one who possesses that knowledge is anything other than a blithering idiot.

To put it another way, I ask: why do people want to become journalists? The answer, if the journalist is worth anything, is that he wants to make the world a better place. That's an intrinsically biased motive! Yet there is no reason to exclude those journalists for having it, so long as they are truthful and honest in their reporting, who qualities that, for all its faults, the New York Times has in abundance over Fox News.

Re:So, err...

[doom]

All writing contains point of view. It's impossible to escape, and it's arguable that it's pointless to try,

But wikipedia has discovered neutrality!

and that trying produces bland, content-free writing.

Well, there you've got me.

Re:So, err...

[bilabrin]

Hey c'mon, hasn't Fox News taught us that there are at least a few 'fair and balanced' news outlets who we can trust?

Oh yeah. Great idea.

[MenTaLguY]

Given the problems we have with political stuff on Wikipedia, this seems like the worst possible idea for a specialized wiki. Candidate sock puppets "sanitizing" their own pages, doing a bit of "creative editing" of their opponents' ... seriously, not a good idea.

So...

[Anonymous Coward]

So, now we can confirm that our choices are in fact still just a Douche or a Turd Sandwich?

Re:So...

[Scrameustache]

So, now we can confirm that our choices are in fact still just a Douche or a Turd Sandwich? Not yet, Ron Paul is still in the race ;-)

Future collaboration using Wiki

[NetSettler]

Ho hum. Another wiki. Useful, sure, I guess. One can never have too many places for bored people to use up their energy documenting the past and present, I suppose, but geez, when it comes to politics, could we not think about the future a bit? How many people even like how things are going right now?

Forget documenting what politicians do and have done. When is someone going to make a forum for discussing what should be? There's a real challenge for the wiki... creating tools for collaborating on a common view of the future rather than the past.

Or how about, as a middle ground if the future is too hard to discuss, even a wiki for each candidate so that we could discuss what made a coherent position/platform for that candidate right now, based on various issues before the candidate made a fool of him/herself by saying what he/she thought we wanted/thought/etc. Rather than let the candidate define him/herself, let the people define what they see in the candidate. Might be better in some ways. Candidates seem to be maleable about what they have to say to get elected anyway, why not duke it out online and see what ends up being stable?

Normal discussion forums have to be read from beginning to end to make sense. A wiki statically records the present state of a conversation in summary form so that anyone can pick up from there if they don't have time to read all of what's been said before, which is kind of like what a politician's platform does. It seems like it should be possible to figure out how to make that work... or a fun experiment to try.

I hope this isn't off-topic. I got all excited when I saw a political wiki and thought "maybe this is it". But it wasn't, and I figured I'd at least record the fact that I had hoped it might be.

Re:Future collaboration using Wiki

[NeutronCowboy]

Forget documenting what politicians do and have done. When is someone going to make a forum for discussing what should be? There's a real challenge for the wiki... creating tools for collaborating on a common view of the future rather than the past.

Rome wasn't built in a day. And neither will a tool that changes our political process.

You gotta learn to crawl before you run... and this is the crawl. Whether we get to the run stage is open for discussion, but this is a crucial step in getting there. Don't dismiss the first steps just because you can't see the destination yet.

Re:Future collaboration using Wiki

[LionKimbro]

Actually, ...

When is someone going to make a forum for discussing what should be? There's a real challenge for the wiki... creating tools for collaborating on a common view of the future rather than the past.

So, several of us are considering working on that right now, at this moment. We're just off the phone with David Korten. While it seems we won't be able to work with him directly, we're thinking about making a wiki seeded with the works of David Korten, Anodea Judith, Paul Hawken, Michael Dowd, and, ... ...well, just whoever wants to show up and collaborate, using Tom Atlee's storycology project as a frame.

I don't know that a single common view can develop by wiki, but I think a lot of major threads can be identified, mapped, collected, and promoted, and I do see a basic coherence to much of the work going on today in activist, Open Source work, economics, neurology, science, and so on-- there is a zeitgeist.

Normal discussion forums have to be read from beginning to end to make sense. A wiki statically records the present state of a conversation in summary form so that anyone can pick up from there if they don't have time to read all of what's been said before, which is kind of like what a politician's platform does. It seems like it should be possible to figure out how to make that work... or a fun experiment to try.

Well, you may want to consider our research into LackOfReworking in wiki. See also: CategoryReworking.

That said, I've never seen a better medium for making sense of the world.

I got all excited when I saw a political wiki and thought "maybe this is it". But it wasn't, and I figured I'd at least record the fact that I had hoped it might be.

My belief is that: If there is something really cool, and you can't understand why somebody hasn't done it before, it's because you haven't done it yourself.

I'd like to invite you to share your idea or vision with us on CommunityWiki, because it sounds like something we may be able to do something with.

Re:Future collaboration using Wiki

[iminplaya]

When is someone going to make a forum for discussing what should be? There's a real challenge for the wiki... creating tools for collaborating on a common view of the future rather than the past.

Yeah, daddy-o. Kind of a beatnik wiki

Just starting out, for better or worse

[RobertB-DC]

I clicked around a bit and found myself on the SourceWatch:Ground rules page. Good ideas, but an awful lot of red links. Several important topics haven't yet been defined, such as:

* "become a sysop"
* "language and rhetoric"
* "using discussion pages"
* even "wikifying"

Of course, since it's a collaborative project, I guess the users get to define those topics. Would it be overly cynical to start the "become a sysop" topic with a redirect to "Please select a giving amount or enter your own desired amount"?

One word: Awesome.

[NeutronCowboy]

Yes, I know. It will be full of propaganda and one-sided views. Even the most OCD-addled citizen editors will have a hard time competing with the attention of someone who gets paid to do the "right" edits.

However, this will mean that every candidate will finally be in one place. If I want to know Ron Paul's position on abortion and compare it with Hillary Clinton's, I can go to one site (and edit the pages - nyuck nyuck nyuck). Combined with the integration with opensecrets.org, I can do actual, honest to god research on ALL candidates trying to represent me, and vote accordingly.

I welcome our new congress-critter overlords - me, you and everyone else.

A bit rosy? For sure. But it this is a significant development for citizens trying to cast an informed vote. We might be going from totally and utterly craptastic to slightly less craptastic, but it's progress - the first true progress I've seen in ages. Now if we could just get redistricting fixed....

Re:One word: Awesome.

[EMeta]

http://www.votesmart.org/. This actually already is what you're looking for.

Re:One word: Awesome.

[NeutronCowboy]

Not quite. Votesmart.org is more on the technical side - what bills were voted for, biography, history of employment, etc. I'm hoping that this will be the why and how to votesmart.org's what.

Re:One word: Awesome.

[Anonymous Coward]

This only works if there's a page, or at least part of a page, that *only* Ron Paul and/or his agents are allowed to edit. Otherwise how are you going to tell what *his* views are, and what are the views that someone else thought it would be amusing to put into his mouth?

If I were designing it, I'd give every candidate an "official" page that they can maintain themselves, and a wikified "links" page where anyone can add a single line linking to any page they want.

Sheldon Rampton is awesome

[Raul654]

I'd just like to say that the guy responsible for this - Sheldon Rampton (author of "Toxic Sludge Is Good for You!: Lies, Damn Lies and the Public Relations Industry" and "Bananna Republicans: How the Right Wing is Turning America Into a One-Party State") is awesome. His books are very informative (my mother made his first book required reading for her environmental science class). After meeting him in person at Wikimania, I think he's awesome.

Re:Sheldon Rampton is awesome

[Chris Mattern]

'd just like to say that the guy responsible for this - Sheldon Rampton (author of "Toxic Sludge Is Good for You!: Lies, Damn Lies and the Public Relations Industry" and "Bananna Republicans: How the Right Wing is Turning America Into a One-Party State") is awesome.

So good to hear it's not being run by somebody with an agenda to push.

Chris Mattern

Re:Sheldon Rampton is awesome

[RevHawk]

If you don't have an agenda of SOME KIND to push, check for a pulse. To be human is to be biased. Some are more open about it than others!

Re:Sheldon Rampton is awesome

[Scrameustache]

being run by somebody with an agenda People without agendas don't get much done.

The word "agenda" has been reduced in popular lingo to a limited use in the negative connotations of the hidden agendas, but you keep using that word, and I do not think it means what you think it means. Having an agenda is not a bad thing. Mother theresa had an agenda, it involved taking care of people who needed help and had nowhere to turn to, it wasn't a bad agenda.

Hidden agendas are a different matter, they imply secrets, hypocrisy, things of which we should careful.
But this guy? Pretty overt.

Reversing position 180 degrees

[athloi]

The citizen editors are assisted and fact-checked by professional editors.

Wasn't the whole point of Wiki that professional editors and writers were not needed? Did they just reverse their position 180 degrees?

Re:Reversing position 180 degrees

[Aladrin]

I think you're confusing the politics of different groups. Wikipedia may have claimed that, but this is SourceWatch. They obviously feel that they need to have some facts checking done so that they aren't spreading information that's horribly wrong. I agree with them.

As far as the actual Wiki software developers go... Since there's the ability to lock down articles, I think they foresaw the need for administrators and experts.

Re:Reversing position 180 degrees

[Anonymous Coward]

No n00b, look up the difference between what a generic wiki is, what wikipedia is, and what this article is talking about. This site and wikipedia are both wikis, but have nothing to do with each other. now run along.

Re:Reversing position 180 degrees

[moogle001]

There is no "they" that rules all wiki's, or determines how best they can be used. Congresspedia is not associated with wikipedia.

Re:Reversing position 180 degrees

[Conor Kenny]

Even though we think they're awesome.
We're just trying to do something a little different.

Won't hold a lot of weight

[dontspitconfetti]

I don't see this as holding a lot of weight in the sense of candidates actually running. I mean, sure it can make the candidates more accessible to the everyday person, but on a larger scale it won't pull its own for Congressional elections. Redistricting really makes it harder for voters to really have a choice anyway.

Re:Oh yeah. Great idea.

[bentcd]

Given the problems we have with political stuff on Wikipedia, this seems like the worst possible idea for a specialized wiki. (...) Well, if wikipedia is plagued by too much politics, perhaps the hope is that a wikipolitica will be plagued by too many facts?

It may seem like a hopeless idea, but desperate times do call for desparate measures. "No shot too long, no straw too short!"

Screw voting

[Anonymous Coward]

If they make it a law that politicians can be jailed for making claims and not keeping them, then I will be interested. Otherwise, it doesn't really matter. Either jerkoff is going to lie. I don't wanna hear that "lesser of 2 evils bullshit", it doesn't change anything.

One giant black hole of internet suck..

[f0dder]

bringing together a coalesce of nutjobs from yahoo comments, digg, reddit, battle.net, web 2.0, etc etc etc

Blame MSM all you want but at least when someone reports something stupid their is a name that can be held accountable.

The anonymous internet... not so much. No matter how good the intention, any internet social site without moderation, will end up as fetid sewage.

"Unlike Wikipedia"?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Unlike Wikipedia, people connected to the subjects of articles are free to add to them..."

Say what? Wikipedia has no policy that says subjects of articles aren't free to add to them.

Re:"Unlike Wikipedia"?

[Conor Kenny]

While it's not an outright ban, that's pretty much the policy.

"This page in a nutshell: Avoid writing or editing an article about yourself, other than to correct unambiguous errors of fact."

Conor Kenny
Managing Editor, Congresspedia.org
ckenny (at) congresspedia.org

Not Wanted

[RevHawk]

I'm not sure if I believe the American People care about the truth anymore. Maybe I'm jaded, or just having a bad day...But the longer I'm alive, the more I see, the more I follow politically, the more I realize that people don't care enough to do anything. They'd rather fill up on corn syrup and whine about the lack of choices, or whine that their only options are 'corrupt'. What's corrupt is our society - period. No honest politicans? Nothing different? Always the same? Mike Gravel Ron Paul Dennis Kucinich And those are just MAINLINE party candidates - there are hundreds of alternative parties out there. Who cares though? Let's just let HillarBama walk straight into the white house. They make us feel better. They're not human, after all. We're no longer able to elect anyone that appears remotely human. "Follow the money!" - Frmr Sen. Mike Gravel

Not That Any Candidate Would Do It

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd like to see a page for each candidate where they stated what their position *would be* if they had public campaign financing.

Nice.

[dbc001]

I'd really like to see an easy-to-use system that lets me see who voted for what and when. I know that congress already has a system that stores that data but it's difficult for laymen to understand the data (I'm guessing that that's intentional).

I would really like to see a requirement that forces elected officials to explain why they voted for each bill - maybe in 5-30 words. This would give us a great deal of accountability on things like the PATRIOT act. It would be a lot harder for them to justify shady and pork-laden votes if they have to explain themselves.

Re:Nice.

[llefler]

I would rather see an easy-to-use system covering what they are going to vote for, and when. That way I could explain to my representatives what issues I find important and how I would like them to vote. Let me be involved without requiring me to devote the equivalent of a full time job to being an informed voter.

Re:Nice.

[Conor Kenny]

We've got some more stuff in the works, but in the mean time the Sunlight Foundation, which co-created Congresspedia, is doing some pretty cool stuff, like their version of the government site mentioned above, which, unlike the original, doesn't suck: OpenCongress.org

Re:Nice.

[Anonymous Coward]

You seem to be saying "I want someone to summarize this 500 page bill so I can make a decision on whether it it right or wrong in less than 2 minutes". I hate to break it to you, but anyone that does that is going to color the results. Democracy is hard work.

Holy crap

[hellfire]

I was all excited to have a great place to learn more about my reps as well as those around me and zipped right over to congresspedia.org.

Then I read thru the entire "new additions" section and it read like a laundry list of scandals, corruption, and Iraq-related bickering. Oh yeah, and Bush vetoed the SCHIP bill to.

I'm so depressed about my sucky country now that I can't do any research. Thanks Congresspedia.org.

Re:Holy crap

[Orne]

"and Bush vetoed the SCHIP bill to(o)"

Some of us look at a veto of this bill -- federalizing healthcare payments to every resident of the United States of America up to the age of 25 including families who make up to $80,000 income -- as a good thing. The bill is (1) not addressing low income families, (2) not addressing children, and (3) not controlling the costs of healthcare. It's socialism with a literal "think of the children" label.

-- Scott

Re:Holy crap

[phantomlord]

Let's not forget it would make it illegal for doctors (or their families) to own hospitals. How dare some otologist, cardiologist, or plastic surgeon have their own operating room. Filthy pig-dog capitalists!

Not True

[asphaltjesus]

U.S. history has had a couple of times in history where the citizens re-take control of their government. How about helping start the next one?

Instead of complaining about it, how about setting up a wiki to document ways for citizens to become involved?

Re:Not True

[RevHawk]

Your assumption is that I do nothing, have done nothing, and/or will do nothing. That all I do is complain. I have no idea where you got that idea.

Re:Oh yeah. Great idea.

[MenTaLguY]

Desperate times call for cool heads, not blind thrashing.

overspecialization

[ChristTrekker]

A wiki just for the 2008 US Congressional elections? Maybe this is a silly question, but what was wrong with the Campaigns Wiki?

...And who built that thingy the Wiki runs on?

[villy]

The conspiracy theorist in me says that once non-centralized groups (read "not the MSM") start leveraging this and reach a critical level of audience, the guv will step in to moderate/filter/etc. If they haven't already. Or outsource it to Blackwater.

You can't think too small... ;-)

Re:Oh yeah. Great idea.

[Xtravar]

It's good for business, though. Imagine, the candidates all have to hire someone to monitor their articles now.

I should start an Interweb Public Relations Firm.

Stop dooming us all!

[Scrameustache]

could we not think about the future a bit? How many people even like how things are going right now?

Forget documenting what politicians do and have done.
When is someone going to make a forum for discussing what should be?

Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

How Long Till the Ron Paul Supporters

[Anonymous Coward]

. . . burn that damn server down?

Very Similar Idea

[patjenk]

This is very similar to http://www.issuedictionary.com./ They are trying to provide an easy comparison mechanism for candidates based solely on facts. They already have a good deal of information about the 2008 Presidential Primaries and are planning to expand to cover every election soon. Their layout seems easier to use than this site's and their information is already populated. It might be worth checking out.

Fools Game

[NEOtaku17]

Trying to eliminate bias is a fools game. I would much rather read news sources which don't hide their bias and proclaim them out in the open, rather than "fair and balanced" news sources. When I know the bias of the news I am reading I can have a good idea of the types of things they will leave out or spin. When a source claims to be bias free I have a hard time with exactly where I should look for the bias and which "facts" I should check. This is one of the reasons I prefer "advocacy" journalism. I know where they stand and I can act accordingly.

BTW I am myself biased:
I am suspicious of elected officials motives
I am very skeptical of government intervention into the economy beyond the role of a referee
I prefer a smaller, less intrusive, government than the one we currently have
I tend to think that the cons of foreign intervention outweigh the pros almost all of the time

There you go. There are my biases. Now you can weigh those against my earlier comment. I wish news reporters would do the same instead of trying to appear "non-human".

A few clarifications

[Sheldon Rampton]

I've read some of the (as usual, freewheeling) discussion of our "Wiki the Vote" project on Congresspedia and thought I'd weigh in with a few points of clarification.

(1) Congresspedia is not a part of Wikipedia and is not formally affiliated with Wikipedia in any way (although we use the same Mediawiki software and appreciate a lot of things that Wikipedia does).

(2) Congresspedia and "Wiki the Vote" are not devoted simply to the 2008 U.S. congressional elections. One of comments here suggested that a wiki devoted solely to that topic would be too narrow, with which I agree. However, Congresspedia and "Wiki the Vote" are both part of Sourcewatch.org, which is a wiki devoted to "the people, organizations and issues shaping the public agenda." (The current slogan on our website is, "Your guide to the names behind the news.") That's not as broad a scope as Wikipedia, of course, but we currently have more than 30,000 articles, so I think we're a little more encompassing (and hopefully more edifying) than spankingart.wikia.com.

(3) Some of the usual concerns have been expressed that we'll become a repository for flame wars and vandalism. Since we're a smaller website than Wikipedia, our procedures for handling that sort of thing are different than Wikipedia's, but overall I think we handle it pretty well. Unlike Wikipedia, we require people to register before editing, which cuts down on some of the casual trolling/vandalism/spamming. (Registration is free and only takes a minute.) Our paid editors also step in sometimes to nip problems in the bud. Wikipedia's approach is more like an unmoderated BBS, whereas we're more like a moderated one. This means that maybe we get less participation, but the environment is also less combative. (I'm not saying one approach is better than the other, but our approach seems to work for us.) Hopefully the proof of the pudding is evident in the quality of our articles.

(4) Finally, some people have expressed concerns about us having an agenda or bias. Guilty as charged, I guess, but we do try to be fair and not to block people from editing simply because we disagree with them about something. We also try to have a somewhat stricter referencing policy than Wikipedia, on the theory that asking people to source their assertions will limit effusions of pure bias and emotion.

Of course, we can't promise that every article is perfect. (We're a wiki, for Chrissakes!) However, I hope that folks will at least find us useful.

Oh, and thanks to Raul654 in particular for saying I'm "awesome." You're a very astute judge of character...

Huh?

[jmorris42]

> I'm hoping that this will be the why and how to votesmart.org's what.

Why? Content posted by joe random user will AT BEST be nothing more than speculation and random opinion, the sort of stuff you can read your fill of at any of a dozen existing sites.... for any political bent you like. Why would the candidates post anything themselves other than a link to their OWN website, one where they can say what they want to say and know it won't be edited into oblivion within an hour.

A Wiki is simply the wrong platform for collecting and delivering this sort of information. If random edits are hidden until moderated/edited it is just votesmart with a wiki interface instead of asking folk to email in changes and updated info. And if you allow live edits the Ronulans and KosKids move in and set up shop like they have everwhere else on the Internet that allows editing or posting comments or online polls without strict controls in place.

Re:Huh?

[NeutronCowboy]

Why? Content posted by joe random user will AT BEST be nothing more than speculation and random opinion

At best, content posted by joe random will be well-sourced, informative and enlightening. At worst, it will be Ann Coulter posting. Personally, I enjoy the mess that is public discourse. There's plenty of nuggets there, if you know how to filter properly. Though filtering at -1 can be interesting as well.

As for what will happen.... well, your exact concerns where the concerns voiced about Wikipedia in the beginning. I'll be ecstatic if this turns into 1/10th of what Wikipedia is now.

Whooaa There!!!

[asphaltjesus]

I was trying to reinforce the idea that other readers should participate any way possible.

I used to express the same pessimism, but I decided one day that I'm not changing the situation for the better by expressing it.

Every opportunity I get, I throw out the idea that one can and should participate in their government with the hopes that it improves citizen participation in some small way. It won't cause any harm that's for sure.

Re:Oh yeah. Great idea.

[Conor Kenny]

Until the professional gig pans out, why not come and edit Ron Paul's page on Congresspedia?

Ron Paul supporters:

[SonicSpike]

"All you votes belong to us!" ;-)

Re:Oh yeah. Great idea.

[doom]

Given the problems we have with political stuff on Wikipedia, this seems like the worst possible idea for a specialized wiki

You have a point, but in their defense at least they require contributors to register. On the downside though, all you need to register is a working email address -- that will screen out casual vandals, but not hired-guns, which are arguably the real problem in the political arena.

I've come to the conclusion that "anonymity" isn't really suitable for anything but a toy site [1]. If you can't tie the identities of the authors back to meatspace ids you're just asking to be messed with by the Karl Roves of the world.

[1] Where this leaves slashdot is left as an exercise.

Re:Oh yeah. Great idea.

[Palpitations]

I gave in and donated to Ron Paul. I don't make a practice of replying to signatures, but since it's somewhat related to this story, I figured I might as well.

I'm very liberal on social issues and an economic moderate, and have never supported a Republican in my life... Until Ron Paul. He's still not my favorite - but he's a much better choice than almost everyone else.

It's sad, but knowing that the winner is going to be either Democrat or Republican (oh, how I wish this wasn't the case...), I gave equal funding to the two best options in my opinion - in this case one from each party. Kucinich and Paul. Realistically, neither of them stand much of a chance, largely in my opinion due to the fact that the media largely ignores them.

Not only do I think those are the best two candidates, but I think that would make for one hell of a race. The debates would be fantastic - and by that, I mean that questions may get answered instead of blatently ignored and twisted into mostly unrelated talking points. The media would no longer be able to ignore the real issues. And most importantly, voters would be given a real option instead of choosing between two people who are rushing towards the center to appeal to the broadest cross-section of voters.

That's not to say there aren't very real differences between your average Democrat and your average Republican, but I'm willing to bet that after the primaries that gap will close. It almost always does, and that's a damn shame.