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How Can Nerds Make a Difference In November?
Scott Aaronson offers an intriguing call for ideas on how nerds can supercharge the political process this year. He's clearly an Obama admirer and phrases his challenge this way: "What non-obvious things can nerds who are so inclined do to help the Democrats win in November?" But the question itself is not inherently partisan. The analogy Aaronson gives is to the Nadertrading idea in 2000 (which we discussed at the time). What's the Nadertrading for 2008? "The sorts of ideas I'm looking for are ones that (1) exploit nerds' nerdiness, (2) go outside the normal channels of influence, (3) increase nerds' effective voting power by several orders of magnitude, (4) are legal, (5) target critical swing states, and (6) can be done as a hobby."
Be smart enough to realize that, as is usually the case in software, starting from scratch is a waste of time.
Refactoring the existing structures to better suit current needs and eliminate bugs saves a lot of set up time and costs.
"What non-obvious things can nerds who are so inclined do to help the Democrats win in November?" But the question itself is not inherently partisan.
You and I seem to have different ideas of what 'partisan' means.
Honestly, the best thing a nerd can do during an election is spread information. Not slanted information but stuff like the folks over at factcheck.org are doing. Another thing is discussing various differences in the voting process like trying to build a grassroots movement to move back to the popular vote or opening up discussions on runoff voting. There's plenty of ways to inform the public, possibly the most important and least rewarded job--in my mind anyhow. I find it humorous when Democrat workers go around alienating Republican voters and vice versa.
If you approach me with the mindset that I need to be voting for your candidate I'm probably not going to react well to it.
My work here is dung.
Close, but if you want to really fix electronic voting, there's one sure-fire way of doing it.
It's one thing to get somebody to admit the elections are riggable in theory. People don't really believe it until you show them. They still have faith in the process, or the government, or human nature. This way, you can get people to take notice without actually doing any real harm.
What you don't do is rig the election for an unbelievable candidate. That way, they immediately go into damage-control mode, make you out to be a prankster, and find some way of "retrieving" (e.g. making up) the "real" results. The point is that you wait long enough for everybody to congratulate themselves on another well-executed election, make all the acceptance speeches, etc, so they really commit themselves and can't say that they weren't utterly fooled.
Bonus points for giving up your anonymity afterwards and pointing out that you rigged the election in favour of a candidate you don't want to win.
That happened in Iowa City where I live. KCJJ (A local radio station known for their run ins with the court system) were threatened with a lawsuit for telling people on the air that republicans were being asked to vote on Wednesday to help prevent long lines at the voting places. Honestly, if you dont know what DAY you're supposed to go vote, you probably should stay home.
Very good point. I think this gets to the root of why those MTV "Rock the Vote!" style campaigns get on my nerves.
I'm all for people making the effort to learn what's going on in politics, and then being able to make an informed decision.
But at the same time, some people are simply apathetic. If you prod them to go out and vote (by selling the idea as trendy and "cool", applying peer-pressure, etc.), you wind up with people voting for completely wrong reasons. EG. I just like candidate X because he looks better on TV. The other guys look too old and ugly!
All things considered, I think we'd do just as well to have them opt out of the whole process, if that's all the effort they're going to put into it.
At the same time though? I *really* wish the people who don't like either of the two "major candidates" would get out there and vote 3rd. party, rather than skipping the process. That's where I'm at right now, myself. I can't bring myself to cast a vote for yet another person following in the footsteps of Bush, but Obama comes from the typical crooked Chicago politician pool, screwed us over by not fighting the telcom immunity bill, and has professed ideas for public healthcare that I think aren't going to work. Both candidates are apparently fine with a continuation of the "Patriot Act" too, which tells me a LOT about them.
That's why I'm going to cast a vote for Bob Barr. Frankly, the guy's kind of a "tool". He's just trying to ride the coat-tails of Ron Paul, and his V.P. already was heard admitting that he's really only running because he hopes it'll boost his popularity so he can get a book deal or radio show program in the future. But that's not the point. The point is, a vote for him is a protest vote the other guys can CLEARLY see they didn't earn.
Exactly. As a conservative, I'm at the opposite end of the political spectrum from most Slashdotters on a lot of issues (although I agree with most of you on issues with technological implications such as net neutrality, privacy, that sort of thing). It's true, I hate the Democratic party with a passion. But over the last four years I've come to hate the Republican party just as much. It's the system that's messed up. We don't have real representation any more. I won't be voting for Obama because I disagree with almost every single policy he has, but I don't trust McCain either. I haven't exactly decided on who yet, but I'll be voting 3rd party this November.
Sane with people in states where the population is not even close to evenly distributed. For example, NY. The majority of things are decided by votes cast south of Westchester. Which is a completely different world as compared to upstate.
BOTH US Senators representing New York really represent NYC and Long Island. Upstate NY has no true representation in the Senate.