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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."
Get a programming job at Diebold.
Airplane Photos, Airline News, Planespotting Guides
Or is that obvious?
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
... should be smart enough to see that neither party works and would start their own.
OK, flame away. :P
Game the search results on the candidates. Especially for sites in the swing states.
I don't care who wins the election. Just to get that out of the way.
I think that people who spend a lot of time on the internet build up a false sense of community size and influence. If one were spending a lot of time on Digg last year, they were probably surprised by how poorly Ron Paul did.
What percentage of Americans are regularly active on the internet? What percentage watch hours of t.v. a day?
I'm all for people getting out and doing something they believe in but the fact that this is compared to something involving Nader illustrates my point perfectly. It is a small group of people taking fringe actions what will not increase voting power by orders of magnitude.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
According to the criteria, I would say contributing labor to key "political" software projects such as GPG or TOR would be best. It can be done as a hobby, definitely exploits our nerdiness, and absolutely goes outside the normal channels of influence.
Granted, this has nothing to do with getting a politician elected, but that's exactly the point. Taking direct action to solve the problems of privacy and government surveillance increases our "effective voting power" many times over, because we don't have to hope that whatever shmuck we put in office will do what we elected him to do. In a certain sense it makes us even more powerful than the president.
I guess my point is that the most powerful things nerds have done to change the political landscape haven't had anything to do (directly) with elections. Because our power and potential is bigger than any politician.
I'm Canadian, but I do hope Obama wins, In the recent weeks, I've been working on getting work in the US, I think it would be nice to expand my computer consulting horizons. As I've been following US politics for the last 10 yrs, I do think Obama is indeed going to be a great president. I would consider moving to the US if a president like Obama was elected!
But really, the problem with Obama, like anything else, are the myths propagated by others, or the misinformation about him. I say that anyone who wishes to help Obama (nerds included), only need to ensure that the facts are made clear to anyone willing to listen.
Nerds and the web, can obviously create ads for Obama such as "did you know" blurbs on their websites for example.
It's not about tricking people into voting for Obama, but about ensuring he's clearly understood by people. So, anyone who can clearly explain who Obama is, what he stands for and most of all, get his message across, is obviously going to help!
... should be smart enough to see that neither party works and would start their own.
OK, flame away. :P
1. Vote third party.
2. If not third party, vote AGAINST the incumbent.
3. If incumbent is unchallenged, abstain in protest.
I'd run myself, but if I'm asked about my Christian Faith, I'd have to lie. I'm a shitty liar. I'm in the Bible belt here, so it comes up.
"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.
If you want to stop voting for the lesser of two evils, stop voting for the flawed two-party system. Simply vote third party to show that you want to be involved but hate the choices given to us by the corporate controlled parties.
It doesn't matter if you vote for Chuck Baldwin, Bob Barr, Cynthia McKinney, Ralph Nader or Alan Keyes.
People need to start demanding that these 3rd party candidates get air time and in the debates. I'm really hoping that google or someone else has a debate with some of these candidates.
The best thing you can do to make real change and a difference is to take over your local government and work up. Get some friends and like minded people and start running for city council, judges, etc....
If you have something that you dont want anyone to know, maybe you shouldnt be doing it in the first place -Eric Schmidt
Lets say you are pulling for Obama. Go into Call of Duty 4 and change your name to "McCain 2008" and run around with the shotgun. Or go play Counter-strike and change your name to "McCain Roxors" and camp in a dark corner with a sniper rifle.
You can also go into people's skype channels and spam your love for the candidate that you do not want to win. People will be so put-off by your actions that you may just swing an independent in the opposite direction!
Hack the Gibson.
"(6) can be done as a hobby"
Affecting a political outcome and changing the policies of your government is NOT a fucking hobby. If you want change you need to put forth commitment and while this might not be a full-time job, it is a second job at the very least. This is not another fucking coding project you can fork if you don't like the way things are going, you can't call others noobs, and you actually have to learn something about social interaction if you want others to listen to your ideas. If you treat this like another OSS project then it will languish in code hell, a perpetual alpha with the occasional vulture picking at the carcass every now and then.
In these days of sloppy journalism and down right bias on mainstream channels in the US then surely the most "effective" is to learn from the real scum of the political process the people who do the anonymous negative campaigning, shooting malicious falsehoods out into the world via leaflets and other approaches.
Nerds could go hugely further than this by creating fake sites, bombarding social networking sites and editing wikipedia to spread these rumours and even create "verifiable" sources. Low quality videos suggesting illegal or immoral behaviour could be uploaded onto YouTube and main stream news channels could be bombarded with votes/emails/text pushing an agenda, view or revelation.
Oh or did you mean what nerds could do on their own rather than what they will be paid to do in this campaign?
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
You mean the guy who voted for telco immunity? The guy whose vice-presidential nominee is a MAFIAA crony?
Remind me why I should support either him *OR* the equally scummy McCain?
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
The other one is an EMP blast.
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
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.
Like "refactoring" from DOS 2.1 to include all the support for all the advancements in the technology since 1983 till now, while still being able to run on the 1983. computers - with exactly the same performance like today's computers.
There ARE times when you should just say "OK, let us start from scratch".
You know... what Microsoft should have done with Windows instead of Vista.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
I've never seen any proof that the party holding control of the executive branch has any impact on the economy.
You make the mistake of assuming that our current economic situation would be different had a democrat been in office. That somehow lenders wouldn't have been making bad loans to people who couldn't afford them. That somehow oil prices would be much lower.
The 'tone' in Washington, as far as I can tell - never changes. It's the same the last 8 years as the 8 years prior.
It tickles me that you think McCain and Obama are fundamentally different. Maybe you thought Democrats taking over congress meant something too. They said it would, when they won they said things would change. Guess what?
And if you want to get hung up on policy in regards to technology, I have one name for you - Biden. Yeah, that's just awesome news for all the nerds out there.
I don't care because there are two candidates who stand for exactly the same things in 2 slightly different packages. You care because you've invested yourself in the propaganda of 1 of the 2 sides. I have lots of friends who've done the same for the other side and think the world will end if Obama gets elected. I'm glad they spend most of their time burning all their energy up at the partisan sites like huffpo, lgf, etc. That way I don't have to hear it.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
I think the point is to convince other people not to vote.
It's actually a sound idea, couched in cynicism. Some people really shouldn't vote. For instance, everyone that doesn't care enough to find their own way to the polls. If they have to be dragged kicking and screaming all the way by volunteers, I don't want their crappy, underinformed vote influencing the election.
Right now, the elections are basically a coin toss, in part because of all the misguided "get out the vote" programs. Yes, you have a right and a duty to participate, but if you're derelict in your duty, you should be punished, not prodded along. That punishment should be that your voice gets unheard.
Turning the election into a random event with nearly equal probability (partially an effect of McCain's very legislation) was not a good road to go down for this country.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
You may upgrade your intellect now.
True confidence comes not from realising you are as good as your peers, but that your peers are as bad as you are.
Sorry, I'm just pissed off at the micro-issue morons. Gun control, telco immunity, abortion rights, etc. These "micro-issues' distract from the whole.
You aren't going to EVER get someone with whom you agree with 100% all the time unless its you.
Weigh the pros and cons of the two candidates, CAREFULLY, and think about who will best serve the country as a whole. Weigh the VP choice as well, McCain is old enough to die or become incapacitated and Obama is black, I can imagine the KKK or some white supremacy group trying to off him ASAP. Those guys are scary crazy, if you think islamic terrorists are crazy, you haven't seen the KKK. They'll kill a black man with no remorse, they enjoy it. (It isn't a racist troll and don't tell me you haven't heard it before. I'm just an engineer looking at the potential issues.)
Third party? Don't be an idiot. A third party will not get elected in this cycle, maybe we can work for a viable third party over time, but not now.
This election is IMPORTANT. Don't screw around and take your citizenship and right to vote seriously. Vote for the best all around package, knowing full well that there are no perfect people, and they will disagree with you on various issues, but *mostly* represent you.
As for the micro-issues:
Telco immunity. Think about this, yea, they should have been nailed to the wall, but they WERE ordered by the government to do something. It is hard to resist being compelled like that. The real prosecution should be against BushCo. If a cop told you to help him, you'd feel compelled to help. If it is illegal, the cop is responsible, not you.
RIAA, well that's the courts and congress. We need to fight it there.
Eight years ago your post would be: "These two candidates are the same guy! I'm voting for Nader!"
Do you honestly thing Gore would have run things just like Bush?
Now, do you honestly thing McCain would run things just like Obama?
Enough with the protest voting, we should mobilize people and teach them to vote for their best interests, not teaching them to be cynical and become protest voters.
Yep - all of them. Every person in the country who labels themselves Christian is a simplistic idiot that can't understand even the most basic of things. Thank God I have an atheist friend to log into slashdot for me, interpret my grunt-like muttering and type up responses on my behalf. Gotta go back to putting down the women and colored folk now.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
Plenty of partisan nutjobs cast their votes for reasons less substantial than 'he looks better on TV'.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
I'll be on the ballot for the US House of Representatives for Florida's 15th Congressional district.
http://lowing08.com/
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
It's not just young people. Older people vote based on what they read in the paper, what they're told by talk radio, and what they see on TV (or just what someone said down at the barbershop/hair stylist or the bingo hall).
Mass ignorance is the reason that the US democracy was set up to eliminate votes from the system, starting by preventing people from voting for all sorts of reasons (though race and sex were part of it, there were also issues of land ownership, literacy, and other items eliminated previously).
Since we've decided that everyone's vote must count, we have to deal with this issue by attempting to educate people, not by bemoaning their ignorance. At least some of these uses of modern tools are trying to educate people, though obviously in a self-serving manner wherever possible.
-PainKilleR-[CE]
It lets bad people do bad things with little resistance.
Jim Jones and Adolf Hitler stirred the emotions of the people, and the people followed them almost without question to disastrous results. We need a president who will try to convince us he is right and follow him, not one who will be assumed right because everybody loves him.
There's the problem with feeling instead of thinking. The Republican Congress ended the recession with sound fiscal policy, aided by the dot com boom. Clinton also saved a lot of money by not asking Congress for it in the area of defense, and look where that got us as he let Al Qaeda grow for a decade, doing nothing about it. Now we get to pay a lot more due to his laxity.
Democratic leadership is just itching for their turn at the helm of the war machine.
WWI
WWII
Korea
Vietnam
Those weren't Republican Presidents who entered us into those wars. You're sadly mistaken if you think the Democrats want less war. What the Democratic leadership wants their own wars that benefit them financially and benefit them politically. They've said they had enough of Bush's war only because it doesn't help them. Have you not noticed how the all powerful Democrats in the house and senate, and Pelosi made promises of getting the U.S. out of the Iraq situation....have faded away?
Democrats know just like they've always known, war is profitable, war can help you win elections....and they're pissed of that the Republicans have stolen this page out of their playbook.
Just face it. You're a goddamn sheep, who believe the kumbaya song the Dems are singing is real.
It's not. It never has been.
Yea, because voting for someone other than democrat or republican is a waste of time, even if you don't agree with the democratic or republican political platforms.
I hate printers.
He is hosting a "Rally for the Republic," in Minneapolis, MN the same time the RNC is going on which has so far sold 10,000 out of 15,000 tickets at $17.76 a piece. How many Presidential contenders in history can say that?
Ron Paul has said many times that his campaign for President exceeded every one of his expectations. His goal wasn't to win the Presidency, but to inject different ideas into the race.
The goal for his continued campaign is to get like minded people into every facet of government. There are tons of "Ron Paul Republicans" running for office everywhere around the country. How many other Presidential contenders in history can say that?
If you have something that you dont want anyone to know, maybe you shouldnt be doing it in the first place -Eric Schmidt
It could be worse - he could have been giving arms & equipment to Al Qaeda. Man, I'm glad we've never had any presidents who were stupid enough to do that...
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
1. Use a deniable encryption scheme to encode a document which has multiple plaintexts, each describing your intent to rig the election in favour of a different candidate.
2. Send the encrypted multiple-plaintext document to the news media.
3. After the election, send along the appropriate key.
4. Singlehandedly psycho-disenfranchise the electorate without ever doing anything illegal. Good job, you anti-democracy terrorist, you!
But if these people don't vote, who will vote for them?
Voter turnout is historically the lowest for middle and lower income people, so if the well-to-do merely vote their pocket books and can dupe enough other people through flag-waving, we could easily get another Gilded age.
Oh wait...it's already here?
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
Every year, when we get close to the election, tons of people come out of the woodwork and say, "Both candidates are evil, I've lost my will to vote, I'll vote third party. Why can't they ever nominate someone good?"
If you recall, tons of people said "Both Al Gore and George Bush are lame politicians" in 1999. Many of those people didn't vote. And simply because Al Gore seemed dull, we lost out on the chance to have a politician who really cared about environmental issues and who would have applied some moderation to the response to terrorism instead of going cowboy.
The trouble is, people, in general, are flawed. The sheer number of decisions a person has to make each and every day means that some of them will be wrong. It's simply not possible to find "a good candidate," because every human being has made a mistake in the past. Part of the reason Senators don't usually become Presidents is that they have a solid, visible voting record and lots of conflicting demands on their votes, so that anyone can point to and say "Haha! This one decision was wrong! You can't be trusted!" By contrast, Governors and Generals seem to have less visible records, so people can't play the "gotcha" game as often.
Please stop thinking that an election is a chance to find a perfect person and vote for him or her. That's not the way elections work; if you keep waiting for a perfect candidate you'll never vote. Elections work by presenting you with candidates, and you get to judge which of them you think will do the best job.
I'll confess this: in 1999, I listened to the candidates and decided that I would be a John McCain supporter. I decided to support him because I looked at Bill Bradley, Al Gore, George Bush, and him, and I decided McCain seemed like the best leader. Unfortunately, after the election, everything I learned about McCain gradually turned negative and everything I learned about Al Gore reinforced his solid reputation. In this campaign, I know a little about Obama and (I think) a fair amount about McCain. Both of them have had to abandon their key supporters to reach across the aisle and compromise with others, but I find McCain's decisions more wrong than Obama's.
Obama showed great courage not backing a junkie's-quick-fix approach to gasoline prices.
McCain supports creationism / intelligent design in schools.
McCain sponsored an amendment to ban torture, and then meekly backed away when George Bush announced that he'd ignore the law.
I'm voting for Obama. I may not agree with everything he does, but I think he's the best person to repair the damage that Bush has done to our country.
One thing you can do that isn't blindingly partisan is to volunteer as an election judge. Election staff are in short supply in many places in the country, and as new (insecure) equipment has been purchased by states, a lot of older staff have retired from the process, overwhelmed by the march of technology. Being a geek is a good fit for this problem.
More staff at the polls makes things run more smoothly, and that encourages turnout in future elections, and even in current ones when people who stayed away hear on Election Day that the line moved quickly, and decide to head in and vote after all. Bigger turnout generally favors Democrats, so if you want to help Obama this is a good thing to do.
But even if you support McCain or someone else, it's a fun, interesting experience, and you'll be helping the country express itself. A lot of staff positions at the polls require a member of each major party, so both Republicans and Democrats are needed to staff the polls sufficiently.
Voting is how we buy in to the government we end up with; even when we vote the loser, we participate in the process and that makes us stakeholders. When you become part of the election process, you facilitate this for your community.
The 2000 election was decided by less than 600 votes in Florida. About 90,000 Floridians voted for Nader that year. If only 1% of those Nader voters could see what the future held.
Seriously. Don't vote for the candidate who merely claims to serve your interests. Vote for the one who will lay the cultural groundwork for the change you wish to see in your country.
It's up to you to be that change, regardless of who wins.
--- The American Way of Life is not a birthright. Hell, it's not even sustainable.
There was a really extreme campaign in Florida where Republicans discouraged blacks, Hispanics, and other traditionally Democratic voters from going to the polls
I lived in Florida for five years. There are so many Hispanics there that there are places there you can't buy a pack of cigarettes without knowing how to speak Spanish. However, the Hispanic population is so Republican I doubt seriously you could find a hundred Hispanic Democrats in the whole state. If the Republicans were asking "proof of citizenship" in Floride, they would have shot themselves in the foot.
Methinks they understand Florida quite a bit better than you do.
As to the question "What non-obvious things can nerds who are so inclined do to help the Democrats win in November?" I'd like to know why the submitter thinks that nerds as a whole will be voting Democrat?
I've split my vote on every election, as I imagine most of my fellow nerds do, since by definition nerds are too smart to fall for partisan politics.
This election on the one hand you have a doddering old fool who supports the current clusterfuck of an administration. On the other hand you have a wholly inexperienced political hack from the most corrupt city in the nation, in the most corrupt state in the Union (mine). Here in Illinois we're so patriotic even being dead doen't keep us from voting. Our last Governor is in Prison, our current governor may be there next because of his ties to convicted felon Tony Rezko, who Obama has ties to as well (the Rezko sleazeball has ties to politicians of both Democrat and Republican arms of the Corporate Party).
I'll be voting "none of the above" (Libertarian, Green, or Constitution) this election, as I can't bring myself to vote for a candidate who is beholden to nobody but the corporations again. The DMCA, Bono Act, FISA, PATRIOT act, all were voted in with almost 100% vote from both arms of the Corporate Party. Why should I vote for a person or party who almost always votes against my interest on bills? A pox on both their houses.
If you consider yourself a Democrat or a Republican, I don't think you're smart enough to be a nerd. Sorry, that's my opinion. Real nerds don't fall for Jedi mind tricks.
Whoever wins, I fear that the present Preseident has fuX0red things up so badly that if you vote for the winner, you vote for Herbert Hoover.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
...lesser of evils, I'll stay Peter Pan.
That is a childish perspective, progress is made in steps. Is there one candidate who you think is any better than the other, even by a little bit?
If you don't think so, you are a fool. There are many differences in these candidates and I can't believe they could be seen as "equally bad."
So, you lose the opportunity to affect the outcome to make it less worse.
Maturity is patience. The old people keep winning because they know patience wins, the young people keep losing because they think they can change things over night.
Neither Obama or McCain does very well on the issues we care about like Net Neutrality, security theatre by DHS, the Patriot Act, letting the MAFIAA have whatever they want etc. It's too late for this election because what nerds need to do first is make themselves felt as bloc that will fund this candidate or that or votes for this candidate or that based on the things that are important to use.
We also need something like GeekPAC but with a more public image friendly name that actually works to serve as a set of faces politicians learn to associate with these issues. Politicians fear groups like the NRA and AARP. We have the numbers and the dollars to inspire that same sort of respect. It is a matter of leadership.
WWI
WWII
Korea
Vietnam
It's definitely true that foreign policy is one of the areas in which the differences between the two parties narrow, despite the popular conceptions.
But there's a couple of problems with this thesis. The biggest one I can think of is the radically different nature of the wars on that list. Another one is the fact that the post-Vietnam Era Democratic party was already becoming fairly different from the pre-Vietnam Era Democratic party... and all your examples belong to the earlier period.
Ultimately, though, I think the biggest problematic assumption is that Democratic voters themselves are a bunch of Kumbaya hippies. I'm sure there's some real pacifist contingent that genuinely believes violence is never ever the answer, but my experience suggests that it's not particularly more common among the dems than isolationist philosophies are among the republicans.
Tweet, tweet.
Vietnam was over 30 years ago and the Democratic involvement was over 40 years ago. The individuals who made those decisions are out of politics or dead. Parties change platforms all the time. A significant example is when LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act and the Dems went from being Dixie-crats to progressives.
The Republicans freed the slaves, and so as a black man I'm going to vote Republican this time around. *rolls eyes*
Please do not put much value on what a given party did historically, but rather what the party's leading candidates are most likely going to do given their own personal history. Yes, the Democrats were in charge as we jumped into a number of wars. However at the moment the Democrats want the support of those who are upset about the whole Iraq thing. Therefore they're playing the anti-war card. It's not that complicated.
There is some merit to your mention of the fact that many of the anti-war claims from the Democrats aren't quite what they were a number of months ago. This is not, however, even remotely related to the fact they were in charge as we went into WWI.
"A witty saying proves nothing." - Voltaire