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We The People Petition Signature Requirement Bumped To 100,000
New submitter schneidafunk writes with news that the White House is raising the signature requirement for petitions from 25,000 to 100,000. From the source: "When we first raised the threshold — from 5,000 to 25,000 — we called it 'a good problem to have.' Turns out that 'good problem' is only getting better, so we're making another adjustment to ensure we’re able to continue to give the most popular ideas the time they deserve. ... In the first 10 months of 2012, it took an average of 18 days for a new petition to cross the 25,000-signature threshold. In the last two months of the year, that average time was cut in half to just 9 days, and most petitions that crossed the threshold collected 25,000 signatures within five days of their creation. More than 60 percent of the petitions to cross threshold in all of 2012 did so in the last two months of the year."
"We're so pleased at the response, we're going to make it that much more difficult to earn a response from this office. Good luck!"
Shenanigans.
Next stop, 1 Million!
Yay.
"Helping to keep you two steps ahead of the Thought Police!"
Stop Collaborating!
"We got tired of answering crazy shit like building a Death Star or putting a Starbucks on the moon, so we want to make it more difficult for the people to express crazy shit while still looking like we give a damn about them."
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it! --Longbottle
Thanks to those who started petitions for Master Chief statues, roaming motorcycle gangs of justices, and Death Stars. Without you folks making jokes out of serious attempts to make political headway on important issues, we might not have had our collective voices diluted. Making a mockery of those interested in forcing the white house to defend, or oppose, or otherwise make a solid stand of issues sure is helpful.
Let's see what nonsense you can come up with to raise that threshold from 100,000 to 250,000.
More Twoson than Cupertino
at 9 days for 25,000 (if that rate is sustainable) were looking at 36 days to hit 100,000 on a 30 day petition... well played white house
This petition, asking the White House to censure the prosecutor responsible for Aaron Swartz' felony case, will need a lot more signatures if they apply this standard to it. So now would be a good time to go sign it.
Crap, broken link. This one should work.
I can get 25,000 people to sign a petition that the world is flat and that everyone should be required to wear their underwear on the outside of their clothes. Yes, that is one petition that says both of those.
A milion people willing to click to support an idea is still less than 1% of the U.S. population. For an online poll 100,000 is very reasonable.
I'd rather them raise the cap and actually look at petitions than leave it low and just give lip service to them.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Getting 100,000 signatures on a petition to lower the requirement to 50,000 might have just the right touch of irony ...
Like a good neighbor, fsck is there
This petition, asking the White House to censure the prosecutor responsible for Aaron Swartz' felony case, will need a lot more signatures if they apply this standard to it. So now would be a good time to go sign it.
Tomorrow would be a good time too, since the limit only applies to _new_ petitions, not existing ones.
If you look at the link you provided, it clearly states that the goal was 25,000, not 100,000.
Wouldn't this mean that if the majority of Americans wanted a Death Star...then a Death Star they shall have? If no action is taken then impeachment!!! Maybe the government is just compiling a list of people who's votes should be filtered out if they sign a petition that the government is not to keen on? Maybe they are compiling a list of people who aren't following suit and should be dealt with? I say tacos for all...
Bump it to 250,000 signatures. If we're going to take this whole idea seriously, talking to the White House here, bump it to a significant amount already. That would be roughly, 1 out of every 1250 supporting official comment on a matter.
The link is near the end of the article. This is great, because now other entities can solicit opinions similarly.
Dark Helmet: 25,000 people is too low.
Colonel Sandurz: 25,000 is too low?
Dark Helmet: Yes, we'll have to go right to... 100,000 people!
Colonel Sandurz: 100,000? Sir, we've never gone that far before! I don't know if the people can take it!
Dark Helmet: What's the matter Colonel Sandurz? Chicken?
Colonel Sandurz: Prepare the people -- Prepare the people for 100,000! Fasten all seat belts, seal all entrances and exits, close all shops in the mall! Cancel the three ring circuis! Secure all animals in the zoo!
Just add {In Space!} to anything.
You can't raise the threshold high enough to weed out the stupid ideas because a lot of them are popular - the Texas succession petition got 125k. That said, the petition system was never going to be useful in the first place, so at least we're not using anything valuable.
I'm sure it'd be easy to get a couple million signatures on something controversial. Why not enable negative signatures?
God spoke to me
What about higher thresholds with bigger results?
Spitballing the specifics:
Get 10 million and news networks need to devote time to its discussion.
Get 50 million and it needs to go before congress as a bill.
Ensuring only the squeakiest of hinges get the oil.
Doesn't mean they won't increase the limit for existing petitions. And in any case, it would be really great if this petition made it to 100k, because it would be taken more seriously. If not by the White House, then by the press, which has started paying attention to these petitions.
Even tools that are only supposed to make us FEEL like we have a voice in government are being lifted out of the average Joe's reach and placed only in the hands of those with resources (i.e. money, and/or people).
It's even more ironic that this is (by chance) being done during Obama's presidency. The voice of the people was gonna be heard under this president. It was gonna be different. Riiiiiight...
Maybe the White House is coming to their senses. Giving it away for free is more work, while small, one-on-one meetings with a fat check are more productive.
They should change the name from "We The People" to "Why We Won't Listen".
I mean, seriously - has any petition on that site been acted upon? Does the number of petitioners even matter?
The site was only a stop-gap measure to give people hope in the credibility of the federal government. It's run its course as people have realized how pointless it is.
It was total PR, it's purpose was to address growing anger at the federal government and defuse some of the "Occupy Wall Street" demonstrations.
How about don't raise the amount of signatures required, but require them to be, ya know, actual signatures on actual pieces of paper. Yeah, petitions by mail can be gamed too, but at least this way they might reduce the number of frivolous '1-click' petitioners while also not looking like they are reducing access to the government.
If your idea goes against the Party, it will not be considered. Thanks!
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
If the president likes the idea, he will do it. If he doesn't, he will dismiss it out of hand. It doesn't matter what the petition says of how many signatures it gets. It only serves to act as propaganda to bolster any idea that he likes. The colonists had an equal chance to petition their king over 200 years ago - and the result would have been the same.
Or has the response to each one on this website typically been something along the lines of "No, and here's why not"?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
It's all joke petitions, I haven't seen an actual response to a legitimate one.
I'd rather sign a petition to remove the prosecutor who keeps shutting down my favorite weed shops.
Because responding to a petition to eliminate (or reform -- I can't remember) the TSA by having the HEAD OF THE F***ING TSA tell us about the awesomeness of his department, and completely ignoring the issues raised by the petitioners isn't making a joke of the process?
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
They haven't been replying to all the petitions that met the requirements, so why do they need to raise the requirements?
If we waste their time with death star petitions, this seems like a totally natural move on their part.
this is just a forum for the prez to pick and choose what he wants to respond to. maybe we should petition to just shut down the website.
That's the problem. Actual participation in the political process isn't very popular. Joke petitions are.
By raising the limit, they've guaranteed a higher percentage of Death Star/birther/secession petitions, and culled out petitions with actual merit. Sorry, the only real solution is to say that if your petition doesn't pass the laugh test, we won't answer it no matter how many signatures you have. And that's gonna really piss off the birthers...
Their official response to the death star petition was *hilarious*, which of course encourages similar shenanigans. Responses to absurd petitions should be concise and boring. "This idea is not financially or technologically possible at this time."
It's not the bogus ones that are the problem.
The oddball crazy ones you can just have some low level staffer dismiss as not serious. The ones that are funny and you get points for answering in a humorous way like the Death Star one are great PR.
It's the ones that present more thorny issues, and or are being asked by people who are serious but you disagree with that are the problem.
You can't ignore them completely if they get the required number.
You also can't just have them brushed off with a "thank you please come again" reply. It's an official response, and can be quoted against you if it's thoughtlessly or flippantly written. And just writing "no comment" could be even worse.
So, it's better for them to have a higher bar for having to answer.
A few might have a non-trivial PR factor (ie the Aaron Schwartz petition), and a few others have made good jokes, but does anyone know of a petition that has actually made a political difference?
I stole this Sig
You should do that too. I think they are part of the same problem: a complete lack of sensible prioritization on the part of the DoJ, and a complete failure on the part of Congress to help the DoJ by eliminating bad priorities like pot prohibition and suppression of dissent.
Yyyyeah, I imagine a lot of people were.
The governent is supposed to be FOR the people, not act as a dictatorship.
If there's thousands upon thousands of people from all over the country, from all walks of life and all economic situations are all screaming for the EXACT SAME THING, and have been for DECADES, the proper response would moreso be "ok, we'll get on that, because we represent the people", not "AAAHAHAHA! Seriously go fuck yourselves, all of you."
What this does show is that Democracy is a totally flawed and broken way to select leaders for a nation. The same people who signed the death star petition are also allowed to vote in general elections. Is it a wonder we then end up with such destructive governments as those headed by Obama, Bush and Clinton? No, its not.
Sam has one liberty, which he sacrifices for one security. Can you tell me what Sam has now?
Just allow people to vote against a stupid petition. The requirement = Support - Against >= 25000 signatures.
is for getting you on some government watch list. Your best bet is to lay low, stay off the net and ride it out until this whole thing comes to a head and we are in full blown civil war. Give it time...
The last vestiges of democracy died when intelligence gathering on the Internet allowed those in charge to monitor, in real-time, the consequences of various forms of political propaganda. 'First past the post' systems are inherently vulnerable to rigging, when you can both control the propaganda influencing voters, and analyse the response to that propaganda immediately after it goes out.
First-past-the-post is the tyranny of the most easily influenced majority. In our modern age, only a true proportional representation voting scheme with national tallies, and no 'cut-offs' for less popular parties, would maintain a democratic process. Most so-called 'political correctness' education has been designed to ensure the sheep NEVER ask for this system, on the excuse that 'extremist' parties would achieve very minor representation, and that is a BAD thing.
America is almost unique in using so-called 'freedom of speech' as a tool to stop people demanding changes to the voting system. You see, any minority in the USA, no matter how reviled, can protest or speak out. Americans are conned into thinking this is just as good as these minorities having (minor) political representation, but of course it is not the same thing at all.
Worse, the sheep are brainwashed into bleating how terrible it would be to have massive plurality (and party fragmentation) in the political chambers. They are told to love the two-party system, and never to question the (lack) of choice it offers. Indeed, worse, they are instructed never to notice it is actually two faces of the same beast- simply swapping heads depending on whether the controlling elites need to do so-called 'right-wing' or 'left-wing' things in the current period- like one person controlling the hot and cold taps to run a bath of the desired temperature.
So, with votes no longer having any importance at all, the sheep need to be confused and bedazzled with garbage like official governmental online petitions. The owners of sites like Slashdot will play their part, and give maximum publicity to these distractions. You see, the owners of Slashdot KNOW that if you are dribbling about petitions to build a deathstar, you aren't thinking about Obama's terrorists (the US recruited, trained, armed and transported them) mass murdering students at university in Aleppo, Syria.
After you finish dribbling about 'deathstars' you can go watch the zionist extremists behind 'Robot Chicken' hilariously depict the nuclear destruction of the entire population of Iran (latest episode), creating a false link between Iran and Al Qaeda as they do so (the zionists never miss a trick) . You Yanks should be ashamed of yourselves for being manipulated by such low grade devices.
Why you ask?
1- In this day and age everyone has access to the internet. Hell I can sit on a toilet at a truck stop in the middle of nowhere and get on the internet on my phone. So with millions more people being online in the US than there used to be say 5 or 10 years ago it makes sense to adjust the required amount accordingly. Its like having a school vote with 100 kids and you need between 51 and 100 votes for your side to win, then suddenly the next year 2,000 kids transfer to the school and you still are using the system meant for 100 kids when voting.
2-People are constantly, always making stupid petitions for the dumbest shit imagineable and for no reason at all. Atleast making it 500,000 would cut down maybe and stop wasting everyones time. People think that every little thing should be petitioned and that every little thing is a catastrophe that needs to be petitioned before mankind is destroyed.
If they would cut back the amount of bullshit petitions like that incredibly idiotic death star one then maybe some real ones might get noticed but as it is now they wont get noticed because of the flood of immature and dumb ones.
Lets look at some of these gems... 1. officially recognize the Sasquatch as an indigenous species and have them lawfully protected by laws banning any hunting. 2. Teach public school children the truth: ANTI-RACIST IS A CODE WORD FOR ANTI-WHITE! 3. ban hammers and baseball bats. 4. Save the Lewpty-Lew! 5. Direct the United States Mint to make a single platinum trillion dollar coin! Among others. Why wouldn't they choose to increase the number of signatures required?
Disagreeing with you does not make me a troll.
Silly proles, do you really think these petitions are going to do any good? Ingsoc has too many resources tied up in the war with Eastasia and Eurasia and no time for your nonsense.
Typical federal government operation: Keep moving the bar to squeeze out the citizens.
Why not just say they'll answer the top X% of petitions? Or even better, handle the single highest petition one at a time? Just take whatever's on top, address it, and then move to the next highest petition?
Or if they have a group doing it, each takes one of the top 10 petitions.
Pulp Audio Weekly - Geek News and Reviews
A) The USA wasn't designed as a "Democracy", the design is for a Constitutional Republic, where "the people" are strictly limited to selecting the representatives.
B) The USA hasn't been a Constitutional Republic for some time, but instead is a de facto corporate oligarchy, where corporate interests are the determining factor in politics.
(A) would have been a good thing, but we were unable to keep it, just as we were warned. A Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for dinner -- hence the need for (A) in the first place.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Your opinion has been returned for misspelling. Report to the canteen for KP at 0400.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Doesn't matter as long as it remains impossible to find anyone in government to tackle actual issues.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
The death penalty is inhumane and should be banned; however, applying it to lawyers and ex-politicians is just, as they are not human.
When they serve, in their "great patriotism" ... they should know that their life is forfeit afterwards - then maybe we can regard them higher than soldiers (as they themselves already do.)
Wake up to the other aspect of politics, watch the classic: Yes, Prime Minister.
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
Build a death star.
Enlist the idiots that voted for a death star as storm troopers.
Blow up death star.
Problem solved.
Someone who isn't so lazy should petition that our petition be responded to after signatures. Wait... are they Facebooking us out?
The death star petition failed with the old threshold.
IMHO they're just trying to head off a slew of petitions as fallout from the recent gun restriction proposals.
The NRA, starting from 4 million members, added another quarter million new recruits in less than a month and is still expanding rapidly. Watch for the white house staffers to raise the threshold again. B-)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
The death star petition failed with the old threshold.
Oops. I heard it had failed, but just checked and found out I'd heard wrong. Mea Culpa.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
The petition to fire her assistant, Steve Heymann, who "wanted a high-profile computer crime conviction," [1] needs help as well.
Howdy howdy howdy
"If you look at the link you provided, it clearly states that the goal was 25,000, not 100,000."
39,573 at 11:38pm, 1/16/13. 40,000 in 4 days, at that rate only 6 days to 100,000 anyway. I guess they better think of a worthy response as many of these people keep things working and most likely voted for the man. Better pucker up.
This is EXACTLY the reason they raised the threshold. Murderous copyrat bastards.
No thanks, the prosecutor did nothing wrong. http://www.volokh.com/2013/01/14/aaron-swartz-charges/
Oh but that doesn't work with you're mob justice.
640K should be enough for anybody.
No brain, no pain.
We value your opinion about our Petition, but we cannot respond to it because it does not meet our threshold for action;
1) Petitions in the past that didn't involve emotional please like "save puppies from beatings" have been largely ignored.
2) Unless the petition is attached to a check from a major corporation, it is ignored.
3) You lack credibility. Everyone but the media and your press agent know you are owned.
4) We've already conducted a useless exercise in our civic obligations, responding to your empty response would be redundant.
5) The only point of this petition in the first place was more as a manifesto, to explain our actions when one of us goes on a killing spree one day.
>>"ad space available -- low rates!!!"
From now on, at least 100,000,000 signatures will be required for us to bat an eye.
-The Administration
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
Doesn't mean they won't increase the limit for existing petitions.
Obtuse idiot.
Tomorrow would be a good time too, since the limit only applies to _new_ petitions, not existing ones.
This new threshold applies only to petitions created from this point forward and is not retroactively applied to ones that already exist.
Why not make a petition to lower the threshold to 25,000?
This is an old problem with group behavior, and it is completely solvable.
To fix the process, the Whitehouse just needs to define what it wants that site to accomplish, and then determine the optimum signature threshold that will generate petitions and responses it wants to deal with. I don't think those Whitehouse bureaucrats have any idea of what they could accomplish with their site -- or even how to go about thinking about it. This is a great opportunity for them, and they are blowing it.
If I were running that site, I'd also run polls on issues that are important to the President. I'd post brief summaries of important Bills or policy alternatives and post links to more information. I'd post links to every single Comment page on a Federal Government website -- and if you don't know what a comment page is; I don't blame you. There are dozens (if not hundreds) of them, and our government hasn't exactly publicized their existence.
I'd also use the site to post my own brief, informal news items and policy updates for visitors. I'd encourage well-placed government officials the chance to blog on this site. I'd make sure to keep the guys who run whitehouse Communications off the site, to minimize the bureaucratic hot air that sneaks onto most government websites. I might even appoint a well-informed community director, to give the site a personal voice and to drum up visitors. I'd add some forums for visitor discussion, and I'd reach out to social media.
If I were an activist interested in all this; I'd publicize the petitions and I'd make fun of the more foolish Government responses. I'd regularly criticize the whole effort in order to encourage these foolish bureaucrats to improve their effort. I might start my own website that acted as a hub page to publicize current petitions, and to offer visitors a chance to post critical reviews of the Administration's general effort. I'll bet you can think of another dozen approaches and issues even better than these I've listed here -- my point is, that there are interesting things we could do about the Government's petition website besides striking cynical holier-than-thou poses about it. That's so 1990s.
sc
Why the threshold? The Constitution doesn't specify a threshold. And what happens when it's met? Will it be automatically carried out? Will it be sent to the President? Will it get a response? Who cares? There's nothing in the law or the Constitution that says anything has to happen.They could set the limit to one and then fail to do anything at all.
Oh, and how do we know everyone who signed is a citizen? Maybe Al Qaeda is behind the Death Star petition, and they are just trying to see if we'll go for it.
What that article says is that the prosecutor's interpretation of the law was within the law. That may be so, but is not the point being disputed. The point being disputed is whether the prosecutor's reading of the law, and the vigorousness with which the case was pursued even after JSTOR asked that it be dropped, represents malfeasance, misfeasance, or what we actually would like prosecutors to do.
The point of the petition is that the signatories to it believe that the prosecutor acted so overzealously that her behavior can be described as misfeasance. It is not that there was no legal basis whatsoever for bringing the charges she brought.
A terrorist is a freedom fighter who isn't on your side.
Casteism
I wrote this petition the other day, only to find out that before it even becomes visible on the web site, it has to gain 150 signatures. However, I never use Facebook & Twitter, so I can't do as they suggest and use those sites to get people to sign it. I only post on Slashdot, and even here I refuse to register an account, and so no one sees my posts. Perhaps you can help.