Date: Tue, 4 Oct 1994 15:09:19 -0700 From: Jim Warren Subject: GovAccess.068: GovAccess WWW; Vote Smart; high-tech candidate; codes disks WEB WOVEN AROUND GOVACCESS GLOBS >From www@vax.sonoma.edu Tue Sep 27 11:46:02 1994 From: www@vax.sonoma.edu (Salazar Library Webmaster) I've collected your past issues from a colleague and put them on the WWW in full-text-searchable form. I'm playing with ways to do this with lots of different listservs, and have a sort of system working. If you are interested, try the URL: http://www.sonoma.edu/experiment.html Thanks for all the hard work, cjh C. Joe Holmes Webmaster, Salazar Library Sonoma State University http://www.sonoma.edu/ ------------------------------ THE *OUTSTANDING*, NONPARTISAN "PROJECT VOTE SMART" IS NOW ONLINE! >From gklaas@rabbit.rgm.com Thu Sep 29 10:06:11 1994 From: gklaas@rabbit.rgm.com (Gerald J. Klaas) PROJECT VOTE SMART is a Non-Profit / Non-Partisan Organization. PROJECT VOTE SMART OFFICES: 129 NW 4th Street, #204 Corvallis, OR 97330 (503) 754-2746 E-MAIL: pvs@neu.edu HOTLINE: 1-800-622-SMART (7627) FROM THE 35,000 MEMBERS OF PROJECT VOTE SMART ... Hundreds of citizens are volunteering to make Project Vote Smart possible. Month after month they labor to assemble an enormous system of factual information on over 2,000 candidates who want to represent you. This Voter's Self-Defense System arms millions of Americans with the power of democracy's most awesome political weapon. Shattering the candidates' ability to manipulate and abuse them, through Project Vote Smart a source of accurate information is being put directly into the hands of the people. This data is a small portion of that continuing effort. PROJECT VOTE SMART COMPONENTS Voter's Research Hotline Our volunteer researchers can tell you what your representatives or candidates are doing for you or to you: * their voting record in over 20 key issue areas * biographical details of their service in Congress * performance evaluations by 70 liberal to conservative organizaions * who has paid for their campaigns * their telephone numbers and mailing addresses * their past campaign position statements * and much, much more! National Political Awareness Test Project Vote Smart interns and volunteers interview all candidates for federal office. These interviews, covering 14 key issue areas, can be used to compare what the candidates say during the elections with what they do if they are elected. This information is available through our Research Hotline (1-800-622-SMART). Computer access to Project Vote Smart data through Internet and bulletin board. * Internet: gopher gopher.neu.edu * Bulletin board: 503-737-3777 (14.4K N81) Manuals Voter's Self-Defense Manual U.S. Government Owner's Manual These manuals contain key issue summaries along with you candidates' or elected officials': * biographical background * campaign finances * performance evaluations by 15 competing liberal to conservative special interest groups. * position statements * local election offices * addresses and phone numbers * committee assignments Research Services Reporter's Resource Center Reporter's Source Book Tomorrow's News Research services are provided for journalists to check the accuracy of claims made by elected officials or candidates. The Reporter's Source Book is published to refer journalists to issue experts who can check the credibility of politicians' claims. The Source Book is used by over 10,000 political journalists and is provided free to the media. Tmorrow's News is a quarterly newsletter featuring articles, awards, seminars, and upcoming events of interest to political journalists. Internship Program Hundreds of student interns from throughout the country work and study at Project Vote Smart. Students working on the project, often with our scholarship assistance, have a unique opportunity to examine the often harsh realities of today's political arena. For information call: 503-737-3760. YOU DO NOT NEED TO BE A MEMBER TO USE OUR SERVICES, BUT PLEASE... JOIN US IF YOU CAN +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | | | [ ] General $35 [ ] Sustaining $250 | | | | [ ] Supporting $100 [ ] Other _____________ | | | | | | All contributions are tax deductible. | | Please make all checks payable to Project Vote Smart. | | | | Name: _________________________________________________________________ | | | | Address: ______________________________________________________________ | | | | City: _________________________________________________________________ | | | | State: ___________ Zip: ____________________________________________ | | | | Phone (optional): _____________________________________________________ | | | +-------------------------------------------------------------------------+ WE PROTECT OUR MEMBERS. Project Vote Smart does not sell or allow anyone to use our membership list. ------------------------------ SILICON VALLEY MAJOR-PARTY CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATE POSITION ON PUBLIC ACCESS >From Bmbrink@aol.com Wed Sep 28 12:40:15 1994 CONGRESS IS BROKEN, BUT IT *CAN* BE FIXED The legislative and oversight functions of Congress have been corrupted. Washington lobbyists have special access and preempt constituents' interests. Elected Representatives fail to represent the citizens who elected them. The majority party refuses to allow proportional minority participation. Career incumbents use their positions for unfair advantage over challengers. 1. CITIZENS MUST HAVE USEFUL ACCESS TO INFORMATION ABOUT THEIR GOVERNMENT Government of, by and for the People requires that the People have access to public information about their government. It must be as comprehensive and timely as the access enjoyed by insiders in Congress and in the executive branch and the judiciary, within the limits of modern information technology. The computer networks make it economically possible and practical. Congress and the other branches must do much more to make their already-computerized records available via the public computer networks, without fees (given that taxes already paid for collecting and computerizing the public's records). Congress should immediately make all bills, amendments, public reports and analyses, hearing schedules and complete vote records available for anonymous access and without fee, at least via the Internet, as the largest, nonproprietary, nonprofit public computer network. Except in the utmost emergency, votes on legislation or amendments should be prohibited until copies of the complete text and analyses are available. A similar bill, California SB1624, was passed by the legislature in 1993. 2. CITIZENS AND THEIR OFFICIALS MUST HAVE ACCESS TO EACH OTHER Modern technology could allow Representatives to remain in their Districts more of the time - more- accessible to their constituents and less-accessible to lobbyists. Committee hearings and similar meetings could be conducted by video-conferencing, probably with significant cost-savings. And, they could allow testimony from around the nation not just by those who can afford to travel to Washington. Tele-voting by Representatives could be implemented with little difficulty. Elected representatives, government officials and staff of all agencies that serve the public should immediately install and publicize public fax-numbers and public electronic-mail addresses. All campaign-finance statements, economic-interest declarations and lobbyist disclosures should be filed in computerized form and made available to the public via the public computer nets within hours of filing, without charge. If I am elected, I will (1) seek suggestions via the nets for legislation to accomplish these goals, (2) utilize the nets to seek public review of *all* draft legislation that I consider introducing, and (3) use all of the resources at my disposal to personally assure their prompt implementation. -- Ben Brink Ben Brink for U.S. Congress, 14th District (San Francisco Peninsula) P.O.Box 7701, Menlo Park CA 94026-7701; 415-853-1994 email: 71740.3462@compuserve.com ; bmbrink@aol.com ; bmbrink@netcom.com [Brink is the Republican congressional candidate for the northern part of "Silicon Valley" on the SF Peninsula. In fairness, if I receive a substantive campaign statement by email from his opponent, of approximately this length, addressing these issues and indicating that it is her personal statement (rather than from some lackey), I will distribute it to GovAccess. --jim] ------------------------------ PENAL AND EVIDENCE CODES AVAILABLE ON DISKETTES >From grady@netcom.com Wed Sep 28 06:49:58 1994 Newsgroups: comp.org.cpsr.talk,comp.org.eff.talk,ca.politics,mn.net You might be interested in knowing that in the current New Yorker I am advertising the California Penal and Evidence Codes repackaged and compressed on diskette for general sale. I don't know how you feel about small internetrepreneurs using the results of your work to open California legislation to electronic access, but the result will be, I think, a lot of people knowledgable about California law and -- perhaps wondering why *their* state doesn't have a similar equivalent to AB1624. Not to mention the federal government... Thanks for your work in getting AB1624 passed. Grady Ward grady@netcom.com [I am absolutely in favor of private-sector non-profits and for-profit entrepreneurs taking free copies of computerized public records and repackaging them and in all other ways adding value to their basic format. Good goin'! (My only objections are when private companies attempt to gain functional monopolies over use or copying or distribution of public government records computerized at tax-payer expense.) --jim] ------------------------------ Unless men are free to be vicious they cannot be virtuous. -- Frank Meyer [from rlm@helen.surfcty.com] Mo' as it Is. --jim GovAccess is an email distribution-list of irregular postings, maintained by Jim Warren, columnist for MicroTimes, Government Technology, BoardWatch, etc. 345 Swett Rd., Woodside CA 94062; voice/415-851-7075; fax/<# upon request> jwarren@well.com -or- jwarren@autodesk.com >> Permission herewith granted for unlimited reposting and recirculation.<< >> Past postings are at ftp.cpsr.org:/cpsr/states/california/govaccess << >> To add or drop the GovAccess list, email to jwarren@well.com . <<