FC: More on Wired tech scorecard for House of Representatives

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

[I am thinking of scoring Senate tech votes too. Anyone have nominations? 
They're (unfortunately) not as common as House ones. H1-Bs, including 
cloture votes, would be an obvious one. --Declan]

*********

From: "Carskadden, Rush" <carskar () netsolve net>
To: "'Declan McCullagh'" <declan () well com>, Cypherpunks Mailing List
<cypherpunks () cyberpass net>
Subject: RE: Wired News tech scorecard for U.S. House of Representatives
Date: Tue, 24 Oct 2000 15:58:52 -0500

Everyone,
     Just a quick observation here. According to the Wired chart, it 
appears that the Republicans average roughly 49.85058296 and the Democrats 
average roughly 47.27853081 on the Wired News scale, with one 
representative being independent (Bernard Sanders), and one representative 
with an "A" for their party designation (Spencer Bachus). Here's my 
Republicans vs. Democrats breakdown of the Wired News chart:

Party  | Republican  | Democrat    |
-----------------------------------
HR2301 | 0.181818182 | 0.343137255 |
-----------------------------------
HR3615 | 0.153846154 | 0.024509804 |
-----------------------------------
HR3709 | 0.958715596 | 0.697115385 |
-----------------------------------
HR3125 | 0.218009479 | 0.575129534 |
-----------------------------------
HR1501 | 0.440909091 | 0.908653846 |
-----------------------------------
HR10   | 0.522522523 | 0.058252427 |
-----------------------------------
HR1714 | 0.986175115 | 0.695652174 |
-----------------------------------
total  | 3.381165919 | 3.203791469 |
-----------------------------------
votes  | 6.798206278 | 6.777251185 |
-----------------------------------
score  | 49.85058296 | 47.27853081 |
-----------------------------------

These are all just averages, and I omitted the "A" and "I" designated 
representatives. In regards to the "A" designated representative, Spencer 
Bachus, I think the "A" is an error. I was under the impression that he was 
a Republican. If he is, in fact, a Republican, then that changes our 
averages slightly:

Party  | Republican  | Democrat    |
-----------------------------------
HR2301 | 0.180995475 | 0.343137255 |
-----------------------------------
HR3615 | 0.153110048 | 0.024509804 |
-----------------------------------
HR3709 | 0.95890411 | 0.697115385 |
-----------------------------------
HR3125 | 0.216981132 | 0.575129534 |
-----------------------------------
HR1501 | 0.438914027 | 0.908653846 |
-----------------------------------
HR10   | 0.520179372 | 0.058252427 |
-----------------------------------
HR1714 | 0.986238532 | 0.695652174 |
-----------------------------------
total  | 3.375       | 3.203791469 |
-----------------------------------
votes  | 6.799107143 | 6.777251185 |
-----------------------------------
score  | 49.75558036 | 47.27853081 |
-----------------------------------

     Which still puts Republicans in more of a hands-off strategy for 
technology, according to voting history. If Spencer Bachus is not a 
Republican, then please tell me what the hell an "A" party designation 
stands for.

     If you are interested in seeing TOTALS as opposed to AVERAGES, here 
is your chart:

Party  | Republican  | Democrat    |
-----------------------------------
HR2301 | 40          | 70          |
-----------------------------------
HR3615 | 32          | 5           |
-----------------------------------
HR3709 | 210         | 145         |
-----------------------------------
HR3125 | 46          | 111         |
-----------------------------------
HR1501 | 97          | 189         |
-----------------------------------
HR10   | 116         | 12          |
-----------------------------------
HR1714 | 215         | 144         |
-----------------------------------
total  | 756         | 676         |
-----------------------------------
votes  | 1523        | 1430        |
-----------------------------------

     Again, it is entirely possible that my information is incorrect. I do 
recommend that you do the research yourself, as relying too much on these 
numbers means relying on numbers collected by a media source and in turn 
sorted and re-calculated by some punk-ass on the cypherpunks mailing list.

     To the best of my knowledge, however, this looks right. What alarms 
me is that though there is a slight difference in the overall score between 
Republicans and Democrats, neither party has a very strong leaning one way 
or the other, which illustrates the frustrations that a two-party system 
creates for those of us who would like to see a strong stance (either way) 
on the issue of government regulation of technology. I anxiously await any 
speculation that might take place on this list regarding how Libertarian 
representatives might have voted had they been in there, but the fact is 
that we live in a two-party system for the time being, and if we feel 
strongly about these issues, we need to accept that our representation may 
not be hearing us. Is it because we aren't speaking loudly enough on these 
issues?

ok,
Rush Carskadden

**********

> Date: Tue, 24 Oct 2000 19:04:02 -0400
> To: "Carskadden, Rush" <carskar () netsolve net>, Cypherpunks Mailing List 
> <cypherpunks () cyberpass net>
> From: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
> Subject: RE: Wired News tech scorecard for U.S. House of Representatives
>
> Rush,
>
> This is a useful analysis. Thank you. I was considering doing one myself.
>
> Let me try to answer your question about how a Libertarian rep would rank.
> Our rankings were explictly designed to reward "hands-off" votes, so it's 
> a reasonable assumption that one would score highly.
>
> But small-l and large-L libertarians disagree among themselves on what the 
> proper role of government should be on tech issues. Consider Ron Paul of 
> Texas. He has been the Libertarian candidate for president and has 
> reportedly never renounced his life membership in the party.
>
> Yet he scored just 71 percent, or 5 of 7 votes. That's because he voted 
> against banning states from taxing the Net (probably on federalism 
> grounds), even though libertarian groups such as Cato and Pacific Research 
> Institute liked that tax-ban. (His other negatively-scored vote was an 
> electronic signature law.)
>
> This scorecard is by nature brittle. If we had included more votes, it's a 
> near certainty that our two 100-scorers would not have perfect votes. One 
> is anti-porn; we (unfortunately) didn't have any Net-porn votes to 
> include. Neither CDA nor COPA was this session. Adding more votes would 
> have boosted other rankings.
>
> Also, the scorecard was designed to focus as closely as possible on votes 
> that only dealt with a narrow issue. We could have included ones such as 
> HR1501, but then we couldn't have figured out whether reps voted for it 
> based on their support of filtering software or firearm restrictions.
>
> -Declan

***********





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