Recently, I was discussing how social media could open a window into the procedures of legislation and increase communication in our democracy. I got some great feedback on that, so, first, thank you. Given some information and further research, I wanted to update that posting with some additional information.
The research points to two areas (as with any conversation, there are two sides) that need to be reviewed. First, are the tools out there that allow for disseminating information to the public online and that allow for public discourse? And second, are the senators and congress members allowed to communicate using these tools or others?
Let's start with online outlets for the public. I'd like to point out the Sunlight Foundation for their work in this area. Their site works "to help citizens, bloggers and journalists be their own best congressional watchdogs, by improving access to existing information and digitizing new information, and by creating new tools and Web sites to enable all of us to collaborate in fostering greater transparency." They have even begun a new project for working towards further transparency--The Open House Project. This project was started "to study how the House of Representatives currently integrates the Internet into its operations, and to suggest attainable reforms to promote public access to its work and members." And as part of that larger work, they have launched Publicmarkup.org to open bills to online, public review. This is a great step towards the proposed tool of putting the legislation language online and allowing for discussion and debate in a public forum. For instance, here is the information on the latest economic rescue plan.
There is plenty of room for improvement, but this is a great first step. You can see that in a lot of instances, they have to look for the PDF posted by one of the parties or administration. They then have to parse that information and quickly get it online. To quickly accommodate this, the sections are put up in large chunks that are then open for comment like any blog posting. On closer inspection, you can see that the House creates these PDFs from an XML document, so it stands to reason that there could be a more automated way of doing this. And...if the metadata is put into the original XML, there could be a more organized way of posting them, so that smaller bits of the legislation can be categorized, organized, and tagged to create more poignant and relevant debate for each point in the bill vs. the large "chunks" we have now.
However, I have to reiterate that this is a wonderful first step in transparency and working towards a more open process.
Now, that addresses public debate, but would congress listen? Or even be allowed to respond or act on that information? That depends on current Congressional Franking Laws. (Background on Franking here) These are meant to create fairness in election campaigns and protect taxpayer dollars by not allowing Congress to post information (using taxpayer dollars) in ways or in places that can also link to or house inappropriate material. (well, the modern day definition--it started with Postal Mail) The current rules were based on regulations/updates made in 1998 before any of the the current social media tools we use today were around. Yes... a world without iPhones and Twitteriffic.
A recent letter by Rep. Micheal Capuano (D-MA), the chairman of the Congressional Committee on Mailing Standards attempted to update the rules to make them more relevant to the Web. In particular, the proposed rule changes dealt with uploading congressional video to YouTube.
"The goal of Capuano’s letter ... wasn’t to create new restrictions for members’ web use, but to change the rules, which were originally designed to guard against tax-payers paying for political mailings, so that they actually apply to the new technologies. Right now, members who post on Qik, Twitter, or YouTube (among others) do so in violation of the rules."
Apparently, before a member of Congress can post public information on YouTube and real-time social media sites like Twitter, the sites must meet franking guidelines, include a disclaimer and be approved. Texas Republican John Culberson states, though, that the letter was "to prevent members from using public money to communicate on outside Web sites featuring commercial and political advertisements," and continues to tweet about this from the floor. The most talked about Tweet being:
"Before I could post a Tweet I would have to get approval of the twits that run the House!" And an hour later: "The Dems will do this unless the Internet community stops them."
But for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction (right, Physics majors?), so there is a Twitter campaign currently out there petitioning for its use by House representatives: Let Our Congress Tweet. It has been successful and the site now is distributing a widget, "Capital Tweets" to keep up with the conversation.
In a bit of good news on this front, the debate is not going to quietly fade away. Member Web use is being reconsidered. And there has been some movement. Marketing Vox reports that updated Senate Web linking rules include some of the major social media sites. Sarah Burris also has some great background on this in her piece on Web 2.0 in Congress. One other resource is this piece on NPR's Talk of the Nation.
So, we're getting there. I don't think the debate on and subsequent changes to current Franking Laws would have happened had there not be exposure to the letter brought before the House leaders or the tweets of Rep. Culberson. Heck, how many of us even knew there were Franking Laws in the first place? So Tweets from the floor, Sunlight Foundation's Publicmarkup.org and all the great debate online can make a difference. But we have to continue to watch.
It's funny, there is a lot of debate on the economy and healthcare with less than a month to the general election. One thing that gets brought up consistently in the healthcare discussion is personal accountability. That we each need to take an active role in our healthcare, to learn about and research our own symptoms. That we should bring appropriate questions to our doctors and stay on top of our history because no one else (including your primary care physician) will (or at least very well). And on the economy, we're still reeling from the credit swap craziness, the commercial paper market freeze-up, and the recently passed economic rescue plan. With as large of a global crisis as this is, there is lots of blame to go around.
But one thing caught my eye.
Regulation vs. De-Regulation is the topic de jour, with many blaming the crisis on little or no oversight into the "exotic" and "over the counter" debt transactions that are at the heart of this debate. Trust is shattered. No transparency was called for. But here's the kicker...our representatives voted to NOT regulate these markets in 1998. And it was not partisan, it passed by a vote of 95 to 5 I believe. Now, ironically, (but probably not related) this was when the Franking Laws included not allowing Congress to use the Internet for communicating to their constituents.
I wonder if that vote would have passed by such a landslide had the public had any information on the contents of that legislation. I wonder if "Main Street" would have agreed that the financial institutions were "too sophisticated and smart enough to manage themselves" feeling that guided such a landslide vote.
Let's open up the Franking Laws. Let's support the Open House Project. And let's improve the tools that allow us to communicate with our Representatives and allow for transparency to hit a greater number of Americans. Heck, let our Congress tweet! But most important, let's stay on top of what is going on. Democracy is work, and instead of being lazy and letting our Representatives deal with the issues, let's make tools that make it easier for us to do the work that is demanded of the citizens of a Democracy.
I think we can do it, and I'd like to help.
(photo credit Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Columbia Pictures, 1939)
More to come....
