Forum:A Proposal for Legislative Transparency
From Campaigns Wikia
There's been a lot of controversy surrounding the issue of congressional earmarks. There have been several high profile cases where congressmen have added last minute appropriations to must-pass bills to benefit their local constituency, with little concern about the impact of this practice on our legislative system.
Rather than waiting for Congress to figure out a legislative solution (good luck!), this article proposes a technological solution.
1. Anytime a bill is introduced in the Senate or House of Representatives, it is uploaded to a public website repository where anyone can view it.
2. Subsequent updates are logged, allowing people to step through the changes made to the bill (i.e. a versioning system).
3. Most importantly, people can add annotations alongside the text of the bill, pointing out inconsistencies, loopholes, pork, etc.
At the moment, this type of work is done by lobbyists. But there is no reason that everyday people (and especially enthusiasts, who are responsibly for the success of Wikipedia-like sites), shouldn't have access. It is easy to imagine that the transparency of this system might result in more responsible legislation.
If you are interested in helping implement this idea, please contact danroy [at] gmail.
- There is a bill introduced by Brian Baird (D-WA03) that would require legislation be posted on the Internet for 72 hours before a vote. Not sure of the status of that bill, or the number. I'm sure someone will fill that in for us. Chadlupkes 19:11, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
