CivicActions

Florida held their primary elections yesterday, and the Florida Party Chair proclaimed victory for the Florida Democratic Voters:

Barack Obama's campaign released an ambitious technology document (PDF) that outlines quite a few exciting new specific proposals addressing the future of the Web.

Jon Stokes of Arstechnica lays out the details well in his article. Here are the summarized bullet points:

* Ensure the full and free exchange of information among Americans through an open Internet and diverse media outlets.

* Create a transparent and connected democracy.

* Encourage the deployment of a modern communications infrastructure.

* Employ technology and innovation to solve our nation's most pressing problems, including reducing the costs of health care, encouraging the development of new clean energy sources, and improving public safety.

* Improve America’s technology competitiveness

* Full support of network neutrality legislation

* Obama decries media consolidation and pledges to "encourage diversity" in media ownership

* Proposes the creation of a modern, online answer to Sesame Street called Public Media 2.0

* Privacy and safeguards against abuse

* National broadband policy and opening up the wireless spectrum to fresh competition

* H1B reform

* Investments in basic science and R&D

Federal law bars corporations from contributing to candidates, and that's not good news for Stephen Colbert's campaign sponsored by Doritos and hyped on Comedy Central 4 nights a week.

Lawrence M. Noble, a former general counsel for the Federal Election Commission says, "These are the kind of things on slow days you'd debate until the late afternoon at the FEC, but there are serious questions that come up. In theory, he could end up having some campaign finance problems."

Colbert responds, "In accepting corporate money, I promise to respect federal election laws the same way I respect the "must-shower-before-swimming law at the Y. As a candidate, I am under no obligation to promote the zesty, robust taste of Doritos brand tortilla chips, regardless of how great a snack they may be for lunchtime, munch time, anytime."

No one likes to be backed into a corner, especially politicians. Seems the spectre of appearing weak and ineffectual was enough for the Dems to surrender their votes on Saturday to the new and improved surveillance program backed by President Bush.

In just two short weeks, CivicActions launched the new California Leadership Committee (CLC) web site.

The CLC is a California state PAC dedicated to "Supporting the Best and Brightest Democrats running for office in California". Former eBay executive and California Controller, Steve Westly founded the CLC in July 2006 to help support the candidates and causes he believes in.

Through the web site you can learn more about the CLC, the candidates, upcoming events, and important policy issues like clean technology.

To kick-off the the site, the CLC has posted dozens of articles, op-eds, pictures and videos, as well as an exclusive interview with Assemblymember Joe Nation, co-author of California’s groundbreaking cap and trade policy.

CivicActions gives a special thanks - and a big shout-out - to Doug Green for his fast and furious Drupal mastery on this project!

Couldn't be said better than a screenshot...

Thanks.

Evolve Strategies has developed a Web-based “widget� to collect and report election incidents that may require voter protection intervention.

VoterStory.org is an open-source utility that can be placed on any website to feed data into a central database, which in turn alerts voter protection groups each time a new incident is reported in their district.

Today MAPLight.org unveiled a pioneering database that lays bare the connection between money and votes in California politics.

http://www.maplight.org

The MAPLight.org website combines information from the Official California Legislative Information website, which contains the official text of each bill and how each legislator voted, and the Institute on Money in State Politics, a national nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to accurate, comprehensive and unbiased documentation and research on campaign finance.

MAPLight.org allows journalists and citizens to answer questions such as: