Project Vote Smart is putting a BIG GUARD DOG onto the political playing field. Today VoteEasy will go national with the attached release. It has not been easy to create and we need your help to build on it. Even if you be a contributing member or volunteer, please use it to defend yourself from the political nonesense that frustrates and often disgusts us all. The new system is causing a lot of excitement and work around here and CNN, THE NY TIMES, ABC, NEWSHOUR, USA TODAY, CBS have all just joined the 1254 others using our databases to support their own systems. VoteEasy seems to be the catalyst for it all - it is powerful stuff and fun to use. However, we have little ability to advertise it, and we need your help. Please share it with anyone else you know that is interested in governance.
Project Vote Smart's VoteEasy is used to research Congressional candidates in all 50 states and it can be accessed by clicking here.
RELEASE DATE: October 15, 2010
FOR INFORMATION: 406.859.8683
To All Congressional Candidates:
GOTCHA!
Great Divide Ranch (10/15/10)— VoteEasy, a powerful, interactive, automated research system that gives each voter instant confirmation on which congressional candidates agree with their own positions on the issues, began today.
Unknown to the candidates, over the past year Vote Smart has applied thousands of research hours detailing each candidate’s political history (votes, public statements, backgrounds and actions), exposing their position on each voter’s questions, even when they refuse to answer the same questions put to them by Vote Smart and national media in the National Political Courage Test. Each position is anchored in the candidates’ own words and public records.
“This is fact checking on a massive scale and it is not popular with either major party,” said Richard Kimball, Vote Smart President. “It is easier to catch a greased pig than it is to catch a candidate with a straight answer to a straight question,” he said. “In fact, one Democratic congressional campaign told us the DCCC would withhold their campaign funds if they provided Vote Smart with answers, while the RNCC had one of their attorneys contact us and threaten legal action if we did not remove their candidates’ positions on the issues.”
VoteEasy converts thousands of research hours into just seconds, enabling any voter in any state to Vote Smart. After typing in their zip code into VoteEasy on Vote Smart’s web, site users can answer the same key issue question their congressional candidates were asked by Vote Smart staff and national media. Then watch the candidates’ squirm as their yard signs advance and recede relative to how the trail of evidence they have left suggests their agreement or disagreement. This candidate match up helps voters cut through the campaign manipulation and identify the candidate most like them on key issues. And if a voter questions why a candidate moved, they simply click on their picture and the candidate’s record will be instantly revealed.
Fearing opposition research, most modern candidates now refuse to answer basic issue questions posed by citizens, Vote Smart and major media. “We are turning opposition research on it’s head to serve the will of each voter”, said Mr. Kimball. Any candidate who thinks our research is in error is welcome and encouraged to exchange their own answers for ours on VoteEasy.
Several media outlets have recently made a note to cover Project Vote Smart's Vote Easy. Here are some significant recent examples:
Project Vote Smart’s Vote Easy was selected as the website of the week by Communication Arts, a site that specializes in information visualization topics.
The Vote Easy was featured on Information Asthetics, which is weblog that "explores the symbiotic relationship between creative design and the field of information visualization.”
The Christian Science Monitor recently featured Project Vote Smart and the Vote Easy in an article.
