Obama released a major package of technology initiatives today that Matt Stoller greeted as "transformative" and "genuinely radical" --- even going so far as to announce that, based on this package and despite his other reservations, Obama is now his first choice.
Prof. Lawrence Lessig, one of the most deeply respected experts on net neutrality, was led to announce his full endorsement of Obama today:
Obama has committed himself to a technology policy for government that could radically change how government works.Kos praised the package on the frontpage. And VentureBeat today called the package "the most comprehensive set of policies for open government I've seen." Steve Benen at The Carpetbagger Report notes that Obama's bold new positions on Iran and now on technology have led to some reconsideration of his candidacy among the netroots.
No one can critique this policy package for a lack of vision, as it lays out an extraordinarily idealistic view of the ability of technology to change the way government works.
Clearly with this package, Obama hit the ball out of the park.
There have been a number of responses already. I diaried the details of the plan today on DailyKos. Adam B has an excellent post on the significance of the Lessig endorsement. Matt Stoller provides a run-down of the proposals on net neutrality and broadband accessibility, while Kos focused on the transparency and open government proposals.
Obama sees the secretive years of the Bush administration and the recent lobbyist scandals as an opportunity to make a case for a radically more transparent government, for a different way of doing business:
Barack Obama will use the most current technological tools available to make government less beholden to special interest groups and lobbyists and promote citizen participation in government decision-making. Obama will integrate citizens into the actual business of government...The web shouldn't just be merely a new means of disseminating old information. It is not enough to simply post thousands of pages of budget documents online and to literally throw these volumes into the public realm. The information needs to be organized in new ways, taking advantage of new technology.
One of Obama's most crucial proposals is to make government information "available online through universally accessible formats." Or as Lessig describes, these information streams could be put into RSS or Atom format, making them easily searchable and broadly accessible. These RSS/Atom feeds could include "votes, contributions, Members of Congress's calendars."
Obama envisions this new access to information as empowering citizens to take action in their communities:
Greater access to environmental data, for example, will help citizens learn about pollution in their communities, provide information about local conditions back to government and empower people to protect themselves.
But it's also intriguing that Obama, in the end, is aiming at more than just improving transparency and providing information. He is actively trying to find ways to incorporate broader citizen input into government decision-making:
Establishing pilot programs to open up government decision-making and involve the public in the work of agencies, not simply by soliciting opinions, but by tapping into the vast and distributed expertise of the American citizenry to help government make more informed decisions.
He would require that all non-emergency legislation pending White House approval be put on the White House website for five days to solicit public comment.
Remarkably, he would require:
his appointees who lead Executive Branch departments and rule-making agencies to conduct the significant business of the agency in public, so that any citizen can watch a live feed on the Internet as the agencies debate and deliberate the issues that affect American society. He will ensure that these proceedings are archived for all Americans to review, discuss and respond. He will require his appointees to employ all the technological tools available to allow citizens not just to observe, but also to participate and be heard in these meetings.Obama also proposes vastly improved government websites:
Lifting the veil from secret deals in Washington with a web site, a search engine, and other web tools that enable citizens easily to track online federal grants, contracts, earmarks, and lobbyist contacts with government officials.These proposals are startlingly imaginative and go beyond what he has mentioned before in the context of his ethics reform package. There is clearly vast potential here, and there's little wonder that the netroots are giving Obama a second look.
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