Congress Funds Study on How to Avoid Constituient's Questions, Stay in Office

andys · 11-03-2009, 11:01 AM

Posted October 28th, 2009

This Friday, the tax payer funded Congressional Management Foundation (CMF) is hosting a briefing for Members of Congress and their staff on their new study: Online Town Hall Meetings: Exploring Democracy in the 21st Century. The CMF study consisted of 21 townhall meetings where Members of Congress and CMF provided a moderator: “spoke via voice over IP, and constituents asked questions and made comments by typing them. Only off-topic, redundant, unintelligible, or offensive questions were screened, and only questions asked by people who had not yet asked a question were prioritized.”

CMF does not say what qualifies as offensive, but if this summer is any indication that definition would include anything that the Congressman did not want to talk about. In other words, this report urges Congressmen not to actually interact with their constituents, but to avoid them altogether by holding safe townhalls they can completely control. And what did CMF find where the results of these Potemkin townhalls?

The online town halls increased constituents’ approval of the Member. Every Member involved experienced an increase in approval by the constituents who participated. The average net approval rating (approve minus disapprove) jumped from +29 before the session to +47 after. There were also similar increases in trust and perceptions of personal qualities – such as whether they were compassionate, hardworking, accessible, etc. – of the Member.

The lesson: avoid your constituents’ inconvenient questions and your approval ratings will rise. And this is a taxpayer funded study. Here is the grant from the National Science Foundation.

Congress is actually using your tax dollars to pay social scientists to find ways they can avoid actually talking to their constituents while improving their chances of reelection.

andys · 11-03-2009, 11:04 AM

Does this not show the absolute disfunction of congress? They use our dollars to finds ways to not listen to / represent us, while still getting elected. Apparently this study was approved in 2004, so this is an ongoing problem.

intheknow · 11-03-2009, 11:05 AM

So once more they are looking for ways to elevate them to a higher social status. Let's see: they have better and more special insurance, they get jets and limos and chauffers, they can vote themselves raises, they get to meet with lobbyists and then vote and no one seems to mind. We have allowed our policitians to become America's royalty.

robine · 11-03-2009, 12:37 PM

vote their asses out....

as long as the dead can be kept from voting and ACORN is stopped, we just might have a chance of sending the bums back to BFE

11-03-2009, 11:01 AM	#1 (permalink)
andys 900-999 post jack of hearts Join Date: Aug 2003 Posts: 931	Congress Funds Study on How to Avoid Constituient's Questions, Stay in Office Posted October 28th, 2009 This Friday, the tax payer funded Congressional Management Foundation (CMF) is hosting a briefing for Members of Congress and their staff on their new study: Online Town Hall Meetings: Exploring Democracy in the 21st Century. The CMF study consisted of 21 townhall meetings where Members of Congress and CMF provided a moderator: “spoke via voice over IP, and constituents asked questions and made comments by typing them. Only off-topic, redundant, unintelligible, or offensive questions were screened, and only questions asked by people who had not yet asked a question were prioritized.” CMF does not say what qualifies as offensive, but if this summer is any indication that definition would include anything that the Congressman did not want to talk about. In other words, this report urges Congressmen not to actually interact with their constituents, but to avoid them altogether by holding safe townhalls they can completely control. And what did CMF find where the results of these Potemkin townhalls? The online town halls increased constituents’ approval of the Member. Every Member involved experienced an increase in approval by the constituents who participated. The average net approval rating (approve minus disapprove) jumped from +29 before the session to +47 after. There were also similar increases in trust and perceptions of personal qualities – such as whether they were compassionate, hardworking, accessible, etc. – of the Member. The lesson: avoid your constituents’ inconvenient questions and your approval ratings will rise. And this is a taxpayer funded study. Here is the grant from the National Science Foundation. Congress is actually using your tax dollars to pay social scientists to find ways they can avoid actually talking to their constituents while improving their chances of reelection. __________________ "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money from the Public Treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits from the Public Treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy always followed by dictatorship."

11-03-2009, 11:04 AM	#2 (permalink)
andys 900-999 post jack of hearts Join Date: Aug 2003 Posts: 931	Does this not show the absolute disfunction of congress? They use our dollars to finds ways to not listen to / represent us, while still getting elected. Apparently this study was approved in 2004, so this is an ongoing problem. __________________ "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money from the Public Treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits from the Public Treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy always followed by dictatorship."

11-03-2009, 11:05 AM	#3 (permalink)
intheknow 1000-4999 post queen of hearts Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Sooo Conservative. Oh NO! Posts: 3,804 Blog Entries: 303	So once more they are looking for ways to elevate them to a higher social status. Let's see: they have better and more special insurance, they get jets and limos and chauffers, they can vote themselves raises, they get to meet with lobbyists and then vote and no one seems to mind. We have allowed our policitians to become America's royalty. __________________ Needed a Hero; Got a Zero. Impeach Obama!

11-03-2009, 12:37 PM	#4 (permalink)
robine 10000-15000 post ace of hearts Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Mountaintop Posts: 18,486 Blog Entries: 1756	vote their asses out.... as long as the dead can be kept from voting and ACORN is stopped, we just might have a chance of sending the bums back to BFE __________________ The modern definition of 'racist' is someone who is winning an argument with a liberal. - Peter Brimelow How many Greats have become the Least for me?

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