Blog on democracyGPS

Polarization in the Maine Senate and House is increasing

Sun, 20 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

One discovery we made in the Maine Senate and House data is that between 2017 and 2022 average voting polarization in the Maine Senate and House has increased from 60% to almost 80%. Sadly, but unsurprisingly, over this period, the percentage of bipartisan votes, where most Democrats and Republicans vote together, decreased from 19% to 10%, and the percentage of polarized votes increased from 32% to 61%. Some, but not necessarily all, of this increase is due to Republican legislators starting to vote more unanimously (like their Democratic colleagues).

Easy access to Maine Senate and House voting histories for undecided voters

Sat, 19 Nov 2022 00:00:00 +0000

To help Maine voters make their final decisions for the Maine Senate and House of Representatives elections next week, we developed a new website (https://dash.democracygps.org) that allows visitors to easily explore and compare the voting histories of Maine politicians. For example, visitors can compare the voting histories of Nicole Grohoski and Brian Langley, who were both running for the Maine Senate District 7 seat. Grohoski has voted mostly (94% of the time) with her fellow Democrats, but Langley’s voting record is more liberal than many other Maine Republicans, having voted with the Democratic majority 50% of the time.

Piedmont Public Safety Camera Survey: Preliminary Results

Wed, 29 Jan 2020 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve analyzed initial results from our pol-is survey about the proposed expansion of Piedmont’s public safety camera program. A presentation describing this analysis is below.

Fixing Our Democracy (CPS Day 2020)

Sat, 25 Jan 2020 00:00:00 +0000

On 1/28/20, I am leading two hour long sessions on electronic democracy at College Prep (a.k.a. CPS) in Oakland, CA. Below are some links to more information.

This blog: https://democracygps.org/
Real-time audience response systems:
- http://mentimeter.com (1 year free for students; $10-25/mo. afterwards; can’t edit imported powerpoint slides)
- https://www.polleverywhere.com/ (free for audiences < 25; $10/mo. for entry level; is supposed to have better powerpoint and google sheets integration)
Pol.is:
- http://github.com/pol-is (source code)
- democracyCPS democracygps.org (free for CPS students)

Operational updates

Sat, 29 Jun 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Update (2025): The server at polis.democracygps.org is no longer active.

We patched a security vulnerability on our wordpress blog that temporarily allowed the title to change to an advertisement for a bailbond service. This vulnerability was very unlikely to have compromised any personal information on the discussion pages, and it did not affect the polling data stored on polis.democracygps.org at all.

We also noticed that polis.democracygps.org was not running. We have restarted the server and are writing an automatic restart script.

Piedmont Public Safety Camera

Sun, 19 May 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Update (2025): The server at polis.democracygps.org is no longer active.

The city of Piedmont, CA is in the process of evaluating and considering an expanded public safety camera program and may discuss further at a June City Council meeting. If you are a Piedmont resident, and to help ensure that the City Council understands your views on public safety cameras, please visit polis.democracygps.org/piedmont-camera to vote on a series of statements regarding the public safety camera program. If the existing statements don’t capture your opinions and feelings, you can add one or more new statements that you agree with. A primary goal is to inform the city council as they decide whether to approve new public safety cameras and to help set policy and safeguards in their use. A secondary goal is to develop a more efficient, inclusive and dynamic platform for debate on city issues. Results from this survey will be submitted to the public safety committee before their next scheduled meeting at the end of November. Thank you in advance for your time and for your participation! And, your opinions will be kept confidential. For a broader discussion, please visit democracygps.org/piedmont/piedmont-public-safety-cameras/.

A Conservative Argument for Algorithmic Democracy

Sat, 20 Jan 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Below is an essay I submitted to the 2016/17 William F. Buckley, Jr. Ideas Forum and Contest. I was not a finalist, but I appreciated the opportunity to make the conservative argument for algorithmic democracy.

Algorithmic Democracy and a Free Society by C.R. Krenn (democracygps@gmail.com) (11/12/17)

In 1950, William F. Buckley Jr. was frustrated by the state of university education in general and by Yale education in particular, and he was not alone. Today, I am frustrated by the state of democratic government in general and by the U.S. Congress in particular, and I am not alone. Regularly, more than 75% of voters polled disapprove of how Congress is handling its job [1]. We should be frustrated that the current polarization in Congress seems to prevent any meaningful discussion or compromise on issues such as immigration, campaign finance reform, tax reform, gun violence, or climate change. We should be heartened that, although the fraction of voters who disapprove of Congress’s job performance is growing, this has not yet significantly changed the voting rate [2]. And, we should be relieved that, although the electorate is becoming more polarized, there is still significant overlap in political values between self-identified Democratic and Republican voters [3]. We all can and should have a louder voice in our government and in the future of our country.

Bernie Sanders would likely have been elected president in 2016 with ranked choice voting

Sat, 20 Jan 2018 00:00:00 +0000

My day job has impeded my progress, but, in honor of the one-year anniversary of Donald Trump’s inauguration as our president, I am releasing the first results from on my ranking voting polling and simulations.

I want to emphasize that this study is not trying to question the actual outcome of the 2016 Presidential election. It is only trying to answer the following questions:

Survey on possible effects of ranked voting in the 2016 U.S. presidential election

Fri, 26 May 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Because ranked choice voting is growing in popularity for state and local elections and because of the particularly fierce competition in the 2016 U.S. presidential primary and general elections, an obvious question to ask is how ranked voting would have affected the U.S. presidential election.

To answer this, we need data, in particular, data from a representative set of voters on how they voted in 2016, and how they would have voted if presidential ranked voting was possible. For more background information on ranked choice voting and to participate in a five-minute poll on presidential ranked voting, please visit: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/dgps-irv-p5

Action inspired by the 2016 Code for America Summit and Trump's election

Wed, 16 Nov 2016 00:00:00 +0000

The recent 2016 Code for America Summit was full of inspiring stories of civic tech successes. And, as our country responds to the presidential election, political leadership also matters. The right political leadership is needed to take advantage of our civic tech successes and to enable more in the future. Is Donald Trump the right leader to do this? Would Hillary Clinton have been better? And, why were our choices for President so limited?

Introduction to democracyGPS

Mon, 05 Sep 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Are you frustrated with the overwhelming influence of money in politics and by how little our individual actions seem to affect government policies? Imagine an online system that moves beyond both direct democracy and representative democracy to more directly connect voters’ opinions though decision making delegates to policy and legislation compromises and implementation. This system could be built into current electronic democracy platforms like https://www.brigade.com and https://www.countable.us/ (merged with causes.com).

I’ve posted a few slides from slideshare describing my vision and an implementation plan below. Please comment or contact me privately through the contact link at the upper right for more information.