Full Spectrum Politics

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Rob Carter and I have put together an idea that is worth your review. Check it out.

Senator John Ensign has admitted to fooling around with a campaign staffer behind his wife’s back and today has resigned from his leadership post in the Senate, as is only right.

Of course, any divorce or affair hurts the Family Ratings here at Full Spectrum Politics. Here are the numbers for the “Honorable” Senator, before and after the sleeping around:

2008 Family Rating: 5.25/6.0
2008 Family Ranking: #31

2009 Family Rating: 3.125/3.5
2009 Family Ranking: #45

Senator Ensign now has the dubious distinction of having a lower family rating than his more hypocritical colleague from Nevada, “Dingy” Harry Reid. As for Ensign’s overall Individual Ratings…

2008 Self Rating: 7.26/9.84
2008 Self Ranking: #9

2009 Self Rating: 6.91/9.42
2009 Self Ranking: #11

…He has dropped out of the top ten. That’s a shame.

After spending quite a bit of quality time on one of my other projects, I came back here last weekend to put the finishing touches on this project. My objective was twofold:

• Make the interface on the back end as simple and as user-friendly as possible so that anyone can enter data on any elected politician,
• Make the presentation on the front end as clear as possible so that anyone can tell what they wish about the politicians that have been entered into the CGIP database.

So please, register yourself here with a username and password and help your fellow citizens out by doing some research on your representatives, or any politician or political candidate in which you might have an interest. Send me an e-mail at admin -at- cgip -dot- us if you have any questions.

The initial study sample used in the beta version of this website was the U.S. Senate of the 110th Congress. I entered the data for this sample population into a spreadsheet, and calculated the ratings in the spreadsheet. I then took the results of the calculations from the spreadsheet and entered the ratings into the database manually. Because of this, the members of the 110th Congress already entered do not have the background data entered into the website database yet, with the exception of Former U.S. Senator John Warner, whose data I used to validate the website’s ability to pull information from the database.

All that is to say is that if you would like to enter data on a current Senator, if he or she was in the Senate last term and was re-elected, then there is already an entry for each of them. If you would like to enter background data for any of these, please feel free to do so by registering on this site and editing the existing entry in question.

The basis for this project can be summed up in about 400 words. Read them, and if you agree, even with only some of them, stay tuned. If you would like to help, contact us at admin -at- cgip -dot- us .

We’ve only received two responses to our Religion Survey, and both of them were refusals. The only sound in response to the CGIP Religion Survey from the rest of the US Senate has been crickets. It has been about ten weeks since the Religion Survey was sent out to each Senator — one copy to each home office, and one copy to each DC office. From other sources, we have been able to get an estimate of the time dedicated to religious activities of two Senators: the Honorable Senator Tom Coburn, & the Honorable Senator Roger Wicker. This data has been taken into account on their respective profiles, and we will always welcome more precise information for these senators or any others. Until otherwise informed, however, the Potential and Actual Religion ratings for all the other Senators shall be zero.

I was driving around this afternoon, when my cell phone rang. It was a lady the office of the Honorable Senator George Voinovich. She apologized for taking so long to get back to me, but she just wanted to let me know that the Senator would not be returning the Religion Survey. She wished me luck with my endeavors. When I requested to ask her some basic questions about the Senator, she referred me to his biography on his official senate website. Since that page does not address how much time he has dedicated to religious pursuits, then by his own choice he will receive Religion Ratings of Zero, until new information presents itself.

We are not taking this personally, however, since I found out this afternoon that we are not the only public interest organization the Honorable Senator has snubbed. Between this and Senator Brown’s most expeditious and polite refusal, the representation of the State of Ohio in the Senate is now fully accounted for in terms of its religious predilections.

The other task that I accomplished this weekend was the completed collection of all the federal election data for each Senator in the 110th Congress. I have also included any local election results already on the internet at the various websites for the State Secretaries of State. Any local election results that aren’t already on the internet will take more time to collect, but I have noticed that it can be procured by means of emailing the various offices of each of the Secretaries of State for each State. That will understandably take a while, but it can be done.

The information that will be much more challenging to acquire will be data on each of the Senators’ personal charitable giving. The Senators that ran for the executive branch offices last year made that information publically available, I think, but I am not aware of any way to get this particular information on any of the other Senators without their cooperation. So until anyone communicates with me otherwise, all the Senators will be recorded as contributing 0% of their personal income to charity. So if you would like your Senator’s standings in the Neighbor Ratings to rise, get them to contact me at the e-mail address that I have provided them with the religion surveys: benwisdom -at- gmail -dot- com.

After a much enjoyed hiatus for the holidays, I pushed through with the rest of the data procured thus far, and have finished the Family Ratings for the United States Senate of the 110th Congress.

I still have to spell out on the Family Rating Method page all the references used, as I have for some of the other Ratings. This one was interesting, because I actually dove into the congressional record to find the results of four votes concerning family issues and tabulated them myself. Look for those details on the Rating Method page soon.

With the inclusion of years of business experience, the Market Ratings are now complete for the US Senate of the 110th Congress. That brings us exactly to the halfway point for our initial study sample.

There is now an entry for each Senator of the 110th Congress, and the Government & Science ratings are complete and accurate. There are still data to be gathered for the other five rating categories; I imagine that the next few to be completed will be Family, Market and Neighbor, in about that order.

When the Religion Ratings will be complete depend on the Senators themselves (and of course the Self ratings depend on everything else being done). To encourage more responses, I will be making contact with the senators’ offices, both by telephone and e-mail in the coming weeks. The time isn’t yet ripe to enlist others’ help with this, though that may come eventually.

I guess I should start working on the ratings for the Senate class of 2008 coming in for the 111th Congress also. When that’s done, the 110th and 11th Congresses can be compared, which should be very interesting indeed.

I just finished making a page showing exactly how far along we are with the initial study sample of the United States Senate. Overall, the data entry we are about one-third of the way done, and the quickly approaching completion of all the data entry for the Government and Science Ratings will mark the halfway point. Stay tuned.

I was quite excited to get an envelope in the mail today with a signature on it in place of a stamp. (Apparently, our legislators don’t apply postage to their mail in the same way as those whom they serve. This is an interesting fact of which I was not aware. Now you know too.)

The signature was that of the Honorable Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio. It was a short, courteous letter declining to return the CGIP Religion Survey. [I will be putting up a scan of it as soon as I can UPDATE 12/19/08: The scan of the letter is up. Sorry to take so long.] I still have to finish completing the research on his election history for the Neighbor Rating, so his profile is not complete yet. But his Religion Rating, both Potential and Actual, is currently zero due to this declination.

I imagine that we’ll get more negative responses sooner rather than later, because doing nothing takes much less time than actually doing something, but I have no problem with issuing more “Zero” Religion ratings based on the politicians’ actual responses, because in the end they are accountable for their own responses.

I’m fairly certain that when all is done, I will get positive responses too. Initial research gives some indication from whom some of those positive responses will come, but I also look forward to being pleasantly surprised by good responses coming from “unexpected” quarters as well.

But just for today, I will bask in the mere acknowledgment received. They know we’re here, and that’s a good start.

I just finished the top rating lists for each category. They can be found here, here, [but not here yet], here, here, here, and here. There is no link for the Top Religion Ratings page because there is nothing to put in it until the Religion Surveys start coming in. As soon as the first one comes in, that page will be activated too.

Since I found the U.S. Census Report on Voting and Registration, I am starting to have working Neighbor Ratings, so those are going in along with everything else. Data entry on the United States Senators continues apace, so all these new Ratings pages will be in flux until that is done.

I have finished posting the ratings that I have so far for those United States Senators who will be leaving the Senate at the end of 2008. Two of them retired: Larry Craig and Wayne Allard. The other five were voted out of office. I will be continuing the data entry for the US Senate in the coming days.

Also in the coming days:

• I will start to work on the pages that explain how the ratings are currently calculated. [UPDATE 11/24/08: Done. See here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.]
• I will be writing the code to compare groups of politicians to each other, and including it on the Tag and Category pages. [UPDATE 11/22/08: This task is complete.]

[On another note, it has been about one week since I sent the Religion Surveys. I know that mail can take a while to get to Congressmen, so I am willing to wait a little longer for any replies. There is plenty to do here in the meantime, anyway.]

The seed of the idea for this organization came into existence while attending the high-definition theater simulcast of Glenn Beck stage show “Unelectable”.  While expounding on many examples of politician foolishness with much comedic effect, Glenn said of these politicians, “Who are these people?!?”  Realizing that it takes some effort to find out about any of the politicians that represent us, I noted the spark of an idea flash into being in my own mind, but didn’t know what it meant until I woke up the next morning.  Overnight and while I slept, that seed of an idea had germinated and peeked out from the mental soil, first leaves already formed.

Since last summer, it has taken a while for the idea to flower, but the first fruit appeared in September and is ripening nicely.  I will be able to share it with you before the end of 2008, hopefully.  Meanwhile, I decided to establish this nice little virtual basket of a website to catch it when it falls from the stem.

Now that I’ve beaten that metaphor to death, all I have left to say is stay tuned for the presentation of the initial set of samples: the United States Senate.  While you’re waiting, feel free to click on over to the “About” page.