Politics and Law

FiveThirtyEight.com blogger Nate Silver (right) was the keynote speaker at SXSWi on Sunday. He was interviewed onstage by Business Week writer Stephen Baker. Silver's blog was home to some of the most accurate statistics about the 2008 election.

(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET)

AUSTIN, Texas--If there was one name that stood out on the agenda of speakers at the South by Southwest Interactive (SXSWi) festival here this week, it was famed FiveThirtyEight.com blogger Nate Silver.

Known as a statistical wunderkind, his models predicted the final outcome of the 2008 presidential election to within .4 percent of the final popular vote. But more important to many Democrats who had their hopes for electoral victory dashed by George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004, FiveThirtyEight.com--which got its name from the total number of electoral votes available--was able to provide daily affirmation that Barack Obama was really winning, even when many were tempted to believe he would be overcome by Sen. John McCain.

Silver was SXSWi's keynote speaker on Sunday, and he and interviewer Stephen Baker of Business Week went onstage in front of an audience of about 2,000 fans, most of whom were there to hear Silver talk about the secret sauce behind his hugely popular blog.

What many might not know is that Silver first came to prominence not in the political realm, but in baseball, where he authored Baseball Prospectus, a well-regarded baseball statistics site. Many might see the connection between baseball and politics as far-fetched, but to people like Silver, it's a very direct path.

Still, before starting FiveThirtyEight.com, he wasn't entirely a political neophyte. Silver had already begun to make a name for himself in the liberal political blogosphere with a series of data-rich posts on DailyKos. When he began to recognize some significant holes in the national polling establishment, he decided to step in to fill the void.

After his keynote interview, Silver sat down with CNET News and talked about the election, how his site got started, and more about the philosophical similarities between baseball and politics.

Q: Many Democrats were emotionally tied to what you were doing, in the sense that your data kept them calm during the election. Did your own numbers keep you calm?
Nate Silver: Yeah, I think so. I'm just one of those people that likes to try and dissect a problem and once you started to dissect, some days you feel better about it. If I ever get cancer, the first thing I'll probably do is go on the Web and collect a bunch of data about different survival rates. I just feel better about things when I do them that way. It's a nerdy kind of thing to do.

Q: We were able to get up every day and look at the data and see what was going on. And this is not something you could do because it was your own data. How your own data affect how you felt about what was going on?
Silver: I wouldn't be frustrated by it if McCain or Obama picked up points on a particular day. Sometimes you get frustrated if you know that something you did reveals something about your model. When something doesn't feel right, and you go and make changes. And we made a lot of changes over the course of the campaign where, even as recently as two weeks before the election, we were tweaking little parameters, and what started out as a pretty simple system--taking weighted averages of polls--became much more complex over time. But, yeah, we were never saying we had the perfect answer. We were always trying to improve things as we went along.

Q: The blog had an overt liberal position, but you always said the statistics were objective. What kind of feedback, if any, did you get from conservatives?
Silver: We had a pretty good balance. We had probably about a 2-1 ratio in terms of liberal versus conservative readers, based on the comment threads. Now that we're not in an election, I think it's swung more toward the liberal side, both in terms of my writing and what people are reading about.

We try and be fair. That's the main thing, we try and be forthright. There's so much commentary from conservatives, also from liberals, that is just entirely disingenuous about certain things. It's a lot of cheerleading and cherry-picking of data. We're trying to present a case that by and large is a liberal's case, because it's my case. It's how I see the world. But we're trying to use data to do it where a lot of people just make bad arguments.

With Tuesday afternoon upon us and what could be record numbers of voters lining up to cast their ballots, it won't be long now before the Election 2008 campaigns are history, and the United States has a new president-elect.

Our colleagues at CBS News will be providing full-bore coverage, updated every 60 seconds, throughout the evening as the Electoral College results start adding up. In addition, Katie Couric and the CBS News Political Team will deliver live, exclusive Web coverage, including a Web-only show after the network reporting ends.

As during the presidential debates, you're encouraged to submit questions and comments about the contest between John McCain and Barack Obama that could become part of the CBS Webcast.

In the last few days before November 4, taxes and the economy have become the most pressing topics of the 2008 presidential campaign.

John McCain

But knowing where the candidates stand on high-tech topics like digital copyright, surveillance, and Internet regulation can be revealing, which is why we've put together this 2008 Technology Voters' Guide.

Included are answers to questions we asked presidential candidates. We received replies from Republican Sen. John McCain, Democratic Sen. Barack Obama, Libertarian candidate Bob Barr, and independent candidate Ralph Nader.

Read on for responses from John McCain, or check out the rest of CNET News' election coverage.

Editors' note: This survey was first published by CNET News in January.

Q: Politicians have been talking for years about the need for high-speed Internet access. Should this be accomplished primarily through deregulation and market forces, or should the federal government give out grants or subsidies, or enact new laws?
McCain: I believe that we must promote competition and reduce regulation in order to secure lower prices and higher-quality services for consumers and encourage the rapid deployment of new technologies.

I have been a leading advocate in the Senate for seeking market-based solutions to increasing broadband penetration. We should place the federal government in the role of stimulator, rather than regulator, of broadband services, remove state and local barriers to broadband deployment, and facilitate deployment of broadband services to rural and underserved communities.

Congress has considered Net neutrality legislation, but it never became law. Do you still support the legislation that was re-introduced in 2007 (S 215), which gives the FCC the power to punish "discriminatory" conduct by broadband providers?
McCain: In general, I believe that we need to move to a different model for enforcing competition on the Internet. Its focus should be on policing clearly anticompetitive behavior and consumer predation. In such a dynamic and innovative setting, it is not desirable for regulators to be required to anticipate market developments, intervene in the market, and try to micromanage American business and innovation.

Telecommunications companies such as AT&T have been accused in court of opening their networks to the government in violation of federal privacy law. Do you support giving them retroactive immunity for any illicit cooperation with intelligence agencies or law enforcement, which was proposed by the Senate Intelligence Committee this fall (S 2248)?
McCain: The struggle against Islamic fundamentalism is the transcendent foreign-policy challenge of our time. I am committed to winning this battle, enhancing the stature of the United States as beacon of global hope, and to preserving the personal, economic, and political freedoms that are the proud legacy of the great sacrifices of our fathers.

Every effort in this struggle and other efforts must be done according to American principles and the rule of law. When companies provide private records of Americans to the government without proper legal subpoena, warrants, or other legal orders, their heart may be in the right place, but their actions undermine our respect for the law.

I am also a strong supporter of protecting the privacy of Americans. The issues raised by S 2248, and the events and actions by all parties that the preceded it, reach to the core of our principles. They merit careful and deliberate consideration, fact-finding, and exploration of options. That process should be allowed to proceed before drawing conclusions that may prove to be premature.

If retroactive immunity passes, it should be done with explicit statements that this is not a blessing, there should be oversight hearings to understand what happened, and Congress should include provisions that ensure that Americans' private records will not be dealt with like that again.

The 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act's section restricting the "circumvention" of copy protection measures is supported by many copyright holders but has been criticized by some technologists as hindering innovation. Would you support changing the DMCA to permit Americans to make a single backup copy of a DVD, Blu-ray Disc DVD, HD DVD, or video game disc they have legally purchased?
McCain: The Internet and digital technology have provided widespread access to enormous quantities of information. This, in turn, made it necessary to update our copyright laws in 1998 to protect the rights of copyright holders to keep pace with the technological advances that characterize the Information Age.

As digitization of commerce, education, entertainment, and a host of other online applications proceeds, international copyright agreements have to be maintained and updated while protecting the rights of copyright owners.

I believe now, as I did then, that knowledge and ideas are central parts of what make the U.S. economy productive and competitive. It is vital that this intellectual property be protected and defended. However, we must ensure that such protections are never so onerous as to stifle the very innovation they strive to safeguard.

The Department of Homeland Security has proposed extensive Real ID requirements restricting which state ID cards can be accepted at federal buildings and airports. Do you support those regulations as written, would you want to repeal Real ID, or would you prefer something in between?
McCain: The 9/11 Commission recommended that the federal government set standards for the issuance of birth certificates and sources of identification, such as driver's licenses. Consistent with these recommendations, the Real ID act established federal guidelines to prevent fraud in the issuance and acquisition of identity documents. I support full implementation of Real ID but understand that states need to be given enough time and funding to implement the requirements.

The Federal Trade Commission is reviewing the proposed merger of Google and DoubleClick. Some members of Congress have raised privacy concerns, while others have said the deal should proceed. What are your views? (Editors' note: We posed this question before the FTC gave the merger unconditional approval on December 20.)

McCain: It is premature to draw conclusions on this specific transaction, prior to the conclusion of the FTC review. I am, however, a vocal advocate of antitrust laws and ensuring that antitrust agencies have the resources they need to protect the competitiveness of the American economy.

Although I support the oversight capacity of the U.S. Congress, I believe that oversight should not be confused with the micromanagement of individual regulatory decisions and processes. I have encouraged the FTC to investigate this and other important mergers carefully to ensure the interests of competitiveness.

Recently, there's been a lot of talk about sex offenders using social-networking sites. What, if any, new federal laws are needed in this area?
McCain: The Internet has a dark side--it can expose children to obscene, graphic, and violent content. Government must develop solutions that balance civil liberties against the compelling interest to protect the innocence of our children.

While the first line of defense will always involve responsible parents, when it comes to protecting children, government must not shrink from its responsibilities. One thing that must be absolutely clear is that child pornographers and those who would prey on children will find no quarter in the darker recesses of the Internet. Government must implement and aggressively enforce laws to hunt down and jail peddlers of child pornography and sexual predators who stalk children on the Net.

This is why I have long fought to keep the Internet safe for our children...(and) recently sponsored the Safe Act of 2007, designed to clarify and enhance the current system for electronic-service providers to report online child pornography, and make the failure to report child pornography a federal crime.

I have also aggressively sought to curtail the online activities of sex offenders by sponsoring legislation to ensure that such criminals register additional information such as e-mail addresses on sex offender registries.

The Bush administration has supported legally requiring Internet service providers, and perhaps search engines and social-networking Web sites as well, to keep logs on who their users are and what they do. Do you support federal legislation, such as HR 837, to mandate data retention?
McCain: I continue to study the legislation in particular and the issue in general. It is apparent that some well-informed analysts in the ISP, tech, and privacy communities are skeptical of the feasibility and value of this proposal.

At the same time, other interested parties, such as the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, support the approach taken in the legislation. I understand both perspectives, believe that further study and alternative proposals are worth exploring, and look forward to finding the best path forward for all those involved.

Do you support enacting federal laws providing for any or all of the following: a) a permanent research-and-development tax credit, b) a permanent moratorium on Internet access taxes, and c) an increase in the current limits on H-1B visas?
McCain: We stand on the threshold of a new era: the innovation age. New information and communications technologies are the leading edge of technology innovations that will permeate every aspect of our society, and I am committed to federal policies that ensure America's competitive edge in technology and innovation. Maintaining our tech edge requires robust basic research and sustained development efforts.

I will support innovation by funding basic research, and reforming and making permanent the R&D tax credit. My leadership first kept the Internet tax-free, I recently sponsored legislation that extended that tax ban for seven years, and I seek to permanently ban taxing access to this source of innovation and growth.

I continue to be a strong supporter of H-1B expansion, but mere expansion is not enough. Reforms should eliminate the artificial limits and allow the Department of Labor to set a level of visas appropriate for market conditions.

We have to know: what's your favorite gadget?
McCain: My slim, stylish gold Razr phone and I are inseparable.

A correction was made to this story. See below for details.

Calling venture capitalist Tim Draper an ardent Republican is something of an understatement. In 1999, he was enough of a fan of then-candidate George W. Bush that he chaired three fundraisers over a year before the actual election.

Salon once dubbed him "George W.'s point man in Silicon Valley." The Draper, Fisher Jurvetson managing partner is a longtime proponent of limited government, free markets, and libertarian concepts like school vouchers, making him a natural fit for a political party whose platform lauds "lower taxes, reasonable regulation, and smaller, smarter government."

This year, though, something odd happened. Draper gave $2,300--the legal maximum--to Barack Obama and zero to John McCain. Draper also did something that would have been unthinkable in the days when Bush was touting laissez-faire principles: he disclosed publicly that he will vote for a Democrat.

VC Tim Draper, once George W. Bush's point man in Silicon Valley, is now voting for Barack Obama.

(Credit: Draper Fisher Jurvetson)

"It's good to have a fresh face," Draper told CNET News on Thursday. "At least from the press, we've seen about six years of fear. I'd like to see six years of opportunity and what that could do for our country, and I think that might happen with Obama."

Draper likes McCain's views on nuclear power and school vouchers, but believes that government spending has run amok in a capital city dominated by Republicans for much of the last decade. Obama, he says, understands that an economic recovery comes from venture capital and entrepreneurship and, overall, "will be a good ambassador for our country."

He's not alone. A review of 2008 campaign contributions show what amounts to a startling number of defections by Silicon Valley leaders well-known for their support of Republican candidates in the past.

Intel Chairman Craig Barrett wrote checks to Bush during the last two presidential elections. He's handed $2,300 to onetime candidate Mitt Romney, but nothing to McCain.Lead21, a once-thriving outpost of free-market Republicanism in Silicon Valley, has not updated its blog since April 2007 (though it is holding an election party in San Francisco next Tuesday).

While McCain can count on some prominent Bay area donors--Sun Microsystems' Scott McNealy and Intel's Paul Otellini are two--the apparent lack of enthusiasm is telling. One explanation might be that Obama is simply a more attractive candidate than Al Gore or John Kerry. Or it could be a response to the neocon influence in the Republican Party and the fictions that led to U.S. involvement in Iraq. Or, perhaps, is McCain too wishy-washy on taxes and enthusiastic about Internet regulation?

Daniel Ballon, a policy fellow in technology studies at the free-market Pacific Research Institute, believes the shift could be due to how much influence the Democrat-controlled Congress will enjoy over technology companies, especially if the party gains a supermajority.

"I don't think anyone wants to bet too strongly on the wrong horse," Ballon said. "They're looking at how the political winds are moving right now and seeing a strong likelihood of an Obama presidency and a stronger Democratic majority in the Congress. They think supporting the wrong person could come back and hurt them."

The McCain campaign headquarters referred calls on this topic to their West Coast regional director, who did not immediately respond to an interview request.

To be sure, the McCain campaign can count on the endorsements of some of the area's best-known former chief executives. Meg Whitman, who stepped down as eBay's chief executive officer in March, and Carly Fiorina, the chairman and CEO of Hewlett-Packard from 1999 to 2005, are both active in the campaign and spoke at the Republican convention in St. Paul, Minn. A survey by Chief Executive magazine says 74 percent of executives surveyed said Obama would be a disaster for the country, and a steady stream of criticisms of the Democratic nominee from business leaders have appeared in the editorial pages of The Wall Street Journal.

Obama, on the other hand, can count a far longer list of endorsements, including Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen, eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, Craigslist founder Craig Newmark, Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes, and Google CEO Eric Schmidt (who appeared with liberal talk show Rachel Maddow during the Democratic convention).

A shift toward the Democrats
The apparent political shift isn't limited to McCain and technology executives. In what could prove to be a worrisome sign for the Republican Party's future fundraising and electoral prospects, rank-and-file employees of tech companies seem to feel the same way about Republican candidates more broadly.

Microsoft employees handed 62 percent of their political giving to Democrats in 2004; now it's up to 70 percent. AT&T employees' Democratic support is up from 39 percent to 44 percent--even though it was Republicans who pushed to shield their employer from lawsuits alleging violations of federal wiretapping laws.

McCain received just $1.35 million from industry employees this year, a quarter of Obama's haul. Even Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, the limited-government candidate who broke with his party over the Iraq war, received $802,502--a remarkable showing considering that Paul dropped out of the race months ago, while McCain has been ramping up his fundraising solicitations and even sending donors prepaid Fedex envelopes.

Overall, what Opensecrets.org defines as the computer and Internet industry four years ago favored Democrats by a 54 percent margin. Now it's a 64 percent margin, which is a remarkable shift in a short time.

It's difficult to discern exactly what's causing the shift, and far too early to say whether this is a one-time move away from Republicans or something that will continue.

Part of the reason could be a dislike for the growth in federal power including warrantless wiretapping and interrogations at Guantanamo Bay, or the amazing uptick in federal spending (the debt has more than doubled since January 2001).

Another could be that Obama is promising billions in taxes hikes and subsequent government spending on favored projects, including $150 billion over 10 years for "green energy," much of which would flow to solar and biofuel start-ups in Silicon Valley. More favorites: $10 billion a year on healthcare tech, and broadband technologies, raising the question of whether some of the Obama-thusiasm can be explained by what economists like to call "rent seeking."

It could also be that Bush has not made tech topics the same priority that his predecessor did, something that Obama promises to change.

"Even Republican friends of mine who are diehards will say there was just nothing going on there," said Rob Atkinson, the president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation and an Obama adviser. "No one was home in the White House when it came to tech."

Atkinson acknowledges that if it looked like Republicans would sweep Congress, "you'd see a very different dynamic." He believes that the lack of enthusiasm for McCain also stems from the Arizona senator's mixed record on tech: "McCain is kind of seen as a little bit erratic in terms of people who have had dealings with him in the past on the Commerce committee. They're not sure what he's going to do and where he's going to go."

Jim Harper, director of information policy studies at the libertarian Cato Institute, thinks the change has to do with revulsion toward Republicans' spending, combined with their desire to centralize power in Washington. "This group is libertarian in outlook and Democratic in donation," Harper said, referring to Silicon Valley. "More so now that eight years of a Republican administration have brought us war and high-spending government."

For Draper, the venture capitalist, spending plays a role in his vote for Obama. "I've noticed that government spending as a percentage of GNP has grown from something like 7 percent to 43 percent in the last 100 years," he said. "During that time the growth in GNP has gone down from 8 or 9 percent to almost flat. I think those two things are related--more government spending equals less growth."

"There's one other thing I think will be a real positive--I think people will start looking up," Draper said. "They've been bombed with bad news for a long, long time and it spread fear throughout the land, and I think it's time to spread opportunity...And I think that might be the visceral thing in Silicon Valley that they are responding to--it's time to swing back to opportunity. Enough of this fear."

CNET's Stephanie Condon contributed to this report

Correction on November 21: The original version of the story reported that, based on public records searches, Republican party loyalists Floyd Kvamme and Michael Kim did not donate to the McCain campaign. A subsequent search showed that they did.

Presidential contenders John McCain and Barack Obama squared off Wednesday night for their third and final debate before Election Day, but the star of the show might have been Joe the Plumber.

Joe Wurzelbacher, an Ohio plumber, loomed large in the debate after McCain brought him up as an everyman worried about what might happen with tax rates under a new administration. As they have in the previous debates, McCain and Obama tried to spell out their economic philosophies for a curious electorate, and especially undecided voters.

Following the debate, which also covered the general domestic policy plans of the two candidates, Wurzelbacher spoke with Katie Couric of CBS News about what it meant for him to have had such a prominent role in the event and about his impressions of Obama and McCain. That conversation is part of a longer CBS News Webcast examining the debate and how the candidates fared.

Besides Wurzelbacher, Couric talks in the Debate Webcast--presented here--with a panel of undecided voters from across the country and with other guests including Sen. Hillary Clinton and Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty.

Just as the economy has dominated headlines in recent weeks, it is likely to be the overriding issue Wednesday night in the third and final debate between John McCain and Barack Obama.

The presidential candidates will take to the podium at 6 p.m. PDT, this time at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y. Moderating the debate--which is to focus in on domestic policy as well as economic matters--will be Bob Schieffer, the chief Washington correspondent for CBS News and host of the show Face the Nation.

Both McCain and Obama this week released new proposals on ways to reinvigorate a punch-drunk economy. After a pummeling last week, the markets have shown a glimmering of a rebound; meanwhile, the latest stimulus effort by the U.S. government involves taking a stake in a number of banking institutions.

You can watch the debate live and online at the CBS News Debate Webcast site. It will be followed by a Web-only analysis and commentary session with Katie Couric, the CBS News political team, and guests. You can also submit your own questions, now or during the event, at the Debate Webcast site.

See also these previous post-debate Webcasts:

• Examining McCain-Obama debate No. 2
• Examining McCain-Obama debate No. 1
• Examining the Biden-Palin debate

YouTube has rejected a request from John McCain's presidential campaign for a legal review of political videos that are the subject of deletion requests.

The Google-owned company said Tuesday evening in a response to McCain's organization (PDF) that it could not give campaigns special treatment and that it was "not in a position to verify" whether infringement complaints made under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act were legitimate or not.

The McCain camp is upset that some of its political ads and videos, which used brief snippets of news broadcasts and other copyrighted material, have been the subject of DMCA takedown requests after they appear on YouTube. Often, the McCain-Palin campaign's general counsel said, those videos are "immediately" removed for 10 days, which is a long stretch of time during a presidential campaign.

The campaign sent a letter to YouTube on Monday asking for a "full legal review" of DMCA takedown notices sent to "political candidates and campaigns." Here is an excerpt from the response from YouTube Chief Counsel Zahavah Levine sent a day later rebuffing the request:

While we agree with you that the U.S. presidential election-related content is invaluable and worthy of the highest level of protection, there is a lot of other content on our global site that our users around the world find to be equally important, including, by way of example only, political campaigns from around the globe at all levels of government, human rights movements, and other important voices. We try to be careful not to favor one category of content on our site over others, and to treat all of our users fairly, regardless of whether they are an individual, a large corporation or a candidate for public office.

The real problem here is individuals and entities that abuse the DMCA takedown process. You and our other content uploaders can play a critical role in helping us to address this difficult problem...You can file counter-notifications. You can seek retractions of abusive takedown notices. You can hold abusive claimants publicly accountable for their actions by publicizing their actions...

We look forward to working with Senator (or President) McCain on ways to combat abuse of the DMCA takedown process on YouTube, including by way of example, strengthening the fair use doctrine...

One example of what upset the McCain campaign would likely be CBS News' successful DMCA takedown request to YouTube over the McCain campaign's lipstick-on-a-pig ad. It used a brief video clip featuring CBS News anchor Katie Couric to make a point about sexism. (Disclaimer: CNET News is published by CBS Interactive, a unit of CBS.)

John McCain's presidential campaign is protesting YouTube's video-removal policy, which has resulted in the deletion of some political advertisements the campaign believes are perfectly legal and protected by fair use.

In a letter (PDF) sent to YouTube CEO Chad Hurley and company attorneys on Monday, the campaign charges that "our advertisements or Web videos have been the subject of DMCA takedown notices regarding uses that are clearly privileged under the fair use doctrine." The DMCA is, of course, the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act that allows copyright holders to submit takedown notices.

The letter cited "numerous" examples, without listing them. One would likely be CBS News' successful DMCA takedown request to YouTube over the McCain campaign's lipstick-on-a-pig ad. It used a brief video clip featuring CBS News anchor Katie Couric to make a point about sexism. (Disclaimer: CNET is published by CBS Networks, home of CBS News.)

Then there was the related flap last fall about Fox News complaining about McCain using a video clip from a Fox News-sponsored debate.

Legally speaking, McCain can't force the Google-owned video site to host his videos; among other things, the terms of service says "YouTube reserves the right to discontinue any aspect of the YouTube Web site at any time."

But more broadly, the campaign has a point; YouTube seems a bit too eager to remove political videos. The McCain camp's solution is to ask for a "full legal review" of videos posted by political candidates and campaigns before they're automatically removed. Another solution? If you don't like the neighborhood, move. Nobody's forcing them to stick with YouTube.

With just four weeks to go until Election Day, John McCain and Barack Obama met again Tuesday night in the second of three presidential debates.

The White House hopefuls covered familiar ground on topics ranging from the economy and the government's financial rescue plan to how to handle complex foreign policy hot spots, including Pakistan, Iraq, and Iran.

On the tech front, not much was said in the debate, which followed a town-hall format, though McCain suggested that he has considered former eBay CEO Meg Whitman as a potential Secretary of the Treasury. Whitman got second billing, though--McCain first named Warren Buffett as a fine choice for that office. Obama allowed that he likes Buffett's economic savvy, too.

For a recap and analysis of Tuesday's debate, check out the Debate Webcast presented here from Katie Couric and the CBS News political team. (It was originally presented immediately after the event.) The CBS Webcast features questions submitted from Web users before and during the debate.