Why not have constituents vote on bills?
I get asked every few months why not extend GovTrack or build a new website where constituents could vote on bills and then we can see how often our elected representatives stray from the will of the people. There are a number of reasons why I think polling constituents on legislative actions is a bad idea if not done right. First, it is exceedingly difficult to get a representative sample online, not only because different populations have different access to the Internet (which is a serious concern of course), but even more so because different segments of the population will choose to visit the site. It seems generally true that it is the most polarized people that will care enough to participate in polls, and you don’t always get any sort of balance either. On some issues you will find that while there are people on both sides of the issue, only one side proactively pushes their position on any given website. I don’t know why that is. Probably there is some degree of chance involve
