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Comment by chomp | Hacker News Reader

Title of the original article: "Do You Want Political Email to Bypass Spam Filters and Go Directly to Your Inbox? Congress Does."

It says Congress, but looking at the submitted bills, there's only 1 party involved in the authoring and sponsoring of said bills. I'll let you guess which one it is.

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For those that don't want to click the article and feel both parties are just as likely to support such a bill, the answer is Republicans.

Both parties send spam email, but across all of my inboxes since I first got on the internet in '95, Republican candidates spam the most and are the most misleading in the content of those spam messages.

I won't speculate why. It's just something I have observed.

My observation is the opposite, I actually very very rarely get anything from Republicans, but non stop garbage from Democrats.

Even if one party objectively spams more than others, personal observation could be biased by (a) how your email address has been passed around and (b) subjective assessment of what constitutes “spam”.

There was once a study that "proved" Democrats were smarter because could recognize the letter W faster than Republicans. This was back during the George "W" Bush period. Basically one group was enraged at the sight of a W, so they were quick to spot it.

Same experience.

Dems seem to not pass emails around as much from my limited experience, giving their messaging possibly less exposure to spam filter training. I'm on Democrat and Republican mailing lists for various candidates, and for the last 4 years I've been getting people trying to sell me MAGA hats and the like. I'm still on IJR's mailing list despite never signing up for it. I have like 3 other tangential publications that are along the same messaging that last year were sending me like 4 emails per day.

Never had Dem merchandise or tangential publications land in my inbox before, and I'm on a couple congresspeople's mailing lists, and have given my email address to state and national Dem organizations.

I feel like for a very long time, the Right has been the most vocal about personal pride, "law and order," being an upstanding citizen, etc., but at the same time it's the Left that's still hamstringing themselves by trying to apply these ideals to politics.

I thought this was just a US thing, but then I saw the same shit happening during the brexit fiasco. I don't understand it, honestly.

>It says Congress, but looking at the submitted bills, there's only 1 party involved in the authoring and sponsoring of said bills.

This seems like a nitpick to me. Most non-trivial pieces of legislation gets passed along partisan lines (for instance[1]), yet we still say that "congress" passed it. Same goes with congress failing to pass some piece of legislation.

[1] https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2021267

This is true, however R's are not in control of the House or Senate at the moment. Lack of D co-sponsors gives me no reason to believe that Congress currently wishes to support this (for now). Maybe this fall, things will be different.

Democratic donations are rising and Republicans are declining sharply [1]. I see no benefit for Dems to support this bill and giving Republicans an opportunity to better access their base (or widen it).

[1] https://twitter.com/ShaneGoldmacher/status/15519178832986439...

The bill has a long term effect that would benefit both parties , the change in donations is a short term event

Let's be cynical here: They never care about the long term if it affects their next election.

> Most non-trivial pieces of legislation gets passed along partisan lines

That reinforces, rather than minimizes, the argument that it is inaccurate and deeply dishonest to characterize the content of a bill whose sponsorship is solely among the party in the minority in both Houses as what “Congress wants”.

Bipartisan bills are often cosponsored. Right now the bill is by a republican, if a Democrat has declared support or the party has in general declares support you can mention it then. When voted on you can display the results

We vote for people based on what they support saying "polticans" for this seems like a way to hide what is obviously a shit bill

I will personally DENY list (Vote against, FOREVER) any candidate that sends me email I haven't asked for, which isn't related to an emergency or direct benefit I am entitled to (looking out for my interests).

It is irrelevant. Once anybody is elected to congress they become part of a society which fraternizes together, schemes together, colludes together, and looks out for each other. It's one big party with engineered fake differences to keep commoners bickering. Congressmen and congresswomen don't represent you or your interests any more than necessary to get reelected. Candidates burn unspeakable amounts of money to get their face in front of the public to get elected. And even if they get voted out for enacting unfavorable policies there are zero consequences and their close buddies are elected instead. You can only vote for members of the same family. They may be affiliated with one or the other party but it's fundamentally just one family. One society that anybody is allowed to pull candidates from in practice. Outsiders will almost NEVER be elected. If they are, the mistake is quickly corrected with a character assassination (Trump) by the Intelligence Community, which works very closely with The Family. This money comes from special interest groups which willingly burn that money to stay in power. Once in power, the elected ones kick back favors to the same special interest groups that allowed them to ascend to power (again, by allowing candidates and incumbents to burn cash to put the candidate's name and face everywhere). Most people only vote for familiar names, faces, those who they are told to vote for by their pastor or other organization, or along party lines. It is a miracle this country still functions.

I’m slightly surprised the proposed wording contains this exception: “…unless the owner or user of the account took action to apply such a label.”

I have taken action - I signed up for an email service that includes automated spam filtering.

This seems like a predictable reaction from a party that has observed how casually tech and media companies are willing to cancel or censure their content and point of view. Once the boundaries are crossed, it’s difficult to uncross them.

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