hip2b2 writes "The US Congress is finally doing something to prevent large bandwidth providers and network operators from charging (or putting restrictions on) competing web and other Internet media content providers. According to this NetworkWorld article, the new bill sponsored by Democratic Representatives Ed Markey of Massachusetts, Jay Inslee of Washington state, Anna Eshoo of California and Rick Boucher of Virginia in the House and Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon in the Senate. I am not a big fan of legislation, but, I hope this bill keeps the Internet a freer place." Here is our coverage of the first round.

Lars Lehtonen writes to tell us that Bruce Perens has posted the text of his LinuxWorld press conference. In his talk he takes a look at many of the hot topics surrounding the open source community including ODF, NTP vs RIM, and GPLv3. From the article: "It's interesting to note that Jack Abramoff, the lobbyist implicated in scandal with Republican Tom Delay, was employed by Bill Gates' dad's law firm "Preston Gates", a political proxy for Microsoft. Microsoft succeeded in lobbying both Republicans and Democrats to oppose ODF."

An anonymous reader writes "The Australian Labor Party (much the same as the Democrats in the US) are claiming they will force ISPs to block violent and pornographic content if elected. From the article: 'Mr Beazley said all households would be included in the policy unless there was a specific request for access to such material. It was "too hard" for many parents to install internet blockers on their computers to prevent offensive material being downloaded.'"

andyring writes "According to CNS News Service, the Democrat Party will have an agenda that guarantees every American will have affordable access to broadband within five years as part of their 2006 election year agenda, according to Nancy Pelosi, House minority leader. Absent, of course, are any details as to how they will accomplish it when they are the party out of power in Congress."

Michael Gracie writes "I picked up "Crashing The Gate - Netroots, Grassroots, and the Rise of People-Powered Politics" from the DailyKos website, albeit apprehensively. The Kos community has a "reputation," and some would suspect that any printed material associated with the site would parallel what is said there. Nevertheless, I was curious to hear what Jerome Armstrong and Markos Moulitsas Zuniga would say, knowing they wouldn't have to deal with the instant (and often aggressive) feedback the "Kossacks" dispense. For the most part, I was pleasantly surprised." Read the rest of Michael's review.

smooth wombat writes "Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. said Wednesday that he has lost confidence in the state's ability to hold fair and secure elections this fall, and called for paper receipts for Maryland's electronic voting machines,and the delay of early-voting procedures approved by the Democratic-controlled legislature." From the article: "'In light of these recent national decertifications and the Maryland General Assembly's decision to override my vetoes ... I no longer have confidence in the State Board of Elections' ability to conduct fair and accurate elections in 2006,' said Ehrlich, a Republican, in his letter to Board of Elections Chairman Gilles W. Burger. Democrats criticized Ehrlich's apparent shift on the paper-receipt issue, noting that he vetoed a bill last year that would have studied the option. Advocates of reforming the state's voting system cheered Ehrlich's remarks, which he made a day before a Senate committee is to hold hearings on a bill that would require a paper trail. "

An anonymous reader writes "Any democrat will tell you the republicans ignore the facts. Any republican will tell you the democrats ignore the facts. Turns out they're right. A new study monitored brain activity of partisans; they shun logic and use emotional processing centers to justify their candidate's contradictory statements. 'With their minds made up, brain activity ceased in the areas that deal with negative emotions such as disgust. But activity spiked in the circuits involved in reward, a response similar to what addicts experience when they get a fix.'"

not so anonymous writes "The Online Freedom of Speech Act was defeated in the House of Representatives yesterday. The Act would have immunized political bloggers from having to comply with hundreds of pages of FEC rules." From the article: "In an acrimonious debate that broke largely along party lines, more than three-quarters of congressional Democrats voted to oppose the reform bill, which had enjoyed wide support from online activists and Web commentators worried about having to comply with a tangled skein of rules. The vote tally in the House of Representatives, 225 to 182, was not enough to send the Online Freedom of Speech Act to the Senate. Under the rules that House leaders adopted to accelerate the process, a two-thirds supermajority was required."

Many reactions to last week's violent games bill. Primotech writes "I first heard of California's AB1179 late Friday night. Like most others, who simply shrugged the bill off as inconsequential, my first thought was strikingly indifferent. Beyond the perfunctory glance, however, it becomes evident that this bill brings into focus and, more importantly, actually probes some of the more serious issues facing the industry. Above all else, examining and dissecting the proposal reveals some truly frightening facts." Relatedly, Shodan writes "Hal Halpin, the President of IEMA, today issued a statement in response to California Assembly Bill 1179, which is on the floor to address the issue of violent videogames." Other states are taking their lead from Illinois and California. KymBuchanan writes "I'm sad to say my state is on the bandwagon, and the charge is being lead by Democrats. From the article: 'Michigan Governor Jennifer M. Granholm has announced that she will sign legislation later this week that will make the sale or rental of mature or adult-rated video games to children illegal ... The fine for anyone caught selling a "violent title" ( apparently defined by the bill as real or simulated graphic depictions of physical injuries or physical violence against parties who realistically appear to be human beings) to minors will initially be $5,000, and can go as high as $40,000 ...'"

jangobongo writes "Does intelligent life exist anywhere besides Earth? Are regular churchgoers less likely to believe life has evolved on other planets? Do more Democrats or Republicans believe in extraterrestrials? And if alien life makes contact, what should we do? These questions were asked on a poll released last week that shows that two-thirds of Americans do believe that life exists on other planets, and of that group, 90% say if we receive a message from another planet we should reply. The poll was commissioned by the SETI Institute and the National Geographic Channel."

PrivateDonut writes "Australian parliament introduced a bill on Thursday that would 'make it illegal for anyone to install a program without informed approval and attract a fine of $10,000.' Is this doomed to fail as many other anti-spam/spyware bills have failed? Or has Australia finally hit the mark?"

sg3000 writes "It's official: the Democrats elected Howard Dean as Chairman of the Democratic National Committee. Dean won the position after a particularly contentious run for chairman, as reported in The New Republic. Governor Dean became a national figure during his impressive run for president in 2003, where he started as an outsider and long-shot candidate but became the front runner, only to see support fail to materialize during the Iowa caucuses."

Washington's secretary of state certified the result of the hand recount (the third count) in the governor's race, reversing the first two results -- which Republican Dino Rossi had won -- and making Democrat Christine Gregoire the election's second governor-elect, by 129 votes out of 2.9 million. The inauguration is January 12. Predictably, the two sides have switched arguments, too, with the Democrats saying Rossi should concede and the Republicans saying they have a duty to make sure the will of the people is followed. The next step may be an election contest, which could take months, and result in a court awarding the victory to a candidate, nullifying the entire election, or sending the matter to the legislature. Rossi is calling for the legislature to pass a special law calling for a new election, which would bypass a contest procedure.

jkauzlar writes "Popular mathematics books don't come along often and when they do, they're only occasionally worth the read. John Derbyshire, a controversy-stirring political propagandist by day, and mathematician-enthusiast by night, has composed what may turn to out to be one of the classics of mathematical literature for the lay-person." Read on for the rest of jkauzlar's review.

Republican Dino Rossi came out on top of the gubernatorial recount in Washington state, beating Democrat Christine Gregoire by 42 votes. He had won the initial count by 261 votes. King County (where Seattle is) gave Gregoire a 245-vote swing. It's expected that the Democrats will call for a partial hand recount, which they would have to pay for (25 cents per vote), unless they end up winning the recount.

Zogby released a poll yesterday that showed the ill-counted mobile-phone-only voters heavily in favor of Kerry over Bush. It should be noted that all participants opted in to the survey through a site run by Democrats, making the results non-random and therefore highly suspect. Further, the results tracked very closely ("virtually identical") to other polls run of the same age group, which means that if the results are to be trusted, mobile-only users in this age group are not any different from other voters in this age group, and their exclusion from those other polls is insignificant.

AJ writes "We used some old and new data mining techniques to see what was happening in the US Senate in 2003. Among other things, we identified the 'social' network of similarities between senators, how influential is each senator and each state, and a 3D VRML view of the Senate. You will be able to check whether Senator Kerry was a centrist or a liberal, and who is acting more cohesively, the Democrats or the Republicans. We provide our data and the source of all our analysis software (Orange and MPCA, both under GPL)."

An anonymous reader points to this Drudge Report story about an election day manual specifying aggressive tactics to be used in the event of any election problems. While Drudge says the Democrats are planning to "declare voter intimidation -- even if none exists", that's not what the manual says.

Indomitus writes "Slashdot recently listed the story about a voter registration company tearing up registration forms from Democrats but the story is quickly becoming much more than just that one story. Daily Kos is keeping track of the many folks digging up more and more information on this scandal-in-the-making. This is not only an important story to get out to voters, it's a great example of power of the internet to facilitate participatory journalism."

Slashdot readers both contributed and helped moderate questions for the New Voters Project Presidential Youth Debate. You can read the answers below, but if you'd like to see an expanded introduction, thumbnails of the candidates, and different formatting, go to the Youth Debate page. And that's not all: We're supposed to get candidates' rebuttals on or about October 17, so don't touch that dial!