Project Vote Smart Helps Voters Wade Through Campaign Rhetoric

Aug 01, 2008 by Eric Ray

(KCPW News) Voters now have a way to avoid campaign attack ads and misinformation about candidates coming from various special interest groups. Project Vote Smart is offering what it's calling the Voters' Self Defense System, which the organization says provides factual information about candidates.

"We focus on collecting things like their voting records, issue positions, grades by special interest groups, their backgrounds and previous experience, their campaign finance data, speeches and public statements, and we pool all of that data together," says Adelaide Kimball, a Senior Board Member with Project Vote Smart.

Kimball says this information is available for each state's candidates for governor, the legislature and Congress, as well as for the presidential candidates. She says it's important for voters to have access to this information because so many candidates are less than forthcoming with it.

"They're just using the tactics that their advisors and consultants are telling them they have to use in order to win," says Kimball. "They're being told that in order to win they have to play the game this way. They have to play it safe, keep their positions to themselves in order not to alienate voters or funders. So they're trying to win the race and then perhaps worry about how they'll do the job after that."

Project Vote Smart's mobile training center will be on hand Sunday at the People's Market at the International Peace Gardens at in Salt Lake City.

Click here to download a longer conversation about Project Vote Smart.

Email to a friendPosted in KCPW Newsroom and Election 2008. Copyright 2009 KCPW