I'm not suggesting you have to use Twitter—or know what Twitter is—to make sound judgments as a leader of the free world. It's not about being pro-net neutrality, either. These things are trivial. It's the long view—can someone who doesn't know how to read a newspaper online by himself truly comprehend just how connected the world is? (How can someone who can't read newspapers online function at all when they cease to be printed on paper?)

How can the techno-illiterate appreciate that technology is both the cause and the cure for our bruised economy, from the globally connected financial crises at hand to America's potential economic revitalization through a charge into green energy systems that spur innovation, create jobs and help to shatter our dependence on oil? Temporarily cheaper gas is a not a means to economics growth—and we will run out in our lifetime. US entrepreneurship is driven by technology and innovation, and it's key to maintaining our superpower status. A green energy—i.e., technology—economy would reboot all of that.

Technology constantly redefines the way we wage war, but it also aims to assuage the global food crisis. It will heal sick people who couldn't be cured before better. Hell, it's what will make flights finally arrive on time. The person at the wheel should know how to use a GPS—and Google, online newspapers, maybe even a smartphone.

That's a small list, but there's a big point. No, I'm not naïve enough to think this will change anyone's mind—in fact I hope your decision is not made so lightly that it possibly could. But I wanted to be clear: The future of this country, on many fronts, is tightly tied up with technology and what we do with it. I don't think it will ever again be possible to vote for someone who doesn't understand that. So why do it now?

[Left Image: Giz Photoshop Contest; Center Image: Thirty30 Photography; Right Image: Gary He]

Waybright actually seems like a really stand-up guy on people being able to vote the way they want, and details some of the measures they're taking to make sure that happens. The machines have confirmation screens, and they'll have techs at the polling places, just in case problems do pop up. It looks like an easy enough fix too—the same machine, when properly calibrated, should work just fine. So just be sure to double check your vote on Tuesday, wherever and however you're voting. [Video the Vote]

Besides being ironically hard drive-less, they have most of the parts turned off for extra security. Even with essentially iron-clad dumb terminals, security remains a huge issue like it was when internet voting was considered in 2004, so we're still a couple elections away from voting while pre-ordering our next Nintendo system just one tab over. But at least we're getting there. [Pop Mechanics via Dvice]

Some officials blamed it on user error for not touching the screens properly—Jackson County Clerk Jeff Waybright said that 400 people voted early using Election Systems & Software's machines without any problems at all. Oh and:

"I hate the fact that stories like this are printed. It makes everybody get scared. That is not good for anybody. Where the fault is, I don't know and the voter doesn't know. There needs to be good communication between the voters and the poll workers."

After being contacted by the Secretary of State's office, though, they've agreed to re-calibrate the machines. Ones of the counties with touchscreen wonkiness, Putnam, will actually use an optical scan machine with a full-size paper ballot on election day—the touchscreens are just for early voting, so it hopefully won't be an issue.

The takeaway is that whoever you're voting for, wherever you're doing it, whatever you're using, double-check it to make sure it was properly recorded before you walk out of the booth. If it's not, call the poll person over, it's what they're there for. Of course, if you see voting machines doing anything particularly crazy, be sure to let us know about it. [Wired]

While Schmidt says the Goog is officially neutral, the WSJ notes that "Congress is considering measures that could have an adverse impact on Google's business" like "rules that would allow telecommunications companies to charge different prices for different levels of Internet service," i.e., net non-neutrality. Obama has said that he is pro net-neutrality, which would benefit Google. Perhaps not-so-surprisingly, Google employees have donated nearly half a million dollars to Obama's campaign, and a mere $20,600 to John McCain as of Aug. 31, according to the Journal (which would likely make them among Obama's top corporate donors, since Verizon employees' $155,000 for McCain placed among his top 20 corporate donors ever).

Tuesday is the first day Obama and Schmidt hit the trail together, but some speculate he's been doing some campaigning of his own with Obama for a while—to be Obama's first tech chief:

Asked at a speech this month whether he would consider entering the political arena, the 53-year-old Mr. Schmidt shouted, "H-, no!" But some tech and media executives speculate that he might desire a role in an Obama administration, possibly the chief technology officer post Sen. Obama has said he would create.

I have to say, there are few more qualified than Google's CEO, especially since Bill Gates dreams beyond tech now, and Steve Jobs is perfectly happy within his own little world at Apple. Who would be your dream tech chief be? [WSJ via Valleywag, Image: Real Dan Lyons]

Yes, the temporary towers currently in place are response to a Secret Service request, though notably Service spokesman Eric Zahren told the Post in the original story that "this was something that was being addressed before we were out there," and that they could have used existing cell coverage in the area. The critical point, though, is that before the Secret Service tower happened, as Green notes, "whatever its motivation, Verizon plainly went to considerable effort and expense to pursue building a permanent tower on the McCains’ ranch," per Cindy McCain's original efforts, and it was "long underway until just recently."

The 200-page environmental assessment alone was an ordeal, with Verizon hiring consultants, sub-contractors, archaeologists and contacting over a dozen Indian tribes, not to mention all of the appropriate government agencies. It's clear Verizon went through a lot of trouble here.

So whether or not the McCains wanted special treatment, it looks like they got it—even Verizon's map of the sparse area (above) clearly denotes "McCain's cabin," so they definitely knew who it was for. And if the permanent tower "made no business sense," as Verizon spokesman Jeff Nelson put it, why did they go through all of that trouble in the first place? Wouldn't they have known how desolate it was before pouring lots of money and time into a bunch of regulatory crap? I guess that's one of the perks of having power—you don't have to ask for favors, you just get them.

Update: AT&T's official story on their tower at the McCain ranch is that they're giving "temporary accommodations to AT&T customers involved in or covering the campaign of a presidential nominee," which seems more on the up and up than Verizon's story. [The Atlantic]

P.S. If you have evidence T-Mobile put a tower on top of Obama's house, let us know.

McCain is a senior member of the Senate Commerce Committee, which happens to oversee the FCC, which regulates the telecom industry—like AT&T and Verizon. Conflict of interest much? And it's not like McCain and Verizon are strangers to each other, anyway. Five of his campaign officials, including manager Rick Davis, have been soul-sucking lobbyists in Washington. A former staffer, Robert Fisher, is now Verizon's in-house lobbyist. Verizon chief Ivan G. Seidenberg, Fisher and other Verizon lobbyists have plowed over $1.3 million into McCain's campaign, and Verizon employees are one of its top 20 corporate donors over the course of McCain's career.

The AT&T situation is as bad, or worse: AT&T lobbyists have raised $2.3 million for McCain, and their employees are his no. 3 corporate donors of all time. His Senate chief of staff Mark Buse, and a whole bunch of others have been AT&T lobbyists.

There's even more in the Post's exclusive story, it's worth checking out if you wanna find out how to get Verizon and AT&T to build personal cell towers at your house if your reception sucks (fair warning, it helps to be a presidential nominee though). [Washington Post]

Update: Verizon has issued a statement about the Washington Post story:

The Washington Post story regarding Verizon providing a cell tower to the McCain Ranch is wrong. Verizon received a request from Mrs. McCain, but declined. Subsequent to that, the Secret Service made a legitimate request for a temporary tower for its work and Verizon complied as is required by our contract with the agency. The Secret Service request, made on May 28, specifically said it needed the service urgently and requested that Verizon “explore every possible means of providing an alternative cellular or data communications source in the referenced area and provide any short term implementation of any type as a solution in the interim.”

•Hulu is our most favoritest pick because it's easy to get to and you can watch Colbert or Tina Fey or Future President Petrelli when it gets dull

•Current's Hack the Debate is our second favorite, a fantastic mashup of the live debate broadcast overlaid with Twitter messages in real-time, so you can see how everyone else is reacting (or jeering, knowing the Twitter mob)

•C-SPAN has a live stream and their debate hub is super-comprehensive and Web 2.0tastic but it looks like you need the Windows Media Player plugin if you're using Firefox (you do for their other videos)

•CNN has a bunch of extra coverage like a debate preview (as if you don't already know what they're gonna say) though you might need their plugin, like you do for other videos of theirs

•MSNBC seems to have a pretty snazzy player with a nice feature set and big, beautiful widescreen video—getting around their site sucks though, so use our direct link to make your life easier

•Foxnews—I tried to find a feed on their site, I really did. Send it in and I'll add it if you feel that strongly about it

•CBS

Or you could skip the debate entirely and base your vote on these zany Photoshops of John McCain and Barack Obama (coming later this week). Sounds like a plan to me. [Election Coverage on Giz]

Clips should be between 30 seconds and three minutes. More importantly, some states have fairly strict laws about filming in or around polling places, so if you get too Michael Moore-y, you might get to document your first cavity search (though that would be more appropriate for RedTube). The Citizen Media Law Project has more details about how to stay out of jail while being a web 2.0 do-gooding oversharer. Or you could just be safe and stick to Twitter to tell everyone who you voted for. [AZ Star, AP, Image: Flickr/Refractionless]

It supposedly tracks Obama tech news and events, but it does a pretty crappy job at it, even though there's a ton of stuff to cover, which would go to their whole point—no mention of the Dems' digital billboard at the Palin rally, the fact that the $3 million dollar projector he supported is sweetass, or most surprisingly, the Obama iPhone app.

They don't talk about the fact that Joe Biden sucks on tech stuff, either, but that's kind of expected. He's, like, old and stuff.

Update: Here's Wired's take on both candidates. [Tech for Obama]

P.S. Please keep all flaming to a low smolder, thanks.

If you're not near a TV or computer tonight Verizon's VCAST service will be streaming CBS's feed live. Of course, there are streams from CBS's regular site, CNN and C-SPAN, who has probably the best and most forward-thinking—for Web 2.0 fanatics anyway—online coverage around. Hulu's Election '08 hub also aggregates everything from speeches to punditry to funnies from The Daily Show, Colbert, Conan and more if you want to flip something more engaging during a particularly snoozy stretch of the debate. Or if your politics appetite is just insatiable, there's Obama's maybe gaming-changing iPhone app if you want to put your fingers in your ears whenever McCain speaks.

Where else are you guys planning to peep the debate? [paid content]

To make matters worse for McCain, Thompson points out that France, the scourge of Republicans and veterans alike, now has broadband that's four times as fast—and half the price!

Admittedly, there's a bit of fuzzy matching required to join McCain's vehement opposition to the 1996 Telecommuncations Act and his subsequent statutory castration of its powers with the slow increase of our cable modem's actual download speed. However, there's no disputing the fact that McCain has done nothing to grow broadband penetration. (Even that comedic allegation that he helped invent the BlackBerry doesn't do anything to support any kind of breaching of the digital divide.)

In fairness to anyone who thinks we're reporting this lopsidedly, we have previously shared reports about Democratic vice-presidential candidate Joe Biden's opposition to net-neutrality legislation, and his Hollywood-backed war against citizen-pirates. And the reason we haven't discussed Sarah Palin's stance is simple—she's a clean slate, baby. Not a word on any of this.

But as you might imagine, Thompson uses his main point—McCain's consistent and ongoing hampering of the kinds of technological innovation that are commonplace in other countries—as a good reason to repeat what we have also recorded on Giz, that Barack Obama's attention to these matters will not be so blas&#233, that in fact he has interesting ideas, not just that America needs a cabinet-level CTO or that there should be true neutrality on the internet, but that, for instance, rural-phone subsidies are used to provide rural broadband (which would basically includes free phone service anyway).

Thompson makes the point that Silicon Valley has gone O, saying that 555 employees of Google have donated to Obama, compared to 26 for McCain. He says the market freedom that McCain wants is "freedom for his country to fall further and further behind as AT&T and the other telecom leviathans sit back, ignoring your customer service calls and just watching the $90 monthly checks roll in." That's harsh, Nick, but it also sounds pretty damn accurate. [Washington Monthly]

John McCain

The 100-Word Version:

McCain thinks the market should determine the fate of the net, so government-mandated "neutrality" would be too much of an intervention. He also voted against renewable energy. He voted in favor of federal funding to get more tech in classrooms, yet he wants to be hands off in closing the digital divide. This is also the same man who is self-proclaimed as computer illiterate, and almost went broke before primaries even began.

Bonus Bits: McCain expects to be in Iraq for over 100 years. No matter what opinion you have on the war, just think about all the crazy gadgets they'll be fighting with then!

If McCain were a gadget, he'd be: a Motorola StarTAC cellphone. Once relevant and desired, both are woefully underpowered now, and backed by a company in financial turmoil.

Mitt Romney

The 100-Word Version:

Romney suspiciously lacks a position on many prevalent tech issues; he offers no statements on net neutrality and vague, blanket statements about subsidized tech programs that might help the poor. He did propose $20 billion for the automotive industry to research alternative energy sources. But he's more concerned with becoming energy independent from other countries, as opposed to finding a replacement for oil. Given his lifelong commitment to capitalism, Romney probably won't take any big risks in the name of technology.

Bonus Bits: Romney probably wishes we weren't living in the YouTube era, so the public wouldn't be exposed to his grasp on cultural relevance.

If Romney were a gadget, he'd be: a Lenovo ThinkPad. Romney and the ThinkPad both are meant for the business sector, eschewing romanticism for a bottom-line mentality.

Mike Huckabee

The 100-Word Version:
Huckabee is the only candidate from the GOP who's in favor of net neutrality, picking up major points from us (in spite of ourselves). He also supports reducing CO2 emissions through renewable energy programs, though I wouldn't exactly call him a techie. Huckabee is mostly concerned with renewable energy so that CO2 emissions don't muck up his hunting grounds. As far as funding tech programs to bridge the Digital Divide, he lacks any stated position.

Bonus Bits: Huckabee has Chuck Norris, the ultimate internet meme, in his corner.

If Huckabee were a gadget, he'd be: a Big Mouth Billy Bass. Not only does Huckabee come off as a low-tech kind of guy who loves his nature, but he has a certain low-brow appeal to him. The Singing Fish embodies a similar characteristic.

Ron Paul

The 100-Word Version:

Paul, our Libertarian in wolf's clothing, is against net neutrality and thinks the FCC should stay out of 700 MHz spectrum auction. He also voted against funding for tech education, reducing greenhouse gases and increasing automotive fuel economy. Sure, he is against federal requirements for search engines to keep detailed search logs. But still, DO NOT WANT.

Bonus Bits: The users of Digg have taken a liking to Paul. Any story that mentions his name is almost guaranteed to hit the front page.

If Paul were a gadget, he'd be: the BugLabs BugBASE. Bug Labs is about letting people do whatever the hell they feel like with the gadget. Ron Paul thinks American citizens should be able to do whatever the hell they feel like with the country. Kindred spirits, they are.

And the winner is...: Huckabee. This may sound absolutely mad, but if I had to pick a GOP candidate based on his tech policies, it would be Mike Huckabee. McCain and Romney could potentially have better tech platforms, but neither has the balls to show their hand. Therefore, mostly by default, Huckabee wins.

Related Reading:
Mike Huckabee
• Chuck Norris Endorsement of Mike Huckabee
• Mike Huckabee on the Issues
• NY Times Magazine: "The Huckabee Factor"

Mitt Romney:
• Mitt on YouTube: Who Let The Dogs Out?
• Mitt on the Issues
• Tech Crunch interviews Mitt

John McCain:
• John McCain @ D5 Conference
• John McCain On The Issues
• John McCain interview with CNET

Ron Paul:
• Digg Nation Hearts Ron
• Ron Paul On The Issues
• CNET Interviews Ron Paul

Special thanks to TechCrunch and CNet.

Hillary Clinton

The 100-Word Version:
Clinton is progressive in several tech areas, including her support for net neutrality, plans for a Strategic Energy Fund to develop alternative resources, and providing tax credits for research and development. Unique to Clinton's manifesto is her desire to bring more women and minorities into math and science professions, where the groups are sorely underrepresented. However, she loses points with us for skirting issues of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, reserving opinion on a consumer's right to legally create backup copies of their media pending further review, and accepting the Bush administration's support of requiring ISPs and search engines to record the surfing habits of their users.

Bonus Bits: Clinton recently said that if elected, she would take the "radical step" of hiring bloggers for government agencies to write about what goes on in meetings. She didn't say how these government employees working under the eye of the president would remain watchdogs of the agencies.

If Clinton were a gadget, she'd be: a designer Taser. The pink outer case projects an image of charm and beauty, but it's the stun gun on the inside that is the true mark of its power. Just like Hillary.

Barack Obama

The 100-Word Version:
The only candidate with a dedicated technology section on his website, Obama has vowed to make priorities of ensuring net neutrality, affordable broadband access, and accelerating research and commercialization of biofuels and plug-in hybrids. In addition to this standard Democrat fare, Obama plans to redefine "broadband," calling the present definition of 200kbps "astonishingly low," reform the patent system to protect major innovations and prevent patent trolls from stifling development, and use the wireless spectrum for maximum public benefit. Finally, an Obama-led administration would include a Chief Technology Officer to oversee these issues and maintain communication between the government and the American people.

Bonus bits: Obama is likely the Apple fanboy's candidate of choice. On a recent episode of Letterman, he made one campaign promise we hope comes true: "I won't let Apple release the new and improved iPod the day after you bought the previous model."

If Obama were a gadget, he'd be: an iPhone. He's the new, sexy and popular candidate, but he still has a lot to prove.

And the winner is...: Barack Obama. From a purely technology-based standpoint, Obama is the more progressive of the two. He cares about topics as nerdy as broadband speed, and wants to protect the freedom that exists on the internet. Obama appears to understand technology on a deeper level than Clinton, and is our choice for the most tech-savvy Democratic candidate.

Further reading:
Hillary Clinton
• Clinton's technology plan
• "Hillary Clinton on Energy & Oil"
• "Clinton knows the value of research"

Barack Obama:
• Obama's technology plan
• "Obama pledges Net neutrality law if elected president"
• "Obama: No warantless wiretaps if you elect me"

Special thanks to TechCrunch and CNet.