Taking Control: Politics in the Information Age

Arguing that the computer age requires new politics and public policies, Winograd, a v-p of AT&T in California, and Buffa, a Colorado lawyer, offer a grab bag of observations and prescription. Both are members of the influential neoliberal Democratic Leadership Council. Some of their dry report is predictable, some is practical and some is Pollyannish. Drawing on recent election results, they argue credibly that the emerging ""new information age constituency"" will support candidates who want to use government more efficiently. Winograd and Buffa support market-driven government regulation, cuts in corporate welfare, worker training for welfare recipients, boot camps for nonviolent criminals and replacing the income tax with a national sales tax (including an exemption for the poor). More dubious are their assumptions that the health-care market can be made to evolve into a universal insurance system, their hope that video conferencing can extend elite educational opportunity (and relieve affirmative action pressure) and their call for a single national presidential primary in which new media, rather than retail politics, prevails. (Apr.)