Jim's complaint about gop.gov seems to me to be a reasonable one. Having
the names of political parties institutionalized in the top-level .gov
namespace sets an unusual precedent. I questioned the gop.gov site in a
column last October (scroll down):
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,32057,00.html
I wrote that it might violate RFC2146.
And, coincidentally, earlier this week I got this mail from Richard Diamond
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, who works for Rep. Dick Armey, House
Majority Leader. Richard said the domain name violated no RFCs:
>GOP.GOV is the site for the House Republican Conference, an official
>leadership office within the House of Representatives. It has nothing to do
>with the Republican National Committee.
>
>As found in the RFC and FAQ, "Top level domains are roughly equivalent to
>cabinet-level agencies". The Speaker of the House is third-in-line to the
>presidency. So that leadership office within the Congress has a greater
>constitutional status than any cabinet agency. Similarly the other
>leadership offices (Majority Leader, Whip and Republican Conference) have
>the same status as cabinet agencies not mentioned in the constitution.
>
>Further, "The registrar will use this RFC as guidance and will not
>grant the .GOV to any new entity which is not listed in the FIPS
>95-1 or the US Government Manual or which has not been granted an
>exception status by the FNC Executive Committee." Leadership offices are
>listed in the US Government Manual. An exception has also been granted by
>the FNC executive committee.
>
>GOP.gov is in full compliance with the RFC, period. There is no argument on
>this matter as the registrar is the final authority, as specified by the
>RFC.
Feel free to redistribute this message.
-Declan
At 02:08 4/8/2000 -0400, Matthew Gaylor wrote:
>[Note from Matthew Gaylor: It seems that the US House of
>Representatives, Republican leadership conference has established
>http://www.gop.gov/. A misuse of the domain name system which gives
>the impression of official .gov sanction when the site is really just
>a politics as usual, partisan site. To be fair the Republicans claim
>that their site is in Beta and that it is an official site due to
>their Congressional status. I find much of this idea rather
>offensive and unfair to Independents and third parties who will not
>be afforded the opportunity to hide partisanship under a mask of
>legitimacy. Of special note is the use of a private ISP Capital Area
>Internet Service (CAIS-DOM) to host the site. Is this to bypass the
>congressional system and if so why?]
>
>Date: Fri, 7 Apr 2000 18:10:41 -0700
>To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Dave Farber), [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Matthew Gaylor),
> State and Local Freedom of Information Issues
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>From: Jim Warren <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: fwd: www.gop.gov ??!!!
>
>I just received this from a friend.
>
>>Did you see that the Republican Party has established the domain
>>www.gop.gov? I'm very surprised that a partisan group could have a .gov
>>domain. I was also very disturbed by the fact that I couldn't get into
>>the site without accepting all the cookies that were being set. Looks
>>like a bad precedent to me on both counts.
>
>
>1. I wonder if this is really a Republican Party website -- as it's name
>certainly implies? The InterNIC Finger gives no listing for it.
>
>[Note from Matt Gov't sites need to looked up on www.nic.gov]
>
>2. I completely agree with the writer: Who the hell is granting dot-GOV
>status to a @#$%^ political party?!
>
>3. And if they're going to give ".GOV" status to the Republicrats (and,
>presumably, the Demopublicans), will they also give it to the Libbies, and
>the Peace & Freedom ... and the Flat Earth Party, and the 4th Reich, et
>al?! Maybe this is the first step to making dog-GOV meaningless as a
>top-level domain.
>
>4. When I attempted to go to it's home-page, I too, found that it tried to
>set two cookies -- which I refused. Then it promptly died saying, "No
>Cookie! To access this site your browser must be accepting cookies."
>
>5. Pretty damned arrogant no matter who's running it -- but especially if
>it really is the Repub Party. (The Party of the People? Apparently not
>unless the People let the Party set tracking/surveillance cookies ... and
>gawd knows what else!)
>
>--jim, Jim Warren; [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>Contributing Editor & technology public-policy columnist, MicroTimes Magazine
>Also GovAccess list-owner/editor; 345 Swett Rd, Woodside CA 94062
> voice/650-851-7075; fax-for-the-quaint/650-851-2814
>
>[self-inflating puff: Hugh Hefner First-Amendment Award, Playboy Foundation;
>Electronic Frontier Foundation Pioneer Award (in its first year);
>James Madison Freedom-of-Information Award, Soc.of Prof.Journalists-Nor.Calif
>founded InfoWorld; the Computers, Freedom & Privacy Conferences; etc etc etc.]
>
>And...
>
>From: Jim Warren <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: Re: fwd: www.gop.gov ??!!!
>To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>Ahah! The plot thickens.
>
>On the one hand, www.gop.gov -- by its dot-GOV domain-name -- pretends to
>be an official government site. And from what those who've accepted its
>cookies say, it *says* it's an official site of an official caucus within
>the official House of the official Congress.
>
>However ... curiously, it appears that -- in spite of it's dot-GOV name --
>it's being run as a private operation through a private ISP, and definitely
>*not* through any official congressional system! See the following, that
>just came in from a net-geek friend.
>
>--jim
>
>
>>A "WHOIS" on gop.gov didn't turn up anything at networksolutions
>>but I did find that the domain is hosted at Capital Area Internet
>>Service in McLean...
>>
>>Capital Area Internet Service (CAIS-DOM)
>> 6861 Elm Street, Third Floor
>> McLean, VA 22101
>> US
>>
>> Domain Name: CAIS.COM
>>
>> Administrative Contact, Technical Contact, Zone Contact:
>> Network Operations Center (CAIS-NOC) [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>> CAIS Internet
>> 1255 22nd Street
>> Washington, DC 20037
>> US
>>
>> (202) 715-1300 -- NOC (703) 448-2091 Fax- - (703) 790-8805
>> Billing Contact:
>> Billing Office (BO-ORG) [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>> CAIS Internet
>> 6861 Elm Street, Third Floor
>> McLean, VA 22101
>> US
>
>
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