Ask an official, post the answer, get paid

CHICAGO — Why do we vote on Tuesdays?

A bipartisan voter-reform group is paying prospective voters to videotape themselves asking elected officials that question face to face.

The first person to post a clip of a particular official onto YouTube or another video-sharing website cashes in.

The bounty hunting is lucrative: For a current U.S. House member, the payoff is $300, while a sitting U.S. senator or governor is worth $500. A vice president, either sitting or not, brings $2,500; President Bush or a predecessor commands $5,000.

The contest is being sponsored by "Why Tuesday?", chaired by former U.N. Ambassador and Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young, and financed by its founder, New York attorney William Wachtel.

The group thinks voter turnout would improve if election day were on the weekend, instead of the Tuesday after the first Monday in November.

The result so far has been an amusing cross between civics lesson and campaign trail "gotcha."

"You know, I don't know," confessed Sen. Russell D. Feingold (D-Wis.), when confronted with the question last week by Jacob Soboroff, a recent New York University graduate, at a retirement center in Milwaukee.

Wachtel said the idea came about when he and other group members saw voters flocking to YouTube to study the latest political ads and off-the-cuff campaign quips.

What better way to get the candidates talking about an issue, said Wachtel, than to get voters asking about it themselves? And what better lure than cash to entice the public?

Some say people shouldn't be paid to ask political leaders a question. "It seems like a well-meaning but misguided crusade," says Curtis Gans, director of the Washington-based Committee for the Study of the American Electorate. Besides, he says, experiments with weekend elections have shown that turnout actually suffers.

Wachtel figures to cough up more than $200,000 if every qualified politician is caught between now and Jan. 31, when the contest ends.

"We're just trying to have some fun and get people talking about voter reform," he said.

The contest began last week. So far, the only postings are by Soboroff and a former college roommate, who say they have earned $2,800 for interviews with four senators, one governor and a House member. They say they are not in league with the contest promoters.