GOP Candidate on How the House GOP's Crowdsourcing Website Is Lame

Governmental crowdsourcing is the new wave among House Republicans: since May, they've been promoting a new initiative/website called America Speaking Out, headed up by Rep. Kevin McCarthty, wherein visitors' ideas for the nation are voted on, with the top ten eventually selected as a new kind of Contract with America. It's a big theme for the class of young-turk rising stars in the House; House Minority Whip Eric Cantor, who has coauthored a book with McCarthy, recently launched YouCut, a site that lets visitors vote on spending cuts (with the promise that House Republicans will force votes on them).

One Republican candidate, however, thinks America Speaking Out is totally unimaginative and weak. Raul Labrador, carrying the GOP banner in Idaho's House race after Young Gun candidate Vaughn Ward crashed and burned, tells it to the Idaho Press-Tribune. Hotline OnCall's Reid Wilson reports:

"I was excited. I was like -- 'cause I loved the Contract with America. I thought what Newt Gingrich did was fantastic," Labrador said of a Fox News interview with Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), who heads America Speaking Out. "And this guy looks into the TV and he says, 'What we are going to do is we are going to go online and we are going to let people tell us their ideas about what we should be doing and than we are going to make a list of the top ten. And than that's going to be our new contract.' I'm probably exaggerating here a little bit, but it was so underwhelming."

"This is your new contract with America? You're going to let the people say what their thoughts and their ideas are?" Labrador asked.

"Now I have no problem with the people saying their things, but you have to show leadership. You have to look at what the problems are in America and say, 'These are the problems that are facing America and these are thing things that I would do as a party or as a candidate to fix those problems.'"

Read the full story at Hotline OnCall.