Politico reports that Republican leaders may decide to relax traditional rules barring most technology from the floor of the House. While these items were banned to prevent any distraction from whoever held the floor, most people don’t actually pay attention to congressional speeches anyway. On the other hand, from covering Congress, I can tell you that iPads — or any other tablet that can display .pdf documents — would be hugely useful to members and their staff. Rather than dealing with bills as three-inch (or higher!) stacks of paper, they would have manageable — not to mention searchable — legislative language easily to hand and could quickly and easily download and distribute amendments and remarks, rather than waiting for printed copies to be distributed by hand.
Plus, you know John Boehner loves him some Angry Birds.
— Tim Fernholz
