Talk:Congressional office lottery

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by PrimalMustelid talk 17:05, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

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Push-ups during the office lottery

Push-ups during the office lottery

• ... that the congressional office lottery has involved a "Jedi mind trick", head rubs, and push-ups (pictured)? Source: "'I was concentrating,' he joked. 'My name is Knight. It was a Jedi mind trick.'" Incoming representatives choose their new digs during House office lottery and "Sharice Davids of Kansas dropped to the floor for a lightning round of push-ups. And Chrissy Houlahan of Pennsylvania, in her lucky jeans, paused to rub a colleague's bald head for an extra boost of support." High Stakes for House Freshmen: The Office Lottery
  • ALT0a: ... that congressional office lottery winners have prepared by pulling tissues from a box and doing a "Jedi mind trick"? Source: "'I was concentrating,' he joked. 'My name is Knight. It was a Jedi mind trick.'" Incoming representatives choose their new digs during House office lottery and "'I practiced pulling tissues out of the box,' he said. 'I'd pull 20 to 25 until I decided that my form was good.'" Freshman Lottery Doles Out New Office Space
  • ALT1: ... that the congressional office lottery has led to representatives "being sent to Siberia"? Source: "But drawing an office on Cannon’s fifth floor ... is the congressional equivalent of being sent to Siberia." Scramble for office space in Congress is about status
  • Reviewed: Daniel Larsen (mathematician)
  • Comment: For ALT0, taking any three items from Congressional office lottery § Superstitions would probably work, though the three I picked seemed like the most wacky ones. Alternative selection and slightly different focus at ALT0a.

Created by Sdrqaz (talk). Self-nominated at 02:09, 4 November 2023 (UTC). Post-promotion hook changes for this nom will be logged at Template talk:Did you know nominations/Congressional office lottery; consider watching this nomination, if it is successful, until the hook appears on the Main Page.

• Interesting topic. New and long enough, no issues with neutrality/sourcing/copyvio. Image would need a crop if used, but license seems OK. QPQ present. The History section seems short, but don't know what more would go there. @Sdrqaz: Maybe clarify exactly which buildings are available to be chosen? I prefer ALT1 and then ALT0a, but all factually OK. Hameltion (talk | contribs) 04:14, 4 November 2023 (UTC)

  Thank you for the quick review, Hameltion. How much cropping do you want for File:Sharice Davids office lottery.jpg? I didn't crop it for the article since having the surroundings made it clear it was a circus environment, but given the limitations of the Main Page, I would be happy to do so. I think that there's definitely further information out there for the history section: I thought of compiling a list of "winners", but I thought that would be too trivial. I've added information about which buildings are available too. Sdrqaz (talk) 17:17, 4 November 2023 (UTC)

  @Sdrqaz: Good additions. I like list of winners if any source has ever mentioned a series of them as a group. I took a closer look at trying to crop (one attempt), but unfortunately the sharp angle kind of makes it not great for main page scale. Hameltion (talk | contribs) 17:41, 4 November 2023 (UTC)

  I've not seen any mention of a series of them as a group: just that when sources cover the lottery, they tend to mention who won that year. Maybe not viable, then. Hmm, that's quite a drastic crop. Maybe something like File:Sharice Davids office lottery (cropped02).jpg? Anyways, I've added both to the image template at the top, replacing the original. Promoter's choice . Sdrqaz (talk) 16:06, 6 November 2023 (UTC)

Lead sentence

Hi, Panini!. Regarding Special:Diff/1192296533, I phrased it that way to avoid redundancy in the lead: I thought that "congressional" would be repeating the "House of Representatives" information, with less detail (congressional can mean the Senate too, of course). Happy to listen to your thoughts on the subject . Sdrqaz (talk) 18:29, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

@Sdrqaz I did this per usual structure of leads where you bold the title. Per MOS:BOLDLEAD it says "If an article's title is a formal or widely accepted name for the subject, display it in bold as early as possible in the first sentence."

In my opinion the word "congress" specifically is not used close enough to "Congressional office lottery" for it to read redundantly, but since you feel it can cause some confusion I removed the word "congressional" from the bolded statement. Panini! • 🥪 19:08, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

Larger picture

The article doesn't explain what happens with incumbents. Since it mentions there being only 75 slots, it seems to be the case that the lottery applies only to newly elected members, not to incumbents who are re-elected. Do incumbents just keep their office? Do they get an opportunity to move to a more desirable office vacated by a member who has retired, resigned, or failed to be re-elected?Bill (talk) 08:09, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

Hi, Bill; thanks for the question. The lottery only applies to new members (in the lead, I referred to "incoming" representatives, but I think I can make that clearer, thanks). There's a cascading effect for office vacancies: incumbents get to keep their offices, unless they choose to move to one that is more desirable, vacated by someone more senior. As a result, new members are choosing from the dregs, the ones which none of the 300+ more senior members wanted. This Roll Call source, in the article, is probably useful . Sdrqaz (talk) 11:10, 29 December 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, that is helpful. Bill (talk) 20:00, 30 December 2023 (UTC)