Last evening, the Firedoglake hosted another installment of their Sunday Book Salons, where John Anderson took questions online about his new book Follow the Money: How George W. Bush and the Texas Republicans Hog-Tied America, released earlier this fall. In the book Anderson gives an overview of the connections between elite Houston law firms, Karl Rove, Grover Norquist, Tom DeLay and his K Street Project to Jack Abramoff. I haven't read the book yet, but last night's discussions makes me want to.

As an Austin American-Statesman review states, Anderson used previously reported or exposed facts to retell this story. By following Deep Throat's advice, Anderson shows the overarching network that put George W. Bush in the White House, DeLay out of a job, Abramoff in prison, and the GOP in the minority.

What a difference a year makes. As we sat down to count our blessings a year ago, we could all be thankful that the 109th Congress was winding down, that the public disdain for that Congress--fueled in part by its profligate earmarking to benefit connected contributors, and the various members with problems ranging from ethical complaints to outright corruption charges (including Rep. William Jefferson, Rep. Alan Mollohan, Sen. Ted Stevens, Rep. Jerry Lewis, Sen. Bob Menendez, Rep. John Doolittle, to name a few--there's a more thorough list here)--might wind down with it. As we sit down to count our blessings in 2007, we can be thankful that the 110th Congress is nearly halfway through its term, that this Congress apparently is equally unperturbed by low poll ratings, that Jefferson, Mollohan, Stevens, Lewis, Menendez and Doolittle remain on the scene, ensuring that VECO's congressional home remodeling service, $90,000 of cold, hard (frozen, actually) cash, unintentional accounting omissions of assets and, of course, Jack Abramoff remain relevant terms in our political discourse.

But there is much to be thankful for. To begin with, computers--"When I sit down to write a letter or start the first draft of an article, I simply type on the keyboard and the words appear on the screen"--which, once connected via pneumatic tube to the the Internet (detailed technical overviews of which are available here and here), allows citizens to access insanely useful resources for understanding the operations of their government.

Yesterday, the Center for Public Integrity released their new report Windfalls of War II, exposing how contractors over the past three years made a mint off the spoils of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. An earlier 2003 report, Windfalls of War (heavily researched by our Sunlight colleague, Larry Makinson) looked at Uncle Sam's spending on private contractors from 2001 through much of 2003.

In this new report, the Center says that the federal contract system for the two war zones is "marred by missing contracts, unidentified companies, a lack of competitive bidding and the absence of minority-owned companies as primary contractors." By the end of 2006, CPI reports, U.S. contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan have grown to $25 billion, while oversight has seriously deteriorated.

Google has been working with federal agencies to help them ensure that their data are accessible through search engines. Many government databases providing critical information or statistics have existed for much longer than the current standards for public Internet accessibility, so the disconnect between search engines and public databases is understandable. There is a clear public benefit, however, when search terms like "Colorado census 1990", "federal childhood immunology standards", "Pennsylvania superfund sites", or "Congressional Record 1930 Stock Market" result in the information the searcher is obviously interested in--government information. (More after the break.)

Money and politics, united completely.

Yesterday, I highlighted a new interactive and customizable widget that lets the citizen be the journalist, AskYourLawmaker.org. Here's another really interesting one.

Besides his day job at the Cato Institute, Jim Harper is the creative force behind WashingtonWatch.com, which places a value on changes to future federal spending, taxes, or regulation. The goal of the site is to convey the significance to average Americans -- in dollars and cents -- of proposed changes to the nation's policies. Jim's new widget allows bloggers to show the current state on pending legislation. It allows individuals to comment on the bill, and to even vote yea or nay on the legislation. It's very cool.

Lisa Zagaroli, writing for McClatchy Newspapers, reports on the growing importance of bundlers in presidential campaign fundraising. These "mega-fundraisers" are very skilled at using their business and personal contacts to raise large amounts of campaign cash for a specific candidate. Only a few presidential candidates have released any information on who is doing the bundling but we know that the bundlers usually have super access to the candidates. No presidential campaign has released both the names of their bundlers and the amount each individual fundraiser has raised. Each campaign has adopted varying degrees of disclosure on who is raising their big bucks.

On October 30, Congressional Quarterly reported that Federal Election Commission is working on new bundling rules. One proposal, which came out of the Congress, is to only disclose the bundlers who are federal lobbyists. The McClatchy report indicates that the FEC is interested in going beyond this.

We're very pleased to announce that Sunlight grantee Capitol News Connection is launching today a new interactive and customizable widget that lets YOU be the journalist -- and hold power to account! You decide what you want to ask members of Congress and presidential candidates, see what other people are asking about, and vote on the questions you think are most important. CNC's award-winning public radio journalists will track down lawmakers and candidates on the campaign trail -- and get the answers you demand. Then, you can listen, comment, share and even embed the audio on your site. This is very cool.

Those using the widget include CNC public radio stations, public television sites, bloggers and social networking sites. To get the widget just go to www.askyourlawmaker.org/widget. Select the customization options you want -- you can display questions or answers -- by topic or state. You can listen and vote within the widget. Try it out -- and help spread the word! We want to get as many questions as possible, and aggregate as many voices as possible around each question: It's hard for a lawmaker to dodge a question asked by, say, 13,952 people in 17 states!

Update: Apparently NPR has taken down the widget from its site, for what may be technical fixes. We trust that will only be temporary. 

(From the Open House Project)

Broad access to fundamental data leads to compelling analysis. Here's a TED talk from Hans Rosling, where he gives a tour of the recent history of countries becoming industrialized, using visualizations built on data from the UN.

The history of representative democracy and government is waiting to be similarly told; here's a broad collection of data indexed on a world map, representing data sets about freedom and government (by Zachary Johnson). When these visualizations are easier to create, and free to those with an Internet connection, our collective ability to visualize societal trends and expressive freedom should continue to develop. What role will this play in shaping the continuing development of industrialized countries? Will a digital view of what we're up to lead to better policy?

(from the Open House Project)

To encourage Congress to grant access to committee hearings, we've prepared this letter. (With the close help of Perla Ni of VoterWatch.)

I'm hoping that we can demonstrate some enthusiasm for what happens in committee hearings, since they're so essential to the legislative process, literally determining the content of our laws and the extent of Congress's oversight. To that end, I've also prepared a brief pledge via pledgebank, where one can pledge to look to committees for legislative information, but only if Congress will meet us halfway and provide access to its proceedings.

You can sign the pledge by visiting pledgebank, or you can also be a signatory to the letter by leaving a comment here.