- Politico - Lawmakers challenged to read health care bill before voting
Passing comprehensive health reform was already a huge task. Now a conservative group wants a pledge from every lawmaker to actually read the entire bill before voting.
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Congressman Brian Baird, D-Wash., has re-introduced a bill in Congress that would ensure the public and members of Congress have adequate time to review legislation before it comes up for a vote.
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On Friday, the House of Representatives voted on the American Clean Energy and Security Act, aka the "climate change bill."
I'm going to sidestep the content of the bill today to make a different point: The legislation is more than 1,000 pages long.
- CNN - CNN: Jake Brewer discusses the Read the Bill campaign
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Louise Schiavone reports on the massive redrafting of the American Clean Energy and Security Act. Jake Brewer, Engagement Director, talks about how Congress didn't have time to Read the Bill before it passed.
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Remember that gargantuan climate change bill we told you about last week? It's gotten bigger. Over the weekend, the bill grew from 946 pages to 1,201 pages, according to the Sunlight Foundation. It's still changing, with important amendments in flux.
- KCRW To The Point - Healthcare Reform: Competition and the 'Public Option'
Senior fellow Bill Allison weighs in on the debate over healthcare reform with PRI KCRW. He explains the role lobbying and money are influencing the discussion.
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The House of Representatives is preparing to vote Friday on a massive "cap and trade" bill purportedly designed to address global warming - though they call it "climate change" now since the globe hasn't warmed in the past few years - that will probably not be finished until minutes before voting begins. The reason is that proponents are still buying votes from moderate Democrats with special-interest favors and sweetheart deals. Not only will this bill do little or nothing to curb global warming - it's all pain and no gain - it has become a Christmas tree for politically connected industries and lobbyists.
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The House of Representatives is preparing to vote on a massive “cap and trade” bill today purportedly designed to address global warming — though they call it “climate change” now since the globe hasn’t warmed in the last few years — that will probably not be finished until minutes before voting begins.
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The watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has served notice that it will file an ethics complaint against Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.), and we concur — without prejudging the case — that issues arising from his sexual affair with a former aide deserve examination.
- National Journal: Under the Influence - Public In Dark On Details Of Climate Bill
Good government groups are using House Democrats' rush to pass climate change legislation to renew their call for more congressional deliberation and public input on major legislation.
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Without regard for the merits or demerits of the bill itself, we pause to take note of criticism for the process by which the new cap-and-trade energy bill is headed for a vote on Friday in the U.S. House of Representatives.
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Jake Brewer, Sunlight's engagement director, was interviewed on the Roger Hedgecock Show about Cap and Trade:
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The Recovery, Accountability and Transparency Board is working on the next generation of the Recovery.gov Web site.
- McClatchy - Conservative Democrats seek larger role in health care reform
WASHINGTON — The Blue Dog Coalition, a group of fiscally conservative House Democrats who largely hail from Southern and Midwestern states, could prove critical in passage of the Obama administration's health care policies.
- The New York Times - White House Changes the Terms of a Campaign Pledge About Posting Bills Online
During the presidential campaign, Barack Obama promised that once a bill was passed by Congress, the White House would post it online for five days before he signed it.
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A New York Times video report about Obama's campaign promise to put bills online for 5 days before signing. The segment interviews Ellen Miller, the executive director of the Sunlight Foundation.
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Ellen Miller discusses the disparity between the Obama campaign promise to not beholden to lobbyist's influence and the reality of how it is played out during the administration's first of year.
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A national news report last week shed some light on another tactic lobbyists use in their efforts to curry favor with lawmakers and other influential government officials.
It’s all perfectly legal. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that it passes the sniff test.
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So far no moat cleaning has shown up in Congressional fine print, but Speaker Nancy Pelosi is wisely ordering electronic disclosure of House members’ expense spending. The speaker grasped the transparency lesson of the scandal in the British Parliament, where members’ long-hidden expense account abuses forced the ouster of the speaker of the House of Commons.
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UK’s Blue Skies Turn to Gray?
The mood in British science has been bleak of late. Two months ago came the announcement that, while their colleagues across the pond would be receiving a large stimulus package, scientists in the UK would have to do without. Then they found themselves fighting off an attempt by the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council to ban scientists who had a record of failing to get grant applications approved from even applying for grants at all. And now they find themselves dealing with the fallout from Gordon Brown’s reshuffling of the British government last Friday, when among other things, he abolished the Department of Universities, Innovation, and Skills—the umbrella organization that included the Ministry of Science and Innovation—and created a new Department of Business, Innovation, and Skills that would be home to a restructured Ministry of Science and Innovation that now includes a substantial military orientation.
- Roll Call - Heard on the Hill: Hit the Recall Button
Hit the Recall Button. Among the advice companies regularly give their employees is to watch what they put into their e-mails — and apparently, that advice applies to campaign committees, too.
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The Web site for the U.S. Supreme Court is hard to navigate and difficult to use.
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Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) used Twitter to criticize President Obama's call for action on health care while the president was in Paris over the weekend.
- National Journal - War To Regulate Lobbyists Is Far From Over
The Obama administration has deftly defused a nasty argument with some of its allies over restrictions on lobbyists seeking economic stimulus money, but the war over how to regulate lobbyists is far from over, writes Eliza Newlin Carney in this week's "Rules of the Game" column.
- Federal News Radio - GroupOn and Rep. Pete Visclosky
To www.grouponwashington.com. Lots of folks in government are talking about social media and the weird and wonderful things that can be done with this technology. Web 2.0 technology might be cool and interesting, but, the challenge is trying to find innovative ways to create real economic value using social media.
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If Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi makes good on her word, taxpayers will be able, for the first time, to monitor the spending habits of members of Congress with the click of a mouse.
- USA Today - Lobbyists unlimited in honoring lawmakers
WASHINGTON — On a mild evening last September, Citigroup lobbyists mingled with South Carolina Rep. James Clyburn at a rooftop reception — complete with miniature putting greens — as the company hosted a party to honor the third most powerful Democrat in the House and raise money for one of his favorite golf charities.
- Congress Daily - Pelosi Orders Posting Of Quarterly Expense Reports Online
The quarterly expense reports that detail how members of Congress spend taxpayer dollars allotted to their offices each year will soon be available to the public online, House Speaker Pelosi said Wednesday.
- Roll Call - Disbursements Set to Move Online
Public interest groups praised Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) decision Wednesday to put Members’ official expenditures online, but they cautioned that the usability of such a system remains to be seen.
- CQ - House Members Must Report Expenses Online
House members will begin reporting their office expenses online rather than through quarterly books, under an order from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
- National Journal - Pelosi Calls For Online Expenditure Docs
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has asked the chamber's Chief Administration Officer Dan Beard to enforce a new level of disclosure for official expenditures from the offices of House members and to post the documents online as soon as possible. She announced the expansion of House rules, which is part of her larger effort to increase transparency and accountability on Capitol Hill, on her blog Wednesday. Member's expenses are currently collected and published as bound paper volumes called the "Statements of Expenditures" but Congress has not made this public information available in an online format, the Sunlight Foundation's John Wonderlich said on his group's blog. The watchdog group called for online disclosure of the expense records in December 2008 and again last Wednesday, he pointed out.
- National Journal - Pelosi Directs Reps to Post Expenditures Online
In the spirit of the Age of Transparency, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., announced that members of the House are now required to disclose expenditures online, the Sunlight Foundation announced today. Sunlight, a government reform organization, has been advocating for this measure since March 2008.
- The Wall Street Journal - Pelosi Orders Online Access to House Expense Reports
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi ordered expense reports for House offices to be published on the Internet. The books recording each House office’s expenses have been available only in print form in a basement office on Capitol Hill or through federal libraries.
- Roll Call - Honda Enlists Public in Web Design
Like many Members of Congress, Rep. Mike Honda Tweets his day-to-day thoughts, posts hearings on YouTube and friends constituents on Facebook.
- National Journal - Start-Up Taps Obama E-Gov Energy
The Seattle-based start-up that helped fuel President Obama's Web-based transition team donor disclosure effort has changed its name, hired a Washington, D.C. public relations firm and on Tuesday launched a social network that aggregates public data from around the world in a single destination. Socrata, formerly known as Blist, is piggybacking on the administration's zeal for open government by offering a Web site intended to increase agencies' transparency; promote civic participation and community collaboration; and improve policymaking. Building on more than a year of beta test feedback from more than 40,000 public and private sector customers, Socrata.com initially is providing free access to more than 200 public datasets. The Obama administration recently unveiled Data.gov, a Web destination for citizens to gain access to agencies' raw data feeds. Socrata offers a wide range of feeds on everything from government agencies to those bilked by financier Bernard Madoff to seafood and chicken recipes.
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The White House has launched several new Web sites as part of its "Open Government Initiative." The Obama administration calls it a groundbreaking expansion of citizen access to the data and process of government. NPR correspondent Andrea Seabrook quotes Sunlight Executive Director Ellen Miller saying the government should make it a priority to get the most important information up sooner.
- National Journal - Inside Washington
There's a backup at the sausage factory. Since the mid-1990s, the amount of legislation introduced on Capitol Hill has nearly doubled, from 6,500 bills entered during the 104th Congress to 11,000 in the 110th. But the chances of a bill becoming law haven't improved during that time. According to a recent study by the Sunlight Foundation, only 4 percent of bills in the 110th Congress became law -- about the same number as during the 104th session. Most legislation died upon referral to oversight committees. The House introduced nearly twice as many bills as the Senate during the 110th Congress -- 7,300 to 3,700 -- and that's about par for the course. Recent history shows that the House produces one and a half to two times as much legislation as the Senate. "More legislation being introduced is a reflection of technology," one Hill staffer said. "With the public's real-time access to what's going on, it's less acceptable to be a backbencher lawmaker."
- Roll Call - Boehner Suggestion on White House Web Site Gets Most Support
House Minority Leader John Boehner’s (R-Ohio) idea for a 72-hour public review period of major spending bills received nearly 1,000 votes on a White House Web site dedicated to opening the process of government to the general public.