Blog : Sunlight Foundation

The Feds and Social Media II

by Ellen Miller Mar 27, 2009 10:09 am

Here’s an exciting development! Last week, I blogged about an encouraging report by Doug Belzer at Federal Computer Week, where... View Article

Ban on Mexican trucks leads to Mexican tariffs

by Bill Allison

investigations

Mar 27, 2009 2:28 am

When I started looking at tariffs, I assumed I would be following measures to lower tariffs. Lately, all of the news has been running in the other direction.

Looking at OpenCongress.org, I found no tariff suspension bills. H.R. 1480, sponsored by Rep. Steve Kagen, would "require that certain laminated woven bags be marked with the country of origin," while this Senate resolution would express the sense that "United States and the People's Republic of China should work together to reduce or eliminate tariff and nontariff barriers to trade in clean energy and environmental goods and services."

Still ...

Congressional ethics committees: What’s past is prolog

by Bill Allison

investigations

Mar 26, 2009 4:27 pm

Glenn Reynolds notes that the two congressional ethics committees are off to a less than rapid start and observes, "It's like it's not meant to actually do anything."

This is a longstanding tradition in American politics, going all the way back to Mark Twain's day (Twain, of course, famously observed that America has no distinctly criminal class, except Congress. He and Gilded Age co-author Charles Dudley Warner didn't think much of the ethics committee process of their day either: "Why does the Senate still stick to this pompous word, Investigation?' One does not blindfold one's ...

Congress Passes Stronger Authority for TARP Special IG

by Paul Blumenthal Mar 26, 2009 3:56 pm

Yesterday, the House followed the Senate by passing a bill to provide the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Assets... View Article

Freddie Mac records exempt from FOIA

by Bill Allison

investigations

Mar 26, 2009 2:24 pm

Bob Secter and Andrew Zajac of the Chicago Tribune report that, while researching what went at Freddie Mac during the period White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel served on the board of directors of Freddie Mac, they were unable to get minutes of board meetings and other information:

The Obama administration rejected a Tribune request under the Freedom of Information Act to review Freddie Mac board minutes and correspondence during Emanuel's time as a director. The documents, obtained by Falcon for his investigation, were "commercial information" exempt from disclosure, according to a lawyer for the Federal Housing Finance ...

Disabled adult children

by Bill Allison

investigations

Mar 26, 2009 1:06 pm

This morning, while reading a release linked from Recovery.gov, I ran across one of those government terms that make no sense. As part of the stimulus efforts, the Railroad Retirement Board, an independent agency that manages federal benefits for railroad retirees and their dependents (more details on why this board exists here) will send additional checks of $250 to most of its beneficiaries, "including disabled adult children."

A disabled adult child is a dependent of a railroad pensioner--or Social Security beneficiary--who, because of his disability, is eligible to continue receiving his benefits based on his parent's or ...

Financial Firm Campaign Giving

by Paul Blumenthal Mar 26, 2009 11:26 am

To follow up on the previous post, the New York Times put together a useful chart to show the campaign... View Article

Who Can Hedge Funds Lean On?

by Paul Blumenthal Mar 26, 2009 10:42 am

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner announced a new regulatory model for the financial system that includes regulating hedge funds for the... View Article

Show me THIS data

by Bill Allison

investigations

Mar 26, 2009 3:20 am

Derek Willis, with whom I was lucky enough to work with at the Center for Public Integrity, critiques the recent Show Us The Data effort (full disclosure: Sunlight was involved in building the site, and I helped a good deal with the conceptualization). He offers eight solid suggestions for data sets that should be publicly available -- and didn't make the cut for the Show Us The Data site. No arguments here with his wish list, and there's some really good suggestions there.

In defense of Show Us The Data, voting was open to the general public, many of ...

Specter ramps up the fundraising

by Bill Allison

investigations

Mar 25, 2009 7:53 pm

In the whirlwind of fundraising parties this month"as of today we've collected 428 invitations for this month and counting"Sen. Arlen Specter stands above his peers, with a dozen parties scheduled in March and more beyond.