I was in Louisville over the weekend and had a chance introduction to freshman Rep. John Yarmuth. Even though our families have been acquaintances for years, I am pretty certain this is the first time we've met, even though we both grew up there. I told him about Sunlight and suggested we get together when he returns to Washington so I could tell him more.
To make a note about following up, I just pulled out the business card that he gave me -- standard issue no doubt. Guess what? No email address!
It's little stuff like that that reminds me just how Congress has insulated itself from the public and 21st century technology. I'm betting on people like Yarmuth to change that.
Continue readingDisclosure is Step One to Earmark Accountability
Friday's edition of The New York Times ran a piece by Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) where he brags on passing earmark transparency and makes the case that disclosure is reform. We agree. If disclosure works as it should kudos are in order for all Members of Congress of both parties that supported this key reform.
Emanuel's take on earmarks is close to my own. Earmarks themselves are not necessarily bad way to allocate federal money, but lack of transparency and accountability about them has been a huge problem. "There was no opportunity to review either their sponsorship or their merit before their passage," Emanuel wrote.
Continue readingHe Will Come, If They Build it
Talking Points Memo's Muckraker has a stunning post from Laura McGann and Paul Kiel about U.S. Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) and his cross-country money fundraising tour. In 2005, a huge transportation bill was being assembled in Congress, and Young, as chair of the House Transportation Committee, used the opportunity to travel the country reaping in campaign cash. Developers and other business executives from Florida to Wisconsin turned the famous line from the film "Field of Dreams" on its head, "If he comes (and we give him loads of cash), they will build it."
A $40,000 fundraiser in Florida resulted in funding for an interchange. A series of contributions totaling $22,000 from a Wisconsin trucking company executive and his associates resulting in the chairman inserting favorable trucking legislation in the bill. Arkansans contributed $66,000 to Young and were rewarded with a $72 million extension of an interstate. Also in Arkansas, Wal-Mart's PAC and execs gave Young $14,000 and suddenly a $35 million widening of the street leading to Wal-Mart's headquarters in Bentonville found its way into the bill. And the New Jersey Alliance for Action held a luncheon for Young, where he collected $29,500 in contributions. The Garden State was rewarded with 179 earmarks totaling $550 million, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense. Now that's a lot of action!I don't know what databases TPM used to explore these connections beyond those of earmarks at Taxpayers for Common Sense, but I'd wager they were looking at numerous ones at the Center for Responsive Politics too. There's gold in those numbers.
Obviously, this type of legal bribery is not unique to Young. But it is shocking, nonetheless, when it's exposed in all of its gore. The temptations are great to misuse the power that resides with committee chairs. This is why openness and transparency is key to keeping Congressional leaders honest. We hope the new earmark disclosure requirements help. Congress can and should take other important steps. Both parties, on taking control of Congress, pledged to end corruption. But history has shown the temptations too enticing to resist. Transparency is the means for Congress to protect itself from...Well, itself.
Continue readingTwo Weeks After Ethics Reform
Gallup just released a new poll that shows that only 18% of the American public approve of Congress with 76% disapproving -- an all-time low. This poll was taken two full weeks after Congress passed the new ethics law which some have described as great victory. (We were very pleased with the online disclosure provisions but generally felt the bill didn't go broad or deep enough.) The numbers represent a significant drop in Congressional support over the past few months, down from a 35% approval rating in March.
I certainly would have thought that the new earmark disclosure requirements alone, which would allow the public to view the sponsors of congressional earmarks on the Internet, would have been something that the public would have noticed, and really liked. There were lots of other good things in the bill too, even though it didn't go nearly far enough to cleanse the Congress of even the perception of corruption. And clearly it didn't.
Continue readingCool New Features at OpenCongress.org
The crazy-smart folks at the Participatory Politics Foundation who do all the hard work at OpenCongress.org are ready to show off two new 'widgets.' One is for tracking bills and the second lets you track issues in Congress. The bill tracking widget allows you to display the status of any bill in the Congressional pipeline, as well as link to news and blog coverage of that bill.
The issue widget lets you select from one of more than 4,000 different issue areas, and display either the most recent bills or the most-viewed bills in that issue area for your community. We figure this ought to be pretty useful to folks who follow issues, rather than specific pieces of legislation.
Reporting Innovations
One day I am going to have to actually meet Howard Weaver. He's been on the edge of my life for years now -- he was money and politics database expert Larry Makinson's editor at the Anchorage Daily News in the early- 80's. Weaver is clearly an insightful guy for an MSM editor. Makinson was working with graphs and charts back then to display the relative influence of political donors in Alaska. (Maybe if Makinson and Weaver hadn't left that paper someone would have followed up on their initial leads. Veco was the top political donor there in 1984.) Weaver encouraged Makinson to create the first Open Secrets (for Alaska) and they teamed up together for the second edition. (BTW The Anchorage Daily News won two Pulitzer Prizes for Public Service while Howard was editor there. Makinson went on to give his talents to the Center for Responsive Politics for many years.)
Continue readingA Dose of Transparentium Required?
Received via email this morning....
Recent weather and gasoline issues are proof of the existence of a new chemical element. A major research institution has recently announced the discovery of the heaviest element yet known to science.
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The new element has been named Governmentium. Governmentium (Gv) has one neutron, 25 assistant neutrons, 88 deputy neutrons, and 198 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312.
These 312 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons.
Visualizing Correspondence
Bill wonders what words turn up most frequently in the subject lines of letters members write most frequently about to the Office of the Secretary of Defense? Al Qaeda? Military contracts? National Guard? Body Armor? Not wanting to let our Labs' team have all the fun, he jumps onto the visualization bandwagon.
Continue readingBenefits in Admitting Failures
There was a really interesting article in the New York Times yesterday that had a headline attention grabbing headline of Foundations Find Benefits in Facing Up to Failures. I had two reactions: "how refreshing" and "well, sure."
Sunlight deliberately set out to be experimental - to throw ideas and projects on the wall and see if they stuck and if they didn't, to stop and figure out why. This was key to our grant making strategy as well. When you hope to be on the cutting edge you expect some things not to work. So we figured we'd win some, lose some. That seemed right to us. Fascinating how risk averse some of the truly big foundations have been and unwilling to admit, until recently, that some things just don't work.
Continue readingDebates 2.0
Sunlight's senior strategic consultant, Micah Sifry, has a really nice op ed in the NY Daily News today, that pretty much summarizes my thoughts about CNN's YouTube debate two nights ago. (He has taught me well.) A big step forward BUT....
Imagine if the next time there's a presidential candidates debate on TV, you could go online to vote beforehand on which questions should be asked, and the top choices from the public were included in the mix. Imagine that during the debate you also could grade the candidates' answers, and see how your peers and the rest of the public were grading them, in real time.
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