...with Google maps.
View H1N1 Swine Flu in a larger map
Not our usual thing, but I thought it was interesting. For those curious, here are members of Congress who have used the words influenza, pandemic, tamiflu or flu over the last two years.
Continue readingStill waiting for FOIA reforms to surface
Roger Strother writes at OMB Watch's Fine Print blog about the latest noise coming out of the Office of Information Policy about the "sea change in the way transparency is viewed across the government." That sea change is supposed to lift a lot of FOIA requests that, unlike boats, seem to sink the bottom with incredible rapidity, then burrow down into the muck at the bottom. We've found that the only way to surface those FOIA requests is the application of vigorous effort (including regularly calling FOIA officers to make sure they haven't forgotten us). Waiting--for months ...
Continue readingPolitical Party Time: More than 170 fundraisers for appropriators (already!) in 2009
We're just past the end of the first quarter of the current election cycle (with seven more to go before it's all over), but members of the Appropriations Committees in the House and the Senate have already had <a href="http://blog.politicalpartytime.org/2009/04/23/more-than-170-parties-with-appropriators/">more than 170 fundraisers</a>, according to my colleague Nancy Watzman.
A few thoughts: Earmark season (why do I imagine a lobbyist dressed up like Elmer Fudd?) comes early in the year--requests had to be submitted to members by April 3 in the House; for the Senate they'll start ...
Continue readingBailout Watch debuts from Open the Government
File this one under useful tools -- our friends at Open the Government have launched Bailout Watch, a compendium of resources on TARP, Treasury, the Federal Reserve, and other places. I like the Expert Exchange page.
(Full disclosure: I sit on Open
Continue readingHedge fund manager hosts Dodd fundraiser
Andrew Miga of the Associated Press reports on Sen. Chris Dodd's fundraising efforts for his reelection bid, and his tendency to raise it from interests with business before his committee:
The special interest cash leaves Dodd vulnerable to charges that he's too cozy with the very people he's supposed to regulate, the same crowd many blame for the financial meltdown. It's a problem lawmakers who rely on Wall Street campaign cash face as Congress tackles a sweeping financial regulation overhaul.One of the country's wealthiest hedge fund managers, John Paulson, recently hosted a New York ...
Continue reading
Hill: No campaign cash for Visclosky from former PMA Group clients
On April 3rd, we noted that Rep. Pete Visclosky, one of the most prolific recipients of campaign cash from and earmarker of federal dollars to PMA Group clients, had requested no earmarks--not a single one--for former clients of the firm for fiscal year FY 2010. Oddly enough, employees and PACs of former PMA Group clients donated nothing to Visclosky's reelection campaign in the first quarter of 2009, according to Roxana Tiron of the Hill.
Let's see...could there be a connection?
Yesterday, Glenn Reynolds linked a Hill story noting that for Rep. John Murtha, it was "business as ...
Continue readingExaminer calls for more transparency in TARP
They mention Anu's report of how difficult it was just to get the names of the folks manning the TARP desk. The editorial is here. Key passage:
Continue reading
Pro Publica tracks the bailout
Maybe it has something to do with today being tax day -- Pro Publica launches a very cool Eye on the Bailout Continue reading
Better links to earmark requests…
...available here.
Continue readingOpen data
It's not just the Open Secrets that's going open data. Our Political Party Time project is making its raw data available too. Find out some of the places where contributors in Open Secrets data rub elbows with members of Congress!
Continue reading
59063
