NEWS ROUNDUP:

• Lobbying law loopholes may have allowed many individuals who were registered to lobby in 2011 to deregister in subsequent years while still working for the same companies, and possibly continuing to lobby. There are plenty of reasons why a lobbyist would want to deregister ranging from fear of stigma to the desire to land an administration job. (Roll Call)
• Mary Schapiro, the former head of the SEC, has found her way through the revolving door and into a job with Promontory Financial Group. The private consulting firm has a long list of former regulators on its roster. (POGO)
• Five New York state politicians were arrested yesterday in a bizarre case of attempted bribery. State Senator Malcolm Smith, a Democrat, was arrested for allegedly conspiring to bribe Republican county chairmen to support a plan that would have Smith run for Mayor on the Republican ticket. Unfortunately for Smith and his alleged conspirators, the wealthy real estate developer bankrolling the plan was really an undercover FBI agent. (NPR, National Journal)
• According to a new government report on Open Government Partnership compliance the U.S. acted on 24 of it's 26 initial commitments. One of the discarded commitments was ExpertNet, a government wide online community that would have allowed volunteer experts to give consultations. (Fierce Government)
• President Obama has taken a different, and in some ways much more limited approach, to dealing with the press than previous presidents. While he holds more formal press conferences and one-on-one interviews, he rarely faces the press in uncontrollable situations. (Huffington Post)
• Opinion: The Justice Department should do a better job of making its Office of Legal Counsel opinions publicly available. They currently withhold significant numbers of the documents and are fighting the Electronic Frontier Foundation over a request by the EFF for access to an OLC opinion on the FBI's authority to surveil American's without a warrant. (Washington Post)

NEWS ROUNDUP:

• For the second year in a row The Committee to Save New York, a group of business interests that work to support Governor Andrew Cuomo, spent more on lobbying in the state than any other organization. Overall lobbying in New York topped $200 million last year. (New York Times)
• The FEC reports for Sarah Palin's PAC indicate that she spent only $300,000 supporting candidates in the 2012 election cycle while directing almost $5 million towards GOP consultants. Presumably those weren't the same "big consultants" that she lambasted at her speech to CPAC last month. (Washington Post, Daily Beast)
• FCC commissioner Ajit Pai, who is about to become the senior Republican on the panel at the youthful age of 40, would like to use technology to improve agency processes and transparency. His major suggestion is a dashboard for information about license renewals, consumer complaints, merger reviews and more. (Federal Computer Week)
• The creators of Ubuntu are working with the Chinese government on Chinese-specific version of the operating system. The Chinese may be pushing an open source alternative to wean their citizens off western software products. (Tech President)
• Mark Zuckerberg's new issue advocacy organization is tapping outside lobbyists in addition to its in house team for a push on immigration reform. Zuckerberg signed up Peck, Madigan, Jones & Stewart as well as Fierce, Isakowitz & Blalock lobbyists that have experience on immigration. (POLITICO)
• Congress might be on an Easter break, but that doesn't mean the influence industry ignores the holiday. The holiday, known in secular circles for the abundance of sweets that come along with it, has powerful backers like the National Confectioners Association which hired 20 lobbyists last year. (Public Integrity)