Planet oGosh! Open Government Open Source Hacking

David Cameron, the leader of the Conservative Party in Britain and the Leader of the Opposition Party in the House of Commons, has been talking about transparency recently. In a speech at the University of East London, Cameron expressed a very negative view of lobbying. The Conservative leader said that the “£2 billion industry” is too significant Westminster and in some cases MPs are approached more than 100 times a week by lobbyists.” Cameron uses an inclusive definition of “lobbying,” similar to the definition found on Sunshine Review:

“We all know how it works. The lunches, the hospitality, the quiet word in your ear, the ex-ministers and ex-advisers for hire, helping big business find the right way to get its way.”

His prescription? To shine “the light of transparency” on lobbying so that the government “comes clean about who is buying power and influence.” David Miller of the Alliance for Lobbying Transparency welcomed Cameron’s admission that something needs to be done. He suggested the Leader introduce a mandatory register of lobbyists. This sounds like some of the lobbyist registration guidelines we have.

“Instead of locking people out of this process,” Cameron said, “we need to invite them in.” Along with lobbyist registration, Cameron hopes to institute a Public Reading Stage for bills so that the public is aware of current legislation. This is similar to propositions by American politicians, such as President Barack Obama’s transparency plans.

These all sound like great ideas for moving Britain to a more transparent way of doing things. Even if Cameron does not necessarily need to commit to his ideas, there’s a good chance the spotlight he has brought to transparency will be a good influence by itself.

Rep. John Murtha, a veteran Democratic lawmaker as popular with his Pennsylvania constituents as he was polarizing on the national political scene, died this afternoon after experiencing complications from gallbladder surgery.

On Saturday, the White House released its Open Government Dashboard. It features a big chart with 29 agencies on it measured by four attributes. I suspect that the technology behind this dashboard is likely an excel file, alongside staffers or interns checking each agency website for compliance. It's a start of something-- but a chart does not a dashboard make.

Here in Washington DC, amidst a couple feet of snow (with more on the way), Mayor Fenty released Track, a real way for citizens to watch their government's performance. Both substance wise and technically, it out-atheletes the White House's Open Government dashboard.

A uniform interface for every agency allows visitors to see in-depth statistics about the agency. Per-agency, context specific performance indicators, and whether or not they're being met are there. How context-specific? On the Department of Transportation's dashboard, we can see that 97.1% of reported potholes are filled within 48 hours. That 55% of sidewalks are in good or excellent condition, and that the stat for "Cost Per Mile of Street Repaving" is N/A, giving the agency a little warning flag.

Budgets aren't a problem either. With it, you can see each agency's budget over time, how they're allocating their resources, and what their budget vs. actuals are. I know, for instance, that the DC Office of the CTO spends nearly four million dollars a year on its service desk, and nearly two million on its network operations center.

You can see website traffic stats for each agency too. On February 6th, for instance, the DOT website got 22,226 visits up from the average of about 2,000 per day. That's a good idea of how many people checked in with the Department of Transportation to see if the roads were clear or when their roads were going to get plowed from the weekend's snow storm.

That isn't to say that their work is done: the district has some obvious next steps: make each agency's page machine readable-- give us the power to parse the data that makes up these pages. All it takes is a JSON or XML representation of the data that's making up the page as it stands, now.

Another thing they could add is the ability for the public to participate in a public forum with each agency. Electronic information requests, like FOIA requests, or the ability to have a public dialogue with the Department of Public Schools about why 49% is the right milestone for "% of elementary students proficient in reading" seems fairly obvious.

But the foundation has been laid. And what's interesting here is-- the foundation was laid for Washington, DC to do this by it's former CTO Vivek Kundra, who is now at the White House. This could be an interesting preview of what's to come from the White House in a few years.

It isn't often that I get to gush about online accountability. But DC's newest CTO Bryan Sivak has done a great job pushing the ball forward. And if you don't think so, now you can check his agency's performance indicators. Let's hope the White House follows their lead.

Sunlight is working with you to build a national campaign that makes government more open and transparent at every level.

You can see where we are so far by visiting this page. Be sure to check out the wiki.

http://sunlightfoundation.com/campaign

We believe that a disaffected, disengaged, cynical public threatens democracy in the United States as few other things can. At its heart, our campaign is about building the political and community clout necessary to combat this problem.

We think we can invigorate democracy by coming together, demanding transparency with serious political muscle, using the very latest in technology to make government information more meaningfully accessible to us, and holding government accountable with it.

As we embark on this campaign, it’s important we’re on the same page about a lot of things, but there’s probably nothing more important to be clear about than our values and beliefs.

So here are five principles we will hold to in all our work.

1) Think and Act Like a Movement
2) Listen and Be Authentic
3) Create Beautiful, Compelling Content
4) Fail Harder…
5) Laugh As Often As Possible

Here’s what we mean.

1) Think and act like a movement.

At its heart, this “campaign” is facilitating the growth of a movement. This is not a command and control type thing we are building. To that end, we will share everything and build leaders.

Anything that is created or has success with this campaign – from logos and style guides to resources and training materials to tactics and lessons learned – will be open and shared across the network. With this approach we want to empower any person who is willing to take up the call of making government transparent with the tools s/he would need to be successful.

One of the best examples of this ethos is, oddly enough, embodied by the U.S. Marine Corps as they make “every man a rifle man” – or “every person a rifle person” as it’s been reworked in recent decades. In other words, if you’re a Marine, it doesn’t matter if you’re in the infantry, an officer or a cook; in all cases, you receive some of the best rifle training in the world and could take up arms on the front lines if required.

While we certainly aren’t militaristic, we can’t stress it enough:

In the open government movement, we want every single citizen to have easy access to all the tools and resources they would need to communicate the need for transparency at the local, state and federal levels, and be able to take actions that help bring it about.

2) Listen and be authentic

From our failures to our concerns to our needs and questions (big and small), we want to listen first and make statements second. We’ll be upfront and honest with each other, acknowledge what’s working and what’s not, and remember that we’re all on the same team trying to accomplish a very large mission.

3) Create beautiful, compelling content.

Making the case for anything in a way that gets hundreds of thousands of people to buy in and actively support takes a lot of convincing and influence. When it comes to transparency, we are trying to build public support and influence government with a relatively new, still relatively amorphous concept. To that end, image and message matter in a big way. We commit to making sure we deliver compelling messages in simple to understand, beautiful packages – from email to video to data visualizations to Web sites to text messages to …whatever we come up with.

4) Fail Harder.

Or: Fail “quickly and cheaply.” We are taking on a very challenging mission in making local, state and federal government transparent. If it was easy, it would have been done already. That means in order to succeed, we’re going to have to try some big things that have never been done before – and that means sometimes we’re going to fall on our face. The internet makes it possible to “fail” quickly and cheaply, and when that happens, that’s a good thing – as long as we learn and grow from it. If we’re not failing sometimes, we’re not pushing hard enough.

5) Laugh as often as possible.

Whether we are building a network of leaders, being open with each other, creating content, failing harder or dealing with jerks, laughter helps a lot. Just about always. Just because our mission is challenging doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be having fun along the way.

And to that end, a somewhat related principle to number 5 that is worth noting and will make all our lives easier:

6) Have no tolerance for jerks.

We adhere strongly to this rule. Please don’t be one. If it needs explaining to you, it’s possible you’re a jerk :)

With these values in place, there are a couple of assumptions we will have in the approach to our work, that we also want to be very clear about. I’ll discuss those in the post right after this one.

Since Washington, D.C., today is covered by nearly three feet of white stuff, and the city is effectively shut down, who better to highlight for this week's PolitiQuizz than Sen. Olympia Snowe?

The challenge: It may not surprise you that the Portland, Maine, metro area is (geographically speaking) this longtime Republican senator's most generous campaign cash contributor for her career. But three non-Maine metro areas also rank among Snowe's top five contributors by metro area. Name at least two of them. 

The first person to correctly answer this question by leaving an answer in this blog post's comments section will win a free copy of The Blue Pages: Second Edition, the new book for which the Center for Responsive Politics provides data and analysis. Answers will be accepted until 5 p.m. Friday. Results will be posted as part of next Monday's PolitiQuizz. (Make sure to provide your e-mail address so we may contact you if you win!)

Now back to last week's question, when we asked you this:

"With a dozen lobbyists on my payroll last year, and my cash in the pockets of dozens of federal lawmakers, I'm out to make sure my favorite product isn't marginalized despite some folks' concerns that it isn't healthy. (We think it's downright tasty.) In recent years, Democratic such as Harry Reid, Max Baucus and Charlie Rangel, as well as Republicans such as Mitch McConnell, Steve Buyer and Jim DeMint, have received thousands of dollars from me. In 2008, I spent more money lobbying the federal government -- $450,000 -- than in any other year that decade. What organization am I?"

Answer: The Cigar Association of America. Learn more about this group here and here.

Congratulations to "Politicalpartypooper," who proved to be the first and only respondent to correctly identify the Cigar Association of America. Our winner receives a free copy of The Blue Pages: Second Edition.

Rep. John Murtha [D, PA-12], Chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, has died at the age of 77 from complications resulting from gall bladder surgery he had last week. Murtha has served as representative for Pennsylvania’s 12th district since 1974.

We have a comprehensive bio of Murtha on the OpenCongress Wiki, which you can view here.

Mutha’s seat will be filled by special election, making it a likely Republican pick-up. Pennsylvania’s 12th district voted for McCain by .4% in 2008 and it has a PVI rating of R+1.

Photo from Center for American Progress Action Fund used under CC license.

Your daily dose of news and tidbits from the world of money in politics:

C-SPAN called out Obama last month for not televising health care negotiations like he said he would do while on the campaign trail. Well, since he’s starting over on negotiating health care, Obama has decided to let the C-SPAN cameras in on the next round of talks:

President Obama moved to jump-start the stalled health-care debate Sunday, inviting Republicans in Congress to participate in a bipartisan, half-day televised summit on the subject this month.

The president made the offer in an interview with CBS News anchor Katie Couric hours before the network televised the Super Bowl. Obama challenged Republicans, who have been largely unified in opposing his proposals, to bring their best ideas for how to cover more Americans and fix the health insurance system to the public discussion.

“I want to consult closely with our Republican colleagues,” Obama said. “What I want to do is to ask them to put their ideas on the table. . . . I want to come back and have a large meeting, Republicans and Democrats, to go through, systematically, all the best ideas that are out there and move it forward.”

If Republicans accept the invitation, the summit will be held on Feb. 25. Ezra Klein has some thoughts on what to expect. One thing to keep in mind is that Congress’s authority to use budget reconciliation for health care will expire in April when the new budget resolution for 2011 is passed. That means that barring some kind of breakthrough with Republicans, conservative Senate Dems, or progressive House Dems, after this meeting on Feb. 25, there won’t be much time left for Congress to pass a bill.

The Center for Responsive Politics will be closed Monday because of a snowstorm that has also prompted the federal government to close its Washington, D.C., offices.

Phone and e-mail messages left with the Center will be returned Tuesday.

For urgent requests from members of the working press, please call me Monday at 817-917-4141.

I’m in New England where, ironically, it’s been beautiful and sunny all weekend. But I hear there’s been a bit of snow in Washington D.C. At least, that’s the excuse those lazy senators and representatives (and the rest of the federal government) are giving for canceling their work day today and postponing all votes until Tuesday.

Anyhow, I’m postponing the weekly “The Week Ahead in Congress” post until Tuesday morning, so grab the RSS feed to stay on top of Congress’s legislative schedule. There should be some interesting stuff coming up in the latter half of the week, like a jobs bill in the Senate and a bill to repeal the health insurance industry’s antitrust exemption in the House.

If you’re in D.C., hit someone in the face with a snowball for me, and I’ll see you on Tuesday. Otherwise, I’ll be here throughout the day with links and updates on health care, jobs, financial reform and the rest of Congress’s agenda.

Above photo, “All You See is the Rear View Mirror,” from Flickr user LitLinx used under a CC license.

Government watchdog and environmentalist groups are accusing William Magwood, President Barack Obama’s nomineee to the independent Nuclear Regulatory Commission, of conflicts of interest that may complicate his appointment.

Magwood faces a confirmation hearing Tuesday before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, where lawmakers will question him on whether he's fit to serve on the commission, which is tasked with protecting public health, safety and the environment where nuclear energy issues are concerned.

Magwood certainly has experience in the nuclear energy field. He was the federal government’s top nuclear technology official from 1994 to 2005, working as director of the Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy, Science and Technology. After leaving the DOE, he founded Advanced Energy Strategies, an energy consulting firm, in 2006. He was also the president of Secure Energy Inc. for four years.

But watchdog groups worry that a pro-nuclear energy advocate and former industry consultant would not be an effective regulator of the same industry, where his role would be to promote public safety -- not the industry’s well-being.

Critics cite the NRC’s focus on safety as a major point of contention.

“The NRC is a regulator, you really don’t want a conflict of interest or appearance of a conflict of interest. Nuclear power is extraordinary dangerous. It [Magwood’s nomination] doesn’t speak to a proactive regulatory regime,” said Mark Floegel, a researcher for the environmental group Greenpeace, which opposes Magwood’s nomination.

The White House and Magwood did not respond to messages requesting comment for this article.

In an October press release, the Nuclear Energy Institute’s senior vice president and chief nuclear officer Tony Pietrangelo said Magwood, and another nominee, George Apostolakis, “are qualified leaders on nuclear technology issues and have the breadth of experience necessary for an agency that effectively oversees the nation’s commercial nuclear industry.”

The press office of the NEI, an industry trade association, this week refused to comment further.

Magwood will almost assuredly have to regulate former employers.

For example, before working at the DOE, he was employed for a decade at Westinghouse Electric, which has applied to the NRC for certification of a new nuclear reactor design. The NRC challenged aspects of the application submitted by Westinghouse last year, saying the company had not demonstrated that "certain structural components" of its nuclear power plant shiled building were safe. The case is still pending, said Eliot Brenner, an NRC spokesman.

Toshiba Corp., the parent company of Westinghouse, spent $1.8 million on lobbying in 2009, and records show the company directly lobbied the NRC.

While working at Westinghouse, Magwood was also manager of nuclear programs for the Edison Electric Institute, a trade association representing electric utility companies. EEI spent $10.5 million on federal lobbying in 2009, and has spent more than $120 million on lobbying over the last decade.

There are also questions as the whether Magwood’s nomination violates Obama’s pledge -- reiterated in his State of the Union address last week -- to stop the “revolving door” relationship between outside interests and the federal government, and to reduce conflicts of interest and industry influence.

“President Obama said he would not have lobbyists in the top of his administration … but it’s telling that someone who has made a career promoting the nuclear industry is being put into the role of regulator,” Floegel said. “A regulator needs to be impartial.”

On the other hand, Magwood has been praised for his technical expertise and experience in the area of nuclear energy, which his supporters say make him an excellent, well-qualified nominee.

Industry groups like the Nuclear Energy Institute -- as well as the influential U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Institute for 21st Century Energy -- have been supportive. The nuclear industry spent $11.9 million on federal lobbying in 2008, according to CRP analysis.

The NEI spent nearly $2.4 million on federal lobbying in 2008, a steep increase from the $1.3 million it spent in 2007. Records show the NEI also directly lobbied the NRC.

Center for Responsive Politics researcher Matthias Jaime contributed to this report.

Does your agency need sample social media policies or have one to share? The Social Media Subcouncil of the Federal Web Managers Council has a wiki to assist you. The Subcouncil's wiki has a free, public spot for you to review and share government social media policies and best practices.

From the wiki:

The Subcouncil uses this wiki to engage the community at large in discussion and to research various topics.  We define the community to include anyone worldwide, whether a government employee or not, who is interested in how government can take advantage of social media tools and concepts to advance agency missions. Because anyone may contribute, information in this wiki does not represent any government agency or policy, nor does it necessarily represent a complete picture of any issue.

The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) has posted a web page on Frequently Asked Questions About Managing Federal Records in a Cloud Computing Environment. The FAQ describes cloud computing, benefits and concerns, and implications for records management.  From the FAQ:

NARA will issue a bulletin on cloud computing by the end of fiscal year 2010. The bulletin will provide a more in-depth exploration of the implications for Federal records that are created, managed, and stored in cloud computing environments. The bulletin will address the records management implications (44 USC 3303) and risks associated with contracting (36 CFR 1222.32—formerly 1222.48), statutory compliance (44 USC 3301), and data governance.

As Daniel noted, Friday was a big day for the Open Government Directive.

On the timeline (WH version) of what the Directive requires, Friday was the deadline for:

• each agency to post an agency.gov/Open webpage,
• the White House to post the Open Government Dashboard, and
• OMB guidance on federal spending transparency.

As the White House dashboard makes clear, agencies have posted their /Open pages, along with pages designed for feedback and ideas for open government.  (Here’s DOD’s ideascale page, for example.)  Most agencies have deployed the Ideascale tool that the GSA helped prepare for this purpose.

As observers judge the administration’s progress in the face of this milestone, they should remember that the requirements for the Directive are intended to be both aggressive and iterative.  They’re aggressive in that agencies were given a 60 day deadline for the creation of a Web page, (a short time to design something so important).  They’re iterative because the deadlines are only deadlines for a launch, not a final evaluation.

That’s why the White House Open Government Dashboard is evaluating on largely binary terms.  Agencies have either launched their /Open pages, or they haven’t.  They either designated an official for data integrity, or they haven’t.

This is an appropriate level of administration scrutiny for how the OGD was designed.  More detailed evaluation metrics would have taken time to design and implement, and if agencies were going to be judged on a 45 point system, they would have waited far longer to launch their /Open pages.

Sometimes the best thing to do is act, and to make improvements as necessary.

That should be the spirit in which the Administration’s Open Government Initiative is being undertaken, and it should be judged on similar terms.

Just as the balance between judgment and creativity is important for other aspects of government performance, it’s appropriate for the OGD, where the Administration has chosen a highly public, iterative, experimentational approach to creating a more transparent government.

It’s time to start thinking about how agencies should be judged on their progress on the Directive.  It’s also time for anyone for has an interest in agencies data to speak up, and let agencies know what they need.  We should think about what agencies’ Open Government Plans should look like, and how we can make sure they’re effective.

Those plans are required to be posted on April 7th of this year, and they will set the stage for access to agency transparency from now on.

Meeting or surpassing the White House’s deadline, the 20 agencies we monitored launched their /open pages by this past Saturday in accordance with the Open Government Directive. (See Sunlight Lab’s /open page tracker; also ProPublica’s transparency tracker).

The White House also revealed its Open Government Dashboard, which monitors 29 agencies for compliance with the OGD. The timely creation of this Dashboard fulfills another promise contained in the OGD.

What’s notable about the White House’s Dashboard is that it helps hold agencies accountable by identifying the 4 agencies that have yet to fully comply with the OGD: the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Office of Personnel Management, the Council on Environmental Quality, and the Office of the US Trade Representative, in addition to indicating the 25 that have fully complied. These 4 agencies have yet to release all three high-value data sets. The Council on Environmental Quality receives an additional warning light for having failed to assign a senior official to ensure data quality.

We are in the preliminary stages of looking at what’s on these /open websites, with four questions initially springing to mind:

• Does each agency’s website contain everything set forth in the OGD?
• Do they exceed those expectations?
• Are the websites designed well?

• Are they making progress towards developing their Open Government Plan?

Both Intellitics and the General Services Administration have put together links to each agency’s pages (and RSS feeds) for gathering feedback and engaging in discussion with the public about the Plan. GSA has also added additional means of contact, specifically email and postal addresses.

In addition, GSA has an additional tool available: a wiki — the open government playbook — that aggregates a lot work done by the government and those outside the government on transparency. Its purpose is to “serve as a useful directory to [OGD] resources” — and invites everyone from government officials to members of the public to contribute. It is a great idea. (We had previously gathered all of our OGD resources on our separate wiki page.)

We’ll have a lot more to say in the upcoming days and weeks, particularly as we dig into the /open pages and the OGD Plan.

Before moving on, I must note that the White House took a risk in publicly setting a deadline for creating these /open pages. Meeting this deadline may not result in a lot of favorable media attention, but had agencies failed to do so, the White House may have been subject to a lot of criticism. The architects of the OGD deserve credit for taking a risk, for being willing to risk public failure in order to make something good happen. At first glace, they made it happen. Congratulations.

We’re going to take a hard look at these webpages to see how well they satisfy the details of the OGD, what improvements should be made, and evaluate the emergence of the Open Government Plan over the next 60 days. There’s a lot more to do, but Saturday marks an important milestone.

Read today a Google Books PR piece on the Guardian website. Of out-of-print or hard-to-get books, it says, “Although copies may be available in libraries, they are effectively dead to the wider world.” Also heard today that Google Street View is proposing inside views, museum interiors.

Last week, I and some OKF people heard a Google Books lawyer, Antoine Aubert, speak at the 7th COMMUNIA workshop on the public domain.

Google digitise the holdings of libraries free of cost, returning the library a copy, retaining some exclusivity over further re-use for Google. For example, a library is asked not to allow other search engines to index the digitised full text of the works.

Rufus commented on the Public Domain Calculator cross-European project that “A library who will remain nameless would not provide us with their catalogue metadata because of an exclusive arrangement with Google in rights to re-use the catalogue. Were they mistaken?” Antoine was not able to give a definite answer, to this and other questions.

A library’s raison d’etre is to provide physical access to books. With high-quality digitisations online for free, physical traffic will definitely fall. Space used for storage in prime central locations is inefficient; why not just scan the books and keep them in an air-conditioned warehouse in Swindon?

Meanwhile a library’s purchasing power is partly determined by the number of people borrowing books. New books will be indexed and stored by Google directly from publishers. There won’t be much reason to visit a library.

The library will become a museum of books. The museum will become a mausoleum of things.

To survive as institutions, museums, libraries and archives need a sustainability model, one which cannot depend on state funding alone.

One path to explore is commercial services for special purposes - re-use of very large high-resolution scans, printing of images and facsimiles, new or custom images, new interfaces and search functions.

If Google now has the right to restrict the use of the works online, those libraries accepting the “free” digitisation offer are not free to build and maintain the services that, as memory institutions in a digital age, they really should be providing.

Well, there’s always Wikipedia, and particularly the Britain Loves Wikipedia events going on through February 2010, focused on photographing heritage objects.

Matthias Schindler spoke at the same COMMUNIA meeting about a German Wikipedia effort to fix and link metadata from authority files by the German National Library - some background slides. His message went, “Give us your metadata. Really, just give us your metadata right now.”

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Related posts:

1. 7th Communia Workshop, Luxembourg
2. Photographing public domain works - Wikipedia Loves Art launches on Sunday!
3. CERN opens up bibliographic metadata!

On December 8th the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) issued a directive requiring a number of "transparency initiatives" by federal agencies, to include setting up "open-government websites" by February 6th.

The Pro Publica Transparency Tracker has been keeping tabs on progress.  Not surprisingly, a number of sites went live today, including the DOE and the DoD. 

You'll notice that all the sites have a section set up to solicit public comment and discussion, using something called "ideascale".  There are five categories for discussion: transparency, participation, collaboration, innovation, and something called "help us improve this dialog site".

I'm sorry to say that only some of the agencies have a clear link from the homepage of their main website to their open-government site.  DOE is one that does!  I hope that all soon will.  It'll be so much more open that way :-)  Your thoughts?

Former Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards made headlines during his 2008
presidential campaign for gaining the confidence – and the cash -- of women’s rights advocates across the country. Now, attention focuses on his new admission of personal transgressions; Edwards fathered a child with his former mistress and campaign videographer.

The women’s issues lobby, which consists of individuals and organizations committed to promoting women’s rights and interests, contributed $352,000 to Edwards’ campaign during the 2008 election cycle, according to a Center for Responsive Politics analysis.

This ranked Edwards among the top five recipients of federal political contributions from the women’s issues lobby during that time frame, the Center has found. Only presidential candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton -- who kept running long after Edwards dropped out -- as well as U.S. Senate candidates Jeanne Shaheen and Kay Hagan, eclipsed Edwards' total.

As a result, these copious donations solidified the women's issues lobby among Edwards' top 10 contributing industries during his 2008 campaign -- the Center for Responsive Politics tracks the contributions of 121 separate industries and special interest areas.

Frances Kissling, founding president of the National Abortion Federation and instrumental in the women’s rights movement, is just one of many woman who chose to back Edwards both publicly and in the form of political donations.

“I'm a lifelong feminist activist. In this crucial election, I am supporting John Edwards, whose economic policies I think will best serve women” she stated in an article for Salon.com in January 2008.

Now, she believes his “behavior and lying is so egregious” that she would not support
him for public office.

“The denial of the affair is disturbing. The denial of pregnancy is disturbing,” Kissling told Capital Eye in a phone interview. “[The affair] definitely affects women’s views of him as a person and as someone they could support in politics.”

Kissling remembers how before his run for the presidency, women’s rights activists supported Edwards for his record on women’s issues as a U.S. senator. Now, she says, “I would consider him to have serious flaws in terms of moral behavior and honesty.”

Throughout his campaign, Edwards gained the confidence of women's rights activists who supported him over Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

For example, Kate Michelman, former president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, was one of those women attracted to Edwards’ campaign positions. Instead of supporting Clinton, Michelman became Edwards’ senior adviser.

“I believe in John's deep and profound commitment to the issues that matter most in women's lives,” Michelman, who could not be reached for comment, said in a statement during the presidential campaign. “[I] know John is the most effective national messenger for the values we share and I have complete confidence that -- with our help -- he will win the White House and improve the lives of women everywhere."

And Edwards' wife, Elizabeth, was instrumental in creating a “Women for Edwards” movement. This group organized and mobilized women won over by his “Agenda for American Women,” which focused on promoting women’s equality, health and economic security.

Edwards also appealed to women who agreed with his emphasis on moral values.

"All of us need to send an unambiguous message to the young people in our communities. We need to clearly say that it is wrong when young men father children but do not support them," Edwards wrote in 2007 book "Ending Poverty in America."

Additionally, Edwards, along with dozens of other leading Democrats, was a signatory to the Hyde Park Declaration in 2000. The declaration stated in part that in order "to strengthen families, we must redouble efforts to reduce out-of-wedlock pregnancies."

Edwards first acknowledged an extramarital affair with campaign videographer Rielle Hunter in the summer of 2008, months after he pulled out of the presidential race.

Then in January, after publicly denying it for months, Edwards confirmed that he is the father of Hunter’s young daughter, Quinn. Edwards and his wife Elizabeth, a breast cancer patient who stayed by her husband’s side when he originally acknowledged the affair, have since separated in the wake of this newest development.

Rumors, from the debatable to the downright absurd, have surrounded Edwards since his announcement.

Former aide Andrew Young recently published "The Politician: An Insider's Account of John Edwards's Pursuit of the Presidency and the Scandal That Brought Him Down,” a book chronicling Edwards’ private life now made public.

Edwards, a lawyer, is also accused of using campaign contributions from individuals and organizations to pay Hunter for her campaign work. A federal investigation is underway.

If it is found that Edwards used campaign contributions for personal purposes, he could be charged with a federal crime.

Come Super Bowl Sunday, the Indianapolis Colts' Peyton Manning will find himself perched inches away from New Orleans Saints' Pro Bowl linebacker Jonathan Vilma, who's tasked, in part, with dislodging the all-galaxy quarterback's head.

A recent survey of National League of Cities (NLC) and Public Technology Institute (PTI) members discovered that using technology to promote municipal government transparency is a leading interest to local officials. According to the NLC, members highlighted five subjects elected officials need more information about:

• Technologies that promote transparency;
• Technology tools and practices that improve government performance
(internal) and service delivery (external);
• Web 2.0/Gov 2.0 and social media to engage the public;
• Technology and telecommunications practices to enhance economic development efforts; and
• New and emerging technology trends and issues.

The opportunities for transparency at the state and local levels have never been greater. The Internet allows direct, low cost access to virtually unlimited quantities of documents and data, while an array of telecommunications devices can instantly transmit information to millions of citizens simultaneously. But for all the power of these technologies, government cannot be fully transparent—and thus accountable—unless disclosure is de rigueur.

Members of the NLC deserve praise for their interest in transparency. But a number of states, counties, cities and school districts come up short in providing an appropriate level of transparency. For example, California’s budget site does not disclose line item expenditures, grants, state contracts, or employee compensation data. Massachusetts has no online database of state spending. New York posts its financial reports online, but in a PDF format that is not searchable.

A useful method of evaluating municipal, state and local government Web sites, a 10-point “Transparency Checklist,” has been developed by Sunshine Review (www.SunshineReview.org).

Sunshine Review is committed to promoting state and local government transparency. In 2008, Sunshine Review launched a wiki platform for measuring government Web content against what should be available. To date, Sunshine Review has evaluated the web content of all 50 states, 3140 counties 805 cities 1560 school districts.

Citizens, public officials and activists may review all evaluations by visiting the Sunshine Review site. Officials interested in improving their government website may contact a Sunshine Review Editor; Kristinpedia@sunshinereview.org.

To learn more about NLC’s Center for Research and Innovation’s work on technology issues, contact Julia Pulidindi at pulidindi@nlc.org.

To learn more about the Public Technology Institute, contact Dale Bowen, assistant executive director for program development, at dbowen@pti.org.

Caddo Parish, Louisiana has upgraded their website to meet 8 out of 10 of Sunshine Review’s transparency checklist items. What does this mean for Caddo Parish? Well, for the Parish it means their transparency grade was boosted from a measly C to a much better B. More importantly, it means that constituents in Caddo Parish now have access to the financial data, including audits, budgets, taxes and contracts. Let’s hope that Parishes like Caddo will be trendsetters for the rest of Louisiana.

THE CAPTAIN WAS HERE: On Thursday, ProPublica published a fantastic story about the role lobbying is taking in the world of rum and tax breaks. The article focuses on alcohol producer Diageo, known for its popular labels Dom Pérignon and Captain Morgan, who is at a center of a fight between Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. According to ProPublica, the two principalities rely heavily on revenues from taxing alcohol produced off the continental United States. But recently, the Virgin Islands has been able to lure Diageo over to its borders by offering very generous tax incentives. Needless to say, Puerto Rico, which received approximately $400 million from taxing Diageo alone, is fighting hard to prohibit the move. What is most striking about this story though is the overwhelming reliance all the actors in this story have on federal lobbying. Our analysis of their lobbying efforts show that Puerto Rico has spent over $1 million in 2009 and the Virgin Islands has spent nearly the same amount. In the end, ProPublica speculates Diageo's move will continue despite Puerto Rico's protests. Who knew there could be such a contentious debate where rum and island paradises are involved?

ABRAMOFF'S DEEP THROAT: Years after disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff was exposed, the insider who first exposed him is now openly talking to the press about his involvement in the scandal. In a remarkable story by The Hill, Tom Rodgers reveals that he was the suspected rival lobbyist who led authorities to Abramoff. Rodgers, a lobbyist for Carlyle Consulting, explains how he first learned of Abramoff's criminal acts and how he systematically gathered evidence for his eventual prosecution. As a member of the Blackfoot Indian tribe, Rodgers also felt personally affronted by Abramoff's actions giving him further reason to expose Abramoff. Rodgers had wanted to wait until the Abramoff scandal was wrapped up before revealing himself which he can now do. Also, be sure to watch the powerful video of Rodgers explaining his role, posted at the end of the article.

CRP IN THE NEWS: Fredreka Schouten of USA Today uses CRP data in her analysis of lobbying expenditures in 2009 ... Eric Lichtblau from the New York Times examines the student loan industry and the role federal lobbying has taken in shaping their future ... Our recent article on the Super Bowl continues to gather attention as Business Week summarizes today's political atmosphere in the NFL and our executive director Sheila Krumholz will discuss it on National Public Radio today as well.

Have a news tip or link to pass along? We want to hear from you! E-mail us at press@crp.org.

U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican-turned-Democrat facing a contentious re-election bid, will do so with less campaign cash after the Federal Election Commission fined him for accepting "excessive contributions from individuals and political committees."

LII Director Tom Bruce gave a short talk yesterday as part of a roundtable at iConference 2010, a gathering of next-generation librarians and information professionals held at the University of Illinois.  On the panel with him were James Jacobs of Free Government Information, ShinJoung Yeo of Radical Reference, Daniel Schuman of the Sunlight Foundation, and Cindy Etkin from the USGPO depository library program.  Under discussion were policy issues and historical conflicts involving government institutions and open access to government documents.    A writeup of Tom’s last trip to Champaign-Urbana is here (at p. 69).

Here is a look at what we’ve been up to this week at OpenCongress:

• President Obama’s $3.8 trillion budget for 2011 was released on Monday. A closer look at it reveals clues as to what the president has planned on a range of issues from health care to taxes.
• Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Joint of Chiefs of Staff Chairman Michael Mullen testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee on the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy banning gays and lesbians from openly serving in the military. Both agreed the policy should end. In other gay rights news, Congressional Republicans are fighting to prevent gays and lesbians from getting legally married in the District of Columbia.
• Donny has a comprehensive rundown of what is ahead for financial reform in the Senate.
• Congress is looking at a 775% tax increase for pipe tobacco.
• The Democrats may finally have settled on a path forward to pass health care reform. The relevant question, though, is whether they can pull it off. Democrats, however, still do have a “Plan B.”
• A bipartisan group of senators have introduced a bill (S.2977) banning civilian trials for 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other co-defendants. In other national security news, the House is working on passing a cybersecurity bill (H.R.4061).
• Senate Democrats announced their own jobs package.
• After 10 months of waiting, the Senate finally confirmed Patricia Smith as solicitor of the Department of Labor. The problem of un-appointed nominees in the Obama administration, however, still persists.
• If you at all enjoyed the Q&A session president Obama held with the House Republicans, sign the petition and demand a regular “question time.”

We here at OpenCongress greatly appreciate your comments and encourage participation on the site. Keep it up.