Ask Your Representative to Support H. Res. 554

Read The Bill
September 23, 2009

At the end of the day it comes down to this: an informed citizenry is critical to a functioning democracy. The point isn't only whether legislators read every word, but whether all citizens - people like us - have an opportunity to review and comment on pending legislation before it has an impact on our lives.

We are going to make sure we have that chance.

There's no ifs, ands, or buts. Legislation should be online for everyone to read.

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“Good Billions After Bad”–One Year After Wall Street Bailout, Pulitzer Winners Barlett and Steele Investigate Where All the Money Went

DemocracyNow!
September 10, 2009

It’s been exactly one year since the onset of the financial crisis and the passage of the Bush administration’s $700 billion bailout of Wall Street. But what were the factors in deciding who received bailout funds? And what happened to all the money? The answer to those two simple questions is: We don’t know. In a new article in Vanity Fair, the Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative team Donald Barlett and James Steele try to find an answer. The problem is, they write, “once the money left the building, the government lost all track of it.”...

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High Court Weighs Rules On Campaign Finance

by Nina Totenberg
National Public Radio
September 9, 2009

The justices of the U.S. Supreme Court have returned early from their summer recess to hear arguments in a case that could rip apart the legal underpinnings of the nation's campaign finance laws. For more than a century, for all practical purposes, those laws have barred corporations from spending money on candidate elections.

Wednesday's argument is a double first: The first argument to be heard by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and the first time new U.S. Solicitor General Elena Kagan will argue a case before the Supreme Court.

The justices view the case as so important that they are hearing it three weeks before the official opening of the new term, and they have taken the unusual step of allowing same-day broadcast of the audio...

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Fraud Complaints Cloud Afghan Election

by Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson
National Public Radio
September 1, 2009

Afghan President Hamid Karzai is ahead in the slow tally of ballots cast in the Aug. 20 elections. But the question looming for many Afghan voters isn't who will win, but whether the balloting was credible.

That decision rests with an American, a Canadian, a Dutchman and two Afghans who serve on the country's Electoral Complaints Commission. Hundreds of formal complaints of election fraud have been filed to the commission. If proven, the allegations could change the outcome of the race...

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