How Government Works

Feb 8, 2016

Top 400 Taxpayers See Tax Rates Rise, But There’s More to the Story

As Americans were gathering party supplies to greet the New Year, the Internal Revenue Service released their annual report of cumulative tax data reported on the 400 tax r...

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Feb 4, 2016

Chlorine Bleach Plants Needlessly Endanger 63 Million Americans

Chlorine bleach plants across the U.S. put millions of Americans in danger of a chlorine gas release, a substance so toxic it has been used as a chemical weapon. Greenpeace’s new repo...

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Jan 25, 2016

U.S. Industrial Facilities Reported Fewer Toxic Releases in 2014

The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) data for 2014 is now available. The good news: total toxic releases by reporting facilities decreased by nearly six percent from 2013 levels. Howe...

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Jan 22, 2016

Methane Causes Climate Change. Here's How the President Plans to Cut Emissions by 40-45 Percent.

UPDATE (Jan. 22, 2016): Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released its proposed rule to reduce methane emissions...

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White House Comments on its Open Government Initiative

May 28, 2009 by Roger Strother*

Over on the White House blog, Beth Noveck, Deputy Chief Technology Officer for Open Government, writes that the administration is officially ending the “brainstorming” portion of its Open Government Dialogue process tonight at midnight. Noveck states that the administration will begin reviewing the submissions for preparation of the “discussion” phase which begins on June 3rd. The brainstorming phase, however, was incredibly short and wrought with problems which I will outline below. I only hope that the administration’s subsequent steps in the process represent dramatic improvements.

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OMB Watch Applauds Obama Administration's Step Forward on Open Government

WASHINGTON, May 22, 2009—On Jan. 21, President Barack Obama issued a memo about the Open Government Directive. The memo gave the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) 120 days to develop recommendations for the directive. This effort has taken a slightly different direction that is encouraging collaboration and public engagement.

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Obama Administration Views Torture Transparency Inconsistently

May 21, 2009 by Roger Strother*

On May 21, President Obama gave a speech defending his administration’s controversial positions on national security and transparency. Despite his campaign promise to bring change and accountability along with greater transparency, some open government advocates have been worried that his actions have not lived up to the hype.

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BREAKING: Lieberman Looks to Make Detainee Photos Indefinitely Secret

May 21, 2009 by Roger Strother*

Sen. Lieberman (I-CT) has submitted an amendment to the Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2009 which would withhold any “photograph relating to the treatment of individuals engaged, captured, or detained after September 11, 2001, by the Armed Forces of the United States” if the Secretary of Defense certifies that the release of the photos could endanger citizens or the armed forces. This incredibly broad statement could cover photos of all detainees captured in any future actions taken by the U.S. military. If passed, these government records which belong to the people would no longer be available under FOIA.

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Hope for Intrepid Earmark Hunters Everywhere

May 21, 2009 by Adam Hughes*

Last week I wrote about the short-sighted decision by House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman James Oberstar (D-MN) not to require members to disclosure their earmark requests for the 2009 Transportation reauthorization bill. As I noted, this decision is a step backward in the House on earmark transparency and disclosure - as the Appropriations committees have adopted more strict disclosure protocols for all appropriations bills this year. Despite this setback, there is good news to report this week.

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BREAKING: White House Invites the Public into Open Government – Finally

May 20, 2009 by Sean Moulton

The Office of Science and Technology Policy is preparing to post a notice in tomorrow's Federal Register asking for ideas from the public on possible recommendations for the Open Government Directive they were tasked by president Obama to produce.

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Congress Attempts to Restore Teeth to Whistleblower Protections

On May 14, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform held a hearing on H.R. 1507, the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act of 2009. The bill is Congress’ most recent attempt to reform whistleblower protections after failing to pass substantively similar bills in the previous two sessions and abandoning a bipartisan whistleblower amendment to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

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Congress Seeks Hidden Truth on Torture

On May 13, a Senate Judiciary subcommittee led by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) held a hearing on the treatment of terrorist suspects in the custody of U.S. government personnel. The hearing was the first to formally discuss torture after the release of four key Bush administration memoranda that established broader interrogation policies. The hearing prompted the Justice Department to release two additional documents concerning internal Bush administration deliberations over policy.

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Agency Plans Add Another Element of Accountability to Recovery Act Spending

On May 17, the Obama administration released the next wave of Recovery Act information, this time by posting Agency Recovery Plans on Recovery.gov. These plans, which are mandated by the Recovery Act, include broad, agency-wide plans and program-specific plans on how each federal agency intends to expend its appropriated Recovery Act funds. Like other Recovery Act-related data dissemination, this latest phase in Recovery Act spending transparency marks another move in the right direction but needs some refinement.

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Quid Pro Quo at the Department of Energy?

May 18, 2009 by Adam Hughes*

The Washington Post ran an article this morning about Recovery Act funding for environmental clean-up being given to contractors with less than stellar performance records. On the surface, this is yet another example of the desperate need for a fully public contractor misconduct database to help prevent awarding contracts to bad actors. But something else jumped out at me from the article that points to a larger problem that I don't think a misconduct database would solve: contractors and executive branch staff are far too cozy.

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