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The Google-Like Pork Thing on the Internets Archives

The Google-Like Pork Thing on the Internets

Bloggers have scored many significant victories in the political sphere in the past few years, bringing down some high-profile politicians in the process. Now they're starting to influence the legislative process, too. Which raises the question: Will they be around for the next phase, monitoring whether the projects they have pushed are funded appropriately and implemented properly?

A case in point: Earlier this year, members of the House and Senate took up the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act. The legislation would, its backers said, "create a Google-like search engine and database" that tracks $1 trillion in federal spending on contracts, grants, earmarks and loans. The bill quickly attracted dozens of co-sponsors. But then some senator or senators placed an unpublicized hold on the measure, slowing its progress.
. . .
The watchdog organization OMB Watch is in the process of developing its own database of agencies' spending under a $234,000 grant. Officials at the organization say its site, which was slated to debut in beta form in early October, does much of what the proposed federal site would do. Other experts, though, have their doubts about whether $15 million will be enough to do everything the bill envisions. And even the folks at OMB Watch acknowledge that neither they nor the government will be able to create a fully Google-like site for federal spending.

"Blog-islation," by Tom Shoop, GovExec.com, October 2, 2006

Maybe it could be based in West Virignia and called the "Robert Byrd Google-Like Pork Thing" ... or in Alaska and named the "Ted Stevens Internets Pork Tubes" ...

Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006, S. 2590, on Thomas

Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006, on Wikipedia

October 2, 2006 06:27 AM    Congress ~   Earmarks

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