Science Addiction

A dormant blog by Devanshu Mehta

Tag: congress

Change Watch: Everybody Has a Wish List

Everybody has a wish list for the new President, including the Government Accountability Office. It’s strange how one arm of the legislative branch has a ready list of things they need from the next President. Do they know they have a President in office right now?

In any case, there are two points in their list that are of our interest:

  • Retirement of the Space Shuttle: To get this done, they want the administration to fill key leadership positions in NASA, which should be interesting. Leadership in NASA has recently had a contentious relationship with the scientific community over climate research.
  • Digital TV Transition: Not sure what they want the next President to do here, but basically they want the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to be more proactive.

Again- they already have an FCC, an NTIA and President Bush, and yet they are willing to wait until the end of January for “urgent” action.

Until inauguration day on the 20th of January, I will be covering some of the aspects of the transition to the Obama administration that affect technology and open government in a series called Change Watch.

Change Congress

The Change Congress project has been trying to compile a comprehensize database on the positions of members of congress on the subjects of earmark reform, lobbyins money and PAC money. There are two ways people can help.

  1. Pester Your Member of Congress: ask them to tell C-C where they stand on the issues.
  2. TAG a politician: If you find an article or a resource that talks about a particular politicians position on the influence of money in politics, tag them on the C-C web site.

That’s it! It’s a simple, but powerful way to assemble a scorecard.