As we reported earlier, last month the conservative Georgia Tea Party Patriots united with the progressive Georgia Common Cause group to demand lobbying reform in the state that would require cap the value of individual gifts given to legislators by at $100. The cap is a modest measure as it would still allow lobbyists to
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Northrop Grumman, the fourth largest weapons maker in the world, follows the actions of Congress very closely. The F-35, which may cost over $1.45 trillion because of unprecedented cost overruns, an expensive surveillance drone program criticized as unnecessary, and even a new fleet of nuclear bombers are among the Northrop Grumman products that may be
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Across the country, state lawmakers have pushed forward bills to lower democratic participation. State after state have adopted laws that criminalize voter registration drives, limit the ability of low-income people and college students to vote, and otherwise restrict qualified voters from casting a ballot. As Republic Report revealed earlier this week, the controversial purge of
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The eyes of many concerned with the nation’s schools were on Wisconsin this week, as school voucher advocate Governor Scott Walker (R-WI) handily defeated his Democratic proponent, further paving the way for school privatization in his state. But on the West Coast, yet another struggle over the nation’s schools was being fought. In two pivotal state assembly
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Reporting campaign finance can be difficult because much of the action is obscured. Journalists have to rely on fairly unreliable government disclosure websites, many of which only report certain types of spending on an almost arbitrary schedule. To find the true number of television ads purchased in an election, one must literally visit every network
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Last year, Politico noted that News America/Fox PAC, Political Action Committee of Fox News parent company News Corporation, was slowing down in donations, possibly thanks to overseas scandals. Sunlight Foundation’s Party Time obtained an invitation to Senator Mary Landrieu’s (D-LA) “11th Annual Crawfish Fest,” a large fundraiser she puts on. The invitation lists News America/Fox PAC as a
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The Center for International Policy released a new report this month focusing on the nuke lobby — the coalition of defense contractors and former government officials who continue to push for costly Cold War-style nuclear stockpile and delivery systems. Interestingly, the report references a statement by the late Senator William Proxmire, Democrat of Wisconsin, from
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Last month, “Senators John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) filed a friend-of-the-court brief urging the U.S. Supreme Court to let stand a decision by the Montana Supreme Court, American Tradition Partnership vs. Bullock, upholding the state’s ban on outside election spending by corporations. The anti-environmental group American Tradition Partnership contends that Montana’s law conflicts directly with the Supreme
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