US citizens
petitioned the White House to "secure resources and funding, and begin construction of a Death Star by 2016" (
previously).
The White House (or, more specifically, Paul Shawcross, Chief of the Science and Space Branch at the White House Office of Management and Budget)
responded.
posted by capricorn
on Jan 11, 2013 -
66 comments
The mayor of Washington DC has been arrested, along with 6 of the 12 members of its city council, during a protest today near a US Senate office building, objecting to the city's use as a bargaining chip while negotiating the
7th Continuing Resolution to avoid a government shutdown last Friday. The bill prohibits the District of Columbia from locally funding abortion services, and imposes a locally-unpopular school voucher program. Had the government shutdown taken place, the DC government would have also had to suspend most of its operations including
trash pickup. For those of you keeping track, Vince Gray is the 3rd (of 6) DC mayor to be arrested while in office.
[more inside]
posted by schmod
on Apr 11, 2011 -
93 comments
Katrina Ushers in Return of Big Government We have a larger govt now (people working for the govt) than we have ever had. We have now the Patriot Act, overseeing much of our activities. We have intelligence agencies doing lord knows what domestically, and security checks etc. Now we learn that Big govt is back? Where had it been before the storm?
posted by Postroad
on Sep 15, 2005 -
43 comments
GovTrack.US ... Using the Technorati API these folks track not only the votes and speeches of members of the US Congress, but also what's being said about them in the blogosphere. You can track them both with e-mail alerts and RSS feeds. There's even a way to embed info from GovTrack on your site if you are focusing on particular legislation.
posted by nathanrudy
on Jan 8, 2005 -
11 comments
Congressman dies of rare disease Congressman Bob Matsui, who was recently elected to a 14th term in Congress, has died due to a rare stem cell disease. Matsui, who was one of the leading opponents of President Bush's plan to eliminate Social Security, was the ranking Democrat on the Congressional subcommittee on Social Security.
posted by expriest
on Jan 2, 2005 -
26 comments
Soldiers Challenge Enlistment Extensions You sign a contract for a specific period of service, when that service is up you're supposed to be done but that doesn't happen if its a contract with the US government. Soldiers are now suing to try and get out of their extended duties.
Yes, there is the Pentagon's "Stop Loss" program but "The lawsuit contends the policy [stop loss] is a breach of the service contract because it extends the length of service without a soldier's consent. It also alleges the contracts were misleading because they make no reference to the policy, said Staughton Lynd, an attorney for the soldiers."
posted by fenriq
on Dec 6, 2004 -
41 comments
Feds win one in the war on anti-war activists A federal judge has ordered a university to turn over records about a gathering of anti-war activists. In addition to records about who attended the forum, the university has been ordered to divulge all records relating to the local chapter of the National Lawyers Guild, a New York-based legal activist organization that sponsored the forum. Subpoenas were also served on activists who attended the forum at the school.
posted by dejah420
on Feb 7, 2004 -
43 comments
Examining Bush's stem cell policy, two years later. Kinsley: Put it all together, and the stem cells that can squeeze through Bush's loopholes are far less promising than they seemed two years ago, while the general promise of embryonic stem cells burns brighter than ever. If you claim to have made an anguished moral decision, and the factual basis for that decision turns out to be faulty, you ought to reconsider or your claim to moral anguish looks phony. But Bush's moral anguish was suspect from the beginning, because the policy it produced makes no sense.
posted by skallas
on Oct 25, 2003 -
1 comment
Drowning the government in a bathtub -
"My goal is to cut government in half in twenty-five years, to get it down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub." Thus spoke Grover Norquist, of
Americans for Tax Reform.
"The lunatics are now in charge of the asylum", quipped the conservative UK
Financial Times. Hardly, says
Paul Krugman. The strategy?: "Instead of challenging popular liberal programs directly, the Republicans are creating fiscal conditions that make those programs unsustainable." [lead post, Am. Prospect]. In other words, the
400 billion dollar deficit, coupled with the Bush tax cuts, is designed to shift the obligations of the Fed
onto the States and, later, to cause a fiscal train wreck after Bush is out of office.
posted by troutfishing
on Jun 12, 2003 -
58 comments
A New Constitutional Convention? Well, as we are all aware it's election days. Time to reshape our government as we see fit. And we have an remarkably robust
blueprint for our government, one that has stood the test of time. But is it time to
change? What would your
suggestions be if you were present at a new creation? I know these links have a lefty feel, there what I could find. But I'm interested in reasoned perspectives from left and right. Is this process necessary or desirable? What Would You Do?
posted by pjgulliver
on Nov 5, 2002 -
39 comments
Pat Buchanan the voice of reason? in times of insane government decree's of "with us or against us" and "shoot first ask questions later." Its amusing that wackos like Buchanan's viewpoints start making sense. So what is the price of the american empire?
posted by vincentmeanie
on Jun 5, 2002 -
36 comments
HR-2357. "The U.S.A. prides itself as being one of the most pluralistic societies on earth, with a stunning variety of houses of worship in many communities. But the right to engage in civic activities, and especially to engage in political speech, is severely curtailed among many faith groups because of the perception that the house of worship will
lose its charitable status if 'politics' is discussed." That may be
about to change...
posted by aaronshaf
on May 21, 2002 -
20 comments
Been to a USGS site today? What about your favorite
national park site? Probably not, since all are part of the
U.S. Department of the Interior, whose external network connections have been severed due to electronic security concerns raised by the court in the case
Cobell v. Norton (formerly Cobell v. Babbitt).
With no external email or access to the Internet could you do your job? How dependent is your workplace on electronic information access?
(Since all their websites are down, I have no direct link to post. A copy of the memo was sent to the members by the admin of a USGS email distribution list.)
posted by carobe
on Dec 7, 2001 -
16 comments
We can all breathe a little easier now, but it comes at a hefty price - $428 million. That's a boatload of money for a security blanket we may not even need. It's times like this, though, that make me happy (not necessarily proud) to be an American. What do you think?
posted by catatonic
on Nov 28, 2001 -
11 comments
July 17th - The Day That Counts. These people have a plan to make their feelings known on the issue of public money being diverted to religious organizations. I had no idea that the atheists were so organized! Is this sort of thing a tremendous waste of time, or do you think it can, or will affect policy discussions?
posted by kristin
on Jul 13, 2001 -
11 comments
FEMA for kids! Let Herman the spokescrab guide you through the catalog of potentially civilization ending disasters. Education is great. Entertaining your kids on cabin fevered summer days is better. I have friends that when they bring their young buck over send him to my computer to play the kiddie offerings at nick.com (sorry dead link this time o' night it seems).
But I can just hear the sunburned Minnesota five year old who's been overly femafied asking mommy after her bedtime story, "August is hurricane season. Is it windy now because we're going to have a hurricane?"
Mom strokes child's hair, "No, here we're only prone to devastating thunderstorms, tornadoes, floods, kidcicle causing cold and blizzards. Now you have sweet dreams and quit worrying about ridiculous things like that. 'Night."
Like of course, a kid that age would really find the FEMA website riveting to begin with. . .
posted by crasspastor
on Jul 1, 2001 -
9 comments
Want stats? Income, food consumption, the common cold...Fedstats, the "gateway to statistics from over 100 U.S. Federal Agencies", is a treasure trove for info junkies.
posted by frykitty
on Apr 27, 2001 -
3 comments
It turns out before the election, representatives introduced a bi-partisan bill in both the House (
H.J. Res. 113) and the Senate (
S.J. Res. 56) to amend the Constitution to replace the electoral college with the direct election of the President and Vice President.
Contact your reps to ask them to support the bills. If we're going to get electoral reform, it will be now.
posted by veruca
on Nov 12, 2000 -
17 comments
