National Journal Online


Survey Finds Low Marks For Obama Administration Transparency Effort The public isn't convinced that the Obama administration is being fully open with Americans, more than a year and a half after the president launched a government-wide transparency effort, according to a new survey conducted by ForeSee Results and Nextgov. But compared to regulated industries in the United States, the White House is doing a lot better. The White House earned a score of 46 out of a possible 100 on its attempts to be transparent about what the West Wing is doing; federal agencies came in with an aggregate score of 40; Congress rated 37; and the banking and Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 2:37pm
Predicting The Election Night Surprises The most nerve-wracking aspect of covering this election's final stages is trying to make sense of late-breaking developments when over 100 competitive House races are simultaneously abuzz. Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 1:58pm
Facebook Sues Alleged Spammers Facebook said Wednesday that it has filed three lawsuits in federal court against defendants accused of using the social networking site to send unsolicited e-mail, or spam, and engage in other scams. The social networking site alleges in the complaints, filed in U.S. district court in San Jose, Calif., that Steven Richter, Jason Swan, and Max Bounty, Inc., violated Facebook's terms of service and federal law by tricking Facebook users into signing up for mobile subscriptions and sending spam to those users' friends. Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 1:56pm
Hispanic "Don't Vote" Group Looks To Broaden Reach The group behind the controversial commercial telling Hispanics in Nevada not to vote isn't shutting down in light of Univision's decision to pull its ads. In fact, it may be broadening its reach. Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 1:05pm
Net Users Expected To Reach 2 Billion The number of Internet users has doubled in the last five years and will surpass 2 billion users by the end of 2010, the International Telecommunication Union reported this week. The greatest growth in new users is expected to come from developing nations, making up 162 million of the 226 million new Internet users in 2010, the ITU said in news release Tuesday. Nonetheless, the United Nations agency found there is still a digital divide between developed and developing countries. Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 12:39pm
Races To Know: Alaska, Pennsylvania Senate Alaska Senate: Once Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski lost her party's nomination in August, the rest of the script was supposed to read like this: Republican attorney Joe Miller cruises to victory, keeping the seat in GOP hands while trouncing Sitka Mayor Scott McAdams (D) and handing Murkowski, who is running as a write-in candidate, a second humiliating defeat. End of story. Except that it has not turned out that way. Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 11:49am
FCC Backs More Conditions For Sirius-XM The FCC approved an order this week requiring the satellite radio provider Sirius-XM to set aside at least 4 percent of its channels on the company's Sirius and XM services for independent programming. The order, adopted Monday, is part of the ongoing conditions set by the FCC when it approved the merger of the nation's only satellite radio providers in 2008. Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 10:59am
DHS Buys More Time To Decide Fate Of Virtual Fence Nextgov.com reports that the Department of Homeland Security has bought itself time to decide whether to proceed with a beleaguered border security project by retaining the system's contractor on a temporary 30-day basis, according to House lawmakers who requested an audit of the program. In 2006, DHS awarded Boeing Co. a three-year contract with several optional one-year extensions to roll out the Secure Border Initiative Network, in the hope of establishing better detection of illegal breaches at U.S. points of entry. Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 9:20am
Polls: House Democrats In Deep Trouble New polling of 10 House districts held by sophomore Democrats show a particularly ominous sign for the majority party: In all but two races, the Democratic incumbent is pulling under 45 percent of the vote with two weeks to go to the election. That statistic is an indication that even Democrats in close races are finding it increasingly difficult to assemble enough support to win as November 2 closes in. Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 9:08am
Dems Cut Members Adrift The Democratic Congressional Committee is spending millions of dollars in key districts around the country on late independent expenditures, demonstrating the districts Democrats believe can be saved from a national wave -- and the members the party believes are already too far behind their Republican rivals to save. In total, the DCCC spent $13.1 million on independent expenditure advertisements in 59 districts, according to FEC filings made late Tuesday and early Wednesday. Democrats are largely playing defense, while targeting only three Republican-held seats. Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 7:30am

Survey Finds Low Marks For Obama Administration Transparency Effort

The public isn't convinced that the Obama administration is being fully open with Americans, more than a year and a half after the president launched a government-wide transparency effort, according to a new survey conducted by ForeSee Results and Nextgov. But compared to regulated industries in the United States, the White House is doing a lot better. The White House earned a score of 46 out of a possible 100 on its attempts to be transparent about what the West Wing is doing; federal agencies came in with an aggregate score of 40; Congress rated 37; and the banking and

Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 2:37pm

Predicting The Election Night Surprises

The most nerve-wracking aspect of covering this election's final stages is trying to make sense of late-breaking developments when over 100 competitive House races are simultaneously abuzz.

Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 1:58pm

Facebook Sues Alleged Spammers

Facebook said Wednesday that it has filed three lawsuits in federal court against defendants accused of using the social networking site to send unsolicited e-mail, or spam, and engage in other scams. The social networking site alleges in the complaints, filed in U.S. district court in San Jose, Calif., that Steven Richter, Jason Swan, and Max Bounty, Inc., violated Facebook's terms of service and federal law by tricking Facebook users into signing up for mobile subscriptions and sending spam to those users' friends.

Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 1:56pm

Hispanic "Don't Vote" Group Looks To Broaden Reach

The group behind the controversial commercial telling Hispanics in Nevada not to vote isn't shutting down in light of Univision's decision to pull its ads. In fact, it may be broadening its reach.

Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 1:05pm

Net Users Expected To Reach 2 Billion

The number of Internet users has doubled in the last five years and will surpass 2 billion users by the end of 2010, the International Telecommunication Union reported this week. The greatest growth in new users is expected to come from developing nations, making up 162 million of the 226 million new Internet users in 2010, the ITU said in news release Tuesday. Nonetheless, the United Nations agency found there is still a digital divide between developed and developing countries.

Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 12:39pm

Races To Know: Alaska, Pennsylvania Senate

Alaska Senate: Once Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski lost her party's nomination in August, the rest of the script was supposed to read like this: Republican attorney Joe Miller cruises to victory, keeping the seat in GOP hands while trouncing Sitka Mayor Scott McAdams (D) and handing Murkowski, who is running as a write-in candidate, a second humiliating defeat. End of story. Except that it has not turned out that way.

Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 11:49am

FCC Backs More Conditions For Sirius-XM

The FCC approved an order this week requiring the satellite radio provider Sirius-XM to set aside at least 4 percent of its channels on the company's Sirius and XM services for independent programming. The order, adopted Monday, is part of the ongoing conditions set by the FCC when it approved the merger of the nation's only satellite radio providers in 2008.

Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 10:59am

DHS Buys More Time To Decide Fate Of Virtual Fence

Nextgov.com reports that the Department of Homeland Security has bought itself time to decide whether to proceed with a beleaguered border security project by retaining the system's contractor on a temporary 30-day basis, according to House lawmakers who requested an audit of the program. In 2006, DHS awarded Boeing Co. a three-year contract with several optional one-year extensions to roll out the Secure Border Initiative Network, in the hope of establishing better detection of illegal breaches at U.S. points of entry.

Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 9:20am

Polls: House Democrats In Deep Trouble

New polling of 10 House districts held by sophomore Democrats show a particularly ominous sign for the majority party: In all but two races, the Democratic incumbent is pulling under 45 percent of the vote with two weeks to go to the election.

That statistic is an indication that even Democrats in close races are finding it increasingly difficult to assemble enough support to win as November 2 closes in.

Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 9:08am

Dems Cut Members Adrift

The Democratic Congressional Committee is spending millions of dollars in key districts around the country on late independent expenditures, demonstrating the districts Democrats believe can be saved from a national wave -- and the members the party believes are already too far behind their Republican rivals to save.

In total, the DCCC spent $13.1 million on independent expenditure advertisements in 59 districts, according to FEC filings made late Tuesday and early Wednesday. Democrats are largely playing defense, while targeting only three Republican-held seats.

Posted: Wednesday, October 20, 2010 - 7:30am

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