Sometimes it seems that encouraging greater transparency in government is the only issue that still attracts bipartisan efforts. Be that as it may, Sen. Jim DeMint, R-SC, and Sen. Dick Durbin, D-IL, deserve praise for persuading the world’s most exclusive debating society that it should post its voting record on the Internet using the most advanced technology possible. In this case, that means posting Senate vote data using what is known among Internet programmers and entrepreneurs as “XML” programming language. Briefly put, as the Sunlight Foundation’s John Wonderlich explains, XML-based posting “encourages advanced processing and analysis, making votes legible to both humans and computers, and giving us a new view on how Senators vote.” It is no exaggeration to say XML is the key element in making possible Web 2.0, with its marvelous inter-activity among multiple users and sophisticated visualization applications that draw from multiple web sites and databases.
Joining DeMint and Durbin in the effort were Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-CN, Sen. John Cornyn, R-TX, Sen. John Ensign, R-NV, Sen. Jim Risch, R-ID, and Sen. David Vitter, R-LA. The group signed a letter last week asking the Rules Committee to direct the Secretary of the Senate to make the change as soon as possible “so the public can use computers to search, sort, and visualize voting records in new ways.” Senate Rules Committee Chairman Charles Schumer, D-NY, and Sen. Robert Bennett, the ranking GOP member of the panel, did so this week. “This simple but important change will help give Americans real transparency on their Senator’s voting record,” DeMint said.
Not all of the congressional news on the transparency front is encouraging. On the House side, at least 70 members missed the mandatory April 4 deadline for posting their earmark requests on their official web sites. The House Appropriations Committee decided not to punish offending members by, for example, refusing to consider requests that weren’t posted as required. It would also help the public better understand where their tax dollars are going if all earmark requests were posted using one format in the same prominent location on every member’s official site. As things currently stand, members are free to post their requests wherever on their sites they please and in any format. The result is a confusing babble of postings that in some cases defy even the most eagle-eyed examiner from finding the required information.
