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Sens. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., and Barack Obama, D-Ill., jointly introduced Tuesday the second phase of the quiet revolution they inaugurated two years ago in federal spending transparency and accountability. Their proposed Strengthening Transparency and Accountability in Federal Spending Act of 2008 (STAFS) builds on the progress begun by the first Coburn-Obama effort, the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006 (FFATA) that mandated establishment of the searchable, Googlelike USASpending.gov Web site. There, any citizen with Internet access can find an amazing amount of detail about how the government spends nearly $1 trillion every year on thousands of grants, contracts and awards. The data can be sorted by company name, congressional district, state or county, type of service or product provided, the type of awarding process used and the awarding agency. Perusing the site can be fascinating. For example, searching for contracts awarded to companies whose names contain “Entertainment” turned up 55 receiving more than $34 million in 2007. Search “Consulting” and 1,651 companies are shown getting nearly $5 billion last year. That’s a lot of entertaining and consulting.

http://www.examiner.com/a-1423795~Another_revolutionary_leap _forward_for_federal_spending_transparency.html

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