'Secret' hold blocks Coburn proposal
By Chris Casteel
The Oklahoman
September 7, 2006
WASHINGTON - Sen. Tom Coburn continued to face obstacles from senators in both parties Wednesday to his bill to create an online database of government spending, despite stepped up pressure from outside groups and "bloggers" pushing the legislation.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., who supports the bill by Coburn and Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, a Democrat, said on his online message board that a Republican senator had placed a secret "hold" on the bill. Frist had reported Tuesday that only Democrats were obstructing consideration of the measure.
The bill, S 2590, would establish a searchable database to allow people to find the recipients of federal grants, loans and other assistance.
At a hearing in July, Coburn, R-Muskogee, said existing databases operated by the federal government don't provide enough detail of expenditures and aren't user-friendly. He said more transparency would increase accountability while giving taxpayers the information they deserve about how their money is being spent.
Outside groups, including the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste, held a news conference on Wednesday calling for the Senate to approve the bill.
Tom Schatz, the president of the group, said, "A public database of government spending would be an invaluable resource for watchdog groups, the media and bloggers to expose wasteful spending, conflicts of interest and other shenanigans. The bill has the potential to turn every taxpayer into a watchdog."
Blogs bring about retraction
Bloggers -- people who operate independent Web sites, many of which have a political bent -- have joined in the push for the bill. When it became known last month that secret holds had been placed on the bill, bloggers, led by the Web site porkbusters.org, sought to identify the senators keeping the bill from being considered by the full Senate.
Any senator can place a hold on a bill or nomination, and it can be done anonymously.
The bloggers contacted Senate offices and determined that Republican Sen. Ted Stevens, of Alaska, and Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd, of West Virginia, were the ones holding it up.
John Hart, a spokesman for Coburn, said Wednesday he didn't know which Democrat was holding up consideration. But he said Stevens had placed a new hold on the bill after lifting his first one.
Stevens had asked for a cost-benefit analysis for the proposal, Hart said, and Coburn's office provided him one.
Stevens and Coburn had a highly publicized showdown last year when Coburn sought to redirect funding from the so-called "Bridge to Nowhere" project in Stevens' home state of Alaska. An enraged Stevens threatened to resign from the Senate if the funding was stripped. The Senate voted against Coburn's amendment to redirect the money.
Hart said that, despite holds, Frist can bring up the bill and force the senators with "holds" to "make their case about why people shouldn't have basic information about how their tax dollars are spent."
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