Citizen Cartwright

Get ready for the campaign finance fight

Four Democratic senators went to the steps of the Supreme Court on Thursday to announce the introduction of legislation pushing back against the court's decision striking down restrictions on corporate and union campaign spending.

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said the goal was to put a new law in place in time for the midterm elections and that "We believe when we put it on the floor we will have Republican votes.”

But the Democrats haven't found a GOP cosponsor yet.

And Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Thursday, “An effort to disregard the First Amendment and defy the Supreme Court in order to limit the speech of those who may disagree with you is an effort that has no place in this country.”

A House companion bill has two Republican cosponsors.

President Obama issued a statement praising the legislation, saying that “powerful special interests and their lobbyists should not be able to drown out the voices of the American people.

For a Schumer press release with a summary of the bill, click here.

Federal prosecutors are investigating Goldman's trades

Following up on a referral from the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Manhattan U.S. Attorney's Office has launched a criminal probe of whether the firm or its employees committed securities fraud in connection with its mortgage trading, The Wall Street Journal reports.

American death rates are going in the wrong direction

The United States has dropped to 49th in the world for death rates among women and 45th among men, behind all of Western Europe and nations such as Peru, Chile and Libya, according to a study in the medical journal The Lancet.

"The U.S. is definitely on the wrong trajectory," says Chris Murray, director of the Institute for Health Metrics at the University of Washington and one of the study's authors. "(The U.S.) spends the most on health out of all countries, but (it) is apparently spending on the wrong things."

How to govern without moderates?

The defection on Thursday of Florida Gov. Charlie Crist from the Republican Party is part of an "ominous" trend, The Associated Press says, of two parties driven by ideologues, where moderates have no place.

And that increases polarization and makes it harder to get things done, AP says.

To answer a hard national problem, have a contest

We're in a new era of innovation-by-contest, The Washington Post says, with the government identifying problems and announcing competitions to solve them.

It's a way to get ideas less expensively and from more sources, using the power of the Internet as a type of global lab, the paper says.

The White House and the Case Foundation join Friday with federal employees from 35 agencies in an all-day strategy session titled "Promoting Innovation: Prizes, Challenges and Open Grantmaking."

Also in the news

Amid Greek crisis, where are European leaders? The New York Times

CIA to station more analysts overseas The Washington Post

FDA approves first 'cancer vaccine' Science

Exercise, weight control may stave off fibromyalgia HealthDay News in Business Week

Getting the public involved in assessing new technologies

Should citizens have a chance to weigh in on technologies as they're being developed? A group including the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars thinks so.

"The ability to create novel biological organisms, manipulate matter at an atomic scale or intervene significantly (and possibly irreversibly) in the Earth's climate system raises a host of ethical, social, legal and environmental questions that will require broad public discourse and debate," says the center's David Rejeski. "Scientific and technological innovation now requires accompanying innovations in governance mechanisms that place an emphasis on public engagement."

The center is recommending in a new report the creation of a nationwide "Expert & Citizen Assessment of Science & Technology" (ECAST) network.

The report cites as a model Denmark's 20-year experience in recruiting citizen volunteers — ranging from homemakers to office and factory workers to garbage collectors to university-educated professionals — to serve on panels on topics including air pollution, genetic testing and electronic surveillance.

Each panel meets for two background education weekends and then in a two-day public forum with experts and stakeholders. The panel writes a report that's presented to the Danish parliament.

The Wilson report alludes to a reason U.S. lawmakers might take to the ECAST idea: If they get citizens' views as policies are being developed, they may avoid angry town meetings later on.

Now, the Senate financial overhaul debate

With Republicans saying they'll allow debate to begin, lawmakers are expected to spend two weeks hashing out disagreements.

"We support 80 percent of the bill and we encourage members to address remaining concerns around the 20 percent on the floor," says Scott Talbott, chief lobbyist for the Financial Services Roundtable, which represents big banks and other financial companies.

Here is a summary of the issues in disagreement.

More pressure on Goldman

Saying that no Wall Street executive is "too big for jail," 62  House members asked the Justice Department on Wednesday to investigate whether Goldman and other Wall Street firms committed criminal fraud in the runup to the subprime mortgage meltdown.

MoveOn.org and the Progressive Change Campaign Committee said they'd gathered signatures from 140,000 Americans on a petition backing the request.

Row over Arizona's toughest-in-the-country immigration law

The Justice Department is considering whether to sue Arizona to block the new law, The Washington Post reports.

And in Arizona, at least three cities — Phoenix, Tucson and Flagstaff — are considering court action. Separately, a referendum effort could prevent the law from taking effect until 2012.

Meanwhile, signing the legislation into law has increased the job-performance ratings of Arizona Republican Gov. Jan Brewer, who faces three primary challengers.