It looks like the long strike at Boeing might be coming to an end, but with the result that about 205 local jobs (180 union jobs and 25 salaried positions) will be lost. This is painful news as the holiday season approaches.
Posts from ‘November, 2006’
Democratic takeover of Congress changes the environment for lobbyists who specialize in earmarks
Reports in the news (Pelosi Says She Would Drain GOP ‘Swamp‘) and on blogs suggest that the Democrats who are about to take control of Congress hope to rein in the practice of earmarking.
An article in the Washington Post last winter explained earmarking:
An earmark is a narrowly focused appropriation. …These home-state projects — which range [...]
Scope and content of this blog
I’m beginning to feel like I am getting the hang of the “content management system” that I use to put words into this blog, but it still seems odd that everything appears in reverse chronological order, and the system has some fancy widgets that I have not yet figured out. (For example, there are still [...]
The phenomenon of local governments paying lobbyists to seek “earmark” federal funding
I’m bothered by (and have commented previously on) the City of Oak Ridge’s lobbying activities in Washington, DC. An article earlier this year in The New York Times, titled “Hiring Federal Lobbyists, Towns Learn Money Talks”, describes the disturbing national trend in which Oak Ridge is eagerly participating.
This hot trend is for local governments to [...]
A candidate’s position on the ballot affects the vote
Interesting article in the New York Times — In the Voting Booth, Bias Starts at the Top. Stanford University researcher Jon A. Krosnick says:
Candidates listed first on the ballot get about two percentage points more votes on average than they would have if they had been listed later (flipping a 49 to 51 defeat into [...]