Conor Kenny's News Articles

Note: Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) has opened up the legislative process to direct suggestions and feedback from citizens over at the new OpenLeft.com site, where he has been live-blogging about a new, comprehensive Internet bill he is writing. This post is about a parallel project we've started on Congresspedia. Cross-posted at OpenLeft.

Any good piece of legislation is built on a solid understanding of the available research and data. Sen. Durbin has enlisted several knowledgeable experts to help him in this project and there's been some great discussion in the comments on OpenLeft. But comment threads can only go so long before, well, the threads get tangled.

So, to fully enable collaboration between all the Internet wonks, policy geeks and regular Joes and Janes out there who have some relevant information (or can find some), we've created an open knowledge base on the Congresspedia wiki for Sen. Durbin's project.

• Two White House aides central to the U.S. attorney firings controversy were scheduled to appear in Congress, although the extent of the testimony they would offer remained questionable in light of President Bush's invocation of executive privilege.

It was a busy week on Capitol Hill, as several high-profile issues were debated and considered in both the House and Senate. The Iraq War continued to dominate the headlines, as the Senate considered yet another measure designed to change U.S. military policy in the country. For an in-depth look at the major bills considered in Congress since Monday, we again turn to Robert McElroy’s TheWeekInCongress.

The House and Senate are in session this week, with both chambers expected to debate and consider several important bills and resolutions. Highlights include:

• The Senate is expected to consider a variety of Iraq-related amendments to the 2008 Defense funding bill, including:
1. An amendment, sponsored by Sens. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and Jack Reed (D-R.I.), which would mandate that U.S. troops begin leaving Iraq within 120 days and have only a "limited presence" in the country by Apr. 1, 2008.
2. An amendment, sponsored by Sens. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) and John Warner (R-Va.), which would direct the Bush administration to file a report to Congress detailing an exit strategy from Iraq by Oct. 16, 2007.
• The Senate is expected to consider a bill, sponsored by Sen. Ken Salazar (D-Colo.), which would call for the implementation of the Iraq Study Group's 79 recommendations.
• The House will consider a $31.6 billion Energy and Water spending measure, which includes $1.1 billion in earmarks.
• The House will consider a $153.7 billion Labor-HHS measure. The bill exceeds the Bush administration's spending request by about $10.6 billion, and faces a veto threat.

After the jump is a full listing of this week's House and Senate hearings, courtesy of GovTrack and Thomas: