U.S.PIRG tax and budget analyst Nicole Tichon has released our latest TARP transparency and accountability report card. The Obama administration gets a first quarter 09 "C", up from the Bush Treasury's last quarter 08 "F."

Our web site is still being rebuilt after a server crash, so the full report may not be available today, but you can read more about it over at Arthur Delaney's Huffington Post interview with Nicole:

"We're coming from an abysmal state: There was no information available about the participants, no information about why they were receiving the money," said U.S. PIRG's Nicole Tichon, author of the report card, in an interview with the Huffington Post. "The fact that there's lip service being paid to taxpayer protection is a great step." The report card praises the administration for making "important progress around transparency in terms of developing online resources, fact sheets, guidelines, interactive programs and tools to help taxpayers navigate the myriad programs and hundreds of participants" in the TARP.

As members of the The Coalition for an Accountable Recovery, we're today co-releasing (PIRG news release) a memo compiled for the coalition by Celinda Lake's firm concerning voter attitudes toward transparency and recover spending. From the Lake Research/Topos memo "New Poll Shows Broad Support for Economic Recovery Package and Tough Government Accountability Measures":

Despite voters’ goodwill toward Obama and sense of optimism about the future, there is still widespread concern about the undue influence of special interests in Washington. Voters remain concerned about the lack of openness, oversight, and accountability in government.

Some of the strongest numbers in the entire survey revolve around voters’ support for pre-conditions for private companies receiving financial assistance from the government, which include “limiting executive pay, bonuses, and dividends to shareholders.” Eighty-four percent (84%) of Americans support these conditions, with 70% supporting these conditions strongly. In addition, more than eight in ten voters from every major demographic, political, and regional subgroup agree.

“We need disclosure and accountability for the states receiving stimulus funds just as we need it for the financial institutions receiving bailout money. Otherwise tax dollars may be spent on Bridges to Nowhere, stratospheric bonuses, and other boondoggles."

Today's New York Times has a story Voter Registration by Students Raises Cloud of Consequences by Tamar Lewin on the latest skirmishes between local voter registrars and students attempting to assert their well-established rights to choose to register and vote where they go to school, instead of where their parents live. The story features PIRG's Sujatha Jahagirdar:

“There’s no issue for snowbirds who live in Iowa but fly to Florida for the winter,” said Sujatha Jahagirdar, program director of the Student Public Interest Research Group’s New Voters Project. “One demographic group, like students, shouldn’t have to overcome a special hurdle to vote. We impose all the responsibilities of citizenship on students, and we have to provide them with the privileges of citizenship, too.”

The Student PIRGs are partners with Demos in their important conference -- A Better Deal: Reclaiming Economic Security For A New Generation -- this Thursday and Friday in Washington DC.

It's getting harder for young adults to get ahead in America. Compared to previous generations, today's 20-somethings earn less, carry more debt and pay more for everything from health care to housing. With young people voting in record numbers, it's time to put this generation's economic crisis on the national agenda and build a movement for a better deal.

I get offered a receipt each morning when I pay cash to buy my cup of coffee, where a mistake is meaningless and I certainly cannot deduct the cost of the coffee on my taxes, or get reimbursed by PIRG, as far as I know.

But do I get a receipt when I vote, where mistakes matter to democracy? Each year, poll workers jokingly give me a "I voted" sticker when I ask, but no real receipt. But worse, many voting machines don't even keep a printed internal "paper trail" receipt for audit purposes. No, not with today's new and "improved" touch-screen voting machines. You can watch U.S. PIRG democracy advocate Gary Kalman (pictured) and other experts in a Voice of America video talking about the need for paper trails in electronic voting machines. Excerpt from commentary by VOA's Jeffrey Young:

The credibility of a democratically-elected government begins with balloting the public believes to be fair and accurately counted. And as the technology of voting advances, election officials have to take new steps to ensure accuracy, and with it, credibility.[...]Unfortunately, many of the electronic voting machines now in use do not create receipts. So, states and [smaller subdivisions called] counties would have to purchase many millions of dollars worth of new equipment to have this capability. But ultimately, what is at stake is the credibility of the election system in a democratic society.