Circulation » obama

Obama's Office of Social Innovation

lindybr1 — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 19:27:25 +0000

I know I’ve been talking a lot about Obama recently, but I just found something else fascinating and new about his administration. While perusing whitehouse.gov yesterday, I noticed that within his Executive Office, Obama has an “Office of Social Innovation.”

Maybe Obama really is trying to make government cool again!

Government Documents – on Scribd?!

lindybr1 — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 23:51:36 +0000

I have been reading chapter after chapter in United States Government: Information & Policies (Hernon, et al) about all the sources one can use to find Government documents. Lemme tell ya – there are lots. Published in 2002, the book was on the cusp of the electronic information breakthrough. As such, we have seen many updates toward making most government documents available online. THOMAS, GPO Access Census.gov and USA.gov are excellent free sources and have expanded since the book was published.

With Barack Obama’s plan for transparency, government information has expanded to social networking sites such as YouTube (which I described in an earlier post).

Is Scribd part of the action now? It sure looks like it! Barack Obama’s official inaugural address is now posted on Scribd for all to see, access, download, embed in webpages or blogs.

Could Scribd join the ranks as THOMAS and GPO Access? I don’t think so, but I must admit I am impressed with the idea of being able to download – or more so – embed government documents into a web page!

Barack Obama Inaugural Address

New Whitehouse.gov already up!

lindybr1 — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 17:47:17 +0000

Wow, whitehouse.gov already has transitioned!

Speaking of the Inauguration… Who is paying for it anyway?

lindybr1 — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 01:55:35 +0000

I’m doing my reading for LIS5661 (government info) and one small section of my book covers financial disclosure information. (Elected officials are required to file personal financial disclosure reports every year). There are quite a few interesting resources — i.e., check out the Office of the Clerk of the House (Public Disclosure Reports), the Federal Election Commission, the Center for Responsive Politics.

Of course I’m curious about the financial reports, so to practice my reference skills, I checked out the sites. Most interesting, however, was my foray to the Center for Responsive Politics. One of the lead stories on their page that caught my eye was a great picture of our president-to-be (in less than 24 hours!) with the caption of “Who’s paying for his inauguration?” Check out the link – it is really, really interesting!

The article breaks down where the money comes from – which states, industries, organizations and even which individuals donated.

Please note that OpenSecrets.org is a nonpartisan guide “to money’s influence on U.S. Elections and public policy.” As someone very well aware of how easy it is to “spin” things in politics, I recommend bookmarking this site.

Update 1/24: One of my other favorite non-partisan/independent organizations, factcheck.org, answered a recent question about Obama’s inauguration costs versus George Bush’s inauguration: Did Barak Obama’s inauguration really cost four times as much as George W. Bush’s?

Inauguration: HBO live feed of events

lindybr1 — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 16:01:43 +0000

Update from previous post (1/20):
Find Live feeds and videos of the inauguration on:

You can also watch the January 18 inaugural celebration and concert from HBO at http://www.hbo.com/weareone/. This site also has photos of the event, though not as many as Obama’s pic2009 page.

Follow the Inauguration on Twitter

lindybr1 — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 05:00:59 +0000

Follow the inauguration on twitter. Links to live feeds of the events plus pictures and other updates can be found here.