Sunlight Foundation Reporting Group

1. Senate wants to "check in" on mobile developments

   By Joshua Hatch May 6, 2011 10:04 a.m.

   Few electronic devices have become as personal and ubiquitous as the mobile phone. Or as contentious. A few weeks ago, researchers discovered previously unknown location tracking files on the iPhone. Before that, the country's second-largest wireless carrier (AT&T) agreed to buy the fourth (T-Mobile). Next week the Senate will hold two hearings to look at these issues.

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2. Sunlight Live covers Bernanke press conference

   By Joshua Hatch Apr 27, 2011 10:57 a.m.

   Today Fed chairman Ben Bernanke will do something no other Fed chairman has done before: He'll hold a press conference immediately following an Open Market meeting. The Federal Reserve says the press conference is designed to "to further enhance the clarity and timeliness of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy communication." And Sunlight Live will cover it through our award-winning live blog platform. Joining us at 2:15 p.m. ET will be USA TODAY's financial reporter John Waggoner.

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3. Sunlight Live covers deficit reduction

   By Joshua Hatch Apr 13, 2011 11 a.m.

   This morning the Sunlight Foundation will use its award-winning live platform, Sunlight Live (sunlightlive.com) to cover the Senate Finance Committee's hearing on deficit reduction. We'll follow that hearing with live coverage of President Obama's speech on that same topic.

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4. Comparing national corporate tax rates

   By Joshua Hatch Mar 28, 2011 12:36 p.m.

   Last week came news that GE has avoided having to pay any -- ANY -- corporate income tax in the United States. As reported in the New York Times, that feat, despite earning $14.2 billion in worldwide profits ($5.1 billion in the U.S.), is due to "innovative accounting" and "fierce lobbying," as well as a large stable of former government officials from the IRS and tax-writing Congressional committees. The article goes on to state that the U.S. has one of the highest corporate income tax rates in the world. But that statement is somewhat misleading, as you'll see below: like General Electric, the effective tax rate of U.S. companies--what they actually pay--is a lot lower than the statutory tax rate--the percentage of corporate income Congress says they should pay.

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5. Congressional office spending by district

   By Joshua Hatch Mar 22, 2011 7:11 p.m.

   Earlier we reported on Congressional office spending. It's one thing to see a list of the top spenders, but it's something else to see that spending mapped according to congressional districts. So that's just what we've done here. Below is a map of 434 congressional districts (we have no data for New Mexico's 3rd district), color coded according to spending. Take a look for yourself (the darker the color, the more the member spent):

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6. Sunlight Live covers gas price hearing

   By Joshua Hatch Mar 16, 2011 10:40 a.m.

   Tomorrow, when the Committee on Natural Resources will hold a full committee hearing on gas prices and U.S. jobs, the Sunlight Foundation will spin up another instance of its data and live-blogging Sunlight Live platform to cover it live.

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7. Nuclear power plants live along fault lines

   By Joshua Hatch Mar 15, 2011 3:04 p.m.

   As recent events have shown in Japan, nuclear power plants are just as vulnerable to natural disasters as anything else. So here at Sunlight we were curious about the locations of domestic nuclear reactors. Using data from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the U.S. Geological Survey, we generated the following map, which shows the location of the aforementioned reactors (there are 104 of them) vis-a-vis geological fault lines. We also included locations of significant historical earthquakes. Take a look and see if we might be vulnerable to a nuclear disaster if/when "the big one" hits, and click on the red dots to learn more about each nuclear power plant:

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8. Financial Crisis report highlights transparency needs

   By Joshua Hatch Feb 15, 2011 5:43 p.m.

   The U.S. financial collapse in 2008 was avoidable and predictable, according to a report by a commission created to investigate the crisis. The report, generated by the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, is the subject of a House Financial Services hearing on Wednesday. That hearing will be live streamed on Sunlight Live, our award-winning multimedia platform combining data, live blogging, social networking and video streaming.

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9. Sunlight Foundation Covers Obama's Chamber of Commerce Speech

   By Josh Hatch Feb 7, 2011 10:55 a.m.

   This morning the Sunlight Foundation will be covering President Obama’s address to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce using Sunlight Live, our award-winning, real-time, investigative reporting platform.

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10. Follow the State of the Union with Sunlight Live

    By Josh Hatch Jan 25, 2011 1:10 p.m.

    When President Barack Obama makes his second State of the Union address tonight at 9 p.m. ET, tune into sunlightlive.com to watch the speech with real-time reporting and context. Using our award-winning Sunlight Live platform, we'll be live blogging the president's speech and the responses by Reps. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and Michelle Bachmann, R-Minn.

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Investigations by Sunlight Foundation reporter Joshua Hatch