This week Law.com featured a brilliant website called MapLight, http://maplight.org/.
Don’t let the fact that this came out of Berkeley scare you. MapLight follows the money trails from organizations and corporations to legislators and legislation. In other words, you can see where political contributions are coming from and what they’re intended for.
Click around on the various tabs and you can learn detailed information on each legislator, such as who their contributions are coming from and geographic information on which area finances them. You can find out which industries are the top contributors to which legislators. There are news stories and information on bills in the works. Both information junkies and citizens who just plain care what goes on in government will enjoy how this website connects the dots. (more…)