Senate Rivals in Pennsylvania In a Dead Heat on Mortgages

Boehner photocopied the zinger and distributed it to colleagues just before they elected him to the top slot in the Republican Conference.

Undeterred, the Journal-News editorialized this month: "We are not asking for federal dollars for 'pork' projects to build a spoon museum or a bridge to Fairfield. We are asking for a fraction of the millions we pay in taxes to come back to this county for special highway projects or redevelopment or job creation or even public transportation. Wouldn't it be nice if instead of a powerful congressman working on his golf game in Scotland, we could get a bus from here to the doctor's office in Oxford?"

Anti-Disclosure Lobby Is Broad

One of the most far-reaching and controversial proposals that the Senate is scheduled to debate this coming week would for the first time require lobbyists to disclose their grass-roots lobbying expenditures for such things as letter-writing campaigns.

At the moment, only direct lobbying of lawmakers has to be reported.

Opposing the plan, written by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) among others, is an unusual coalition of interest groups from the political right and left. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is among the conservative groups against the notion, which isn't a surprise. The nation's biggest business lobby has long tried to block additional government regulation, which the proposal would certainly impose.

But this time, some prominent left-leaning groups, which normally support government activism, are also arguing against the measure's extra paperwork. Twelve organizations including the Alliance for Justice, League of Conservation Voters, NAACP and NARAL Pro-Choice America have written to congressional leaders to ask them to block grass-roots disclosure.

"We must do everything we can to eliminate corruption in today's lobbying practices, but we cannot do so at the expense of free speech," Alliance for Justice President Nan Aron said. "The grass-roots lobbying reform . . . will interfere with the rights of Americans to receive information about important public issues and to meaningfully engage their elected representatives."

Staff writer Jeffrey H. Birnbaum contributed to this report.