Taxes
Leaders Reportedly Reach Deal On R&D Tax Credit
     House and Senate leaders this week appear to have reached the agreement they need to pass a set of business tax-relief measures before adjourning. Negotiators reportedly reached a deal on a plan to combine some popular tax breaks, known as tax extenders, with trade measures. A bill reflecting the compromise, H.R. 6408, could come up for quick votes in both the House and Senate on Friday. The tax extenders include the long-awaited renewal of the research and development tax credit. The R&D credit expired in December 2005, but the language in the latest bill would renew it retroactively. Senate Republican leaders still face a potential filibuster by combining the tax credits with the trade measures that include a plan to allow duty-free clothing from Haiti into the United States. But leaders are working on getting the votes to prevent a delay.

Privacy
Foes Of Phone 'Pretexting' Want Action On Bill
     Proponents of a bill designed to stop Internet-based brokers from fraudulently obtaining and selling telephone records hoped for passage as the 109th Congress neared an end. One staffer said he is "hearing very good things about the likelihood of this passing," but as of Thursday, no action had occurred. The House in May unanimously passed a bill aimed at such "pretexting," and the Senate Judiciary Committee approved a nearly identical bill by voice vote. The legislation would punish people who obtain the phone records of others under false pretenses. It also would ban the sale or "transfer" of communications providers' account information. The question now is whether the Senate might clear the House measure to send the bill straight to President Bush. House bill sponsor Lamar Smith, R-Texas, said the support in both chambers "sends a strong message to data thieves: This activity will not be tolerated."

E-Government
E-Filing Bill For Senate Candidates Gets Late Push
     Senate candidates follow different campaign-reporting rules than everyone else, but backers of electronic filing are working to change that this year. They want Congress to clear a bill, S. 1508, that would impose e-filing rules on Senate candidates before lawmakers leave town. "This is just basic accountability and basic information the voters need in a timely way," said Steve Weissman, a spokesman for the Campaign Finance Institute. Internet activists from the left and right have joined hands, or perhaps links, to fight for the cause. "There is not much on which the left and right blogospheres agree, except, perhaps, on the ability of the Internet itself to transform politics," lawyer Adam Bonin wrote at Daily Kos. The Washington Post also endorsed the idea in a Wednesday editorial.

On The Hill
GAO: Technology Not Responsible For Relief Fraud
     Lawmakers and government investigators said human error, not technology, appeared to be to blame for why the Federal Emergency Management Agency made hundreds of millions of dollars in improper payments after hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005. "I call it fraud prevention 101," Greg Kutz, the Government Accountability Office's managing director for forensic audits and special investigations, told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. Kutz and his assistant director, John Ryan, released a report concluding that as of November, FEMA continued to make improper payments to people claiming disaster assistance. Kutz said FEMA's information technology systems tagged "hundreds of millions of dollars" in potentially improper payments before they were made, but "someone somewhere" made a decision to allow the payments. "We believe the technology is there [for] fraud prevention," Kutz said.

Privacy
House Panel To Make Data Security Push Next Year
     The House Financial Services Committee will redouble efforts to pass a data security bill in the new Congress, but turf wars are imminent, a member of the panel said. Illinois Democrat Melissa Bean said her committee's incoming chairman, Barney Frank, D-Mass., has data security near the top of his to-do list, but the House Energy and Commerce Committee also has a stake in the debate. Issues of "who's going to move first on what" will surely arise, she said. Frank is "very much a pragmatist and you'll continue to see that in his chairmanship," Bean said in response to a question about whether Frank would seek a federal policy to pre-empt varying state laws. The challenge is to balance basic consumer protections and state regulations, Bean said. "If [Frank] were to consider that, he would look at making sure that the standard was uniform," she said.

Business
SEC Likely To Seek Revisions To Accounting Rules
     Sarbanes and Oxley may be the two most despised names in the business world these days. Public companies all across the United States associate those monikers with a 2002 accounting law that they see as too burdensome. But Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox told technology industry leaders that he expects some revisions to the rules implemented under the statute. Cox's strong hints at a Northern Virginia Technology Council breakfast came after others in recent weeks. "We're very, very focused on making sure after four years of Sarbanes-Oxley that we fine tune it to make sure investors are getting their money's worth," Cox said. He offered no details of the revisions expected at an SEC meeting Dec. 13 but expressed the need for a balanced solution. "We want to make sure we remain the leading capital market on the planet. ... Sound regulation gives us a competitive advantage" Cox said.

Privacy
Privacy Watchdogs Urge Probe Of Spying Program
     Civil liberties watchdogs urged a federal advisory committee to aggressively investigate the Bush administration's program of wiretapping without warrants, arguing that oversight is only effective when the truth prevails and not deference to those in power. The White House Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board has been criticized since its 2004 inception for being a dependent part of the very branch of government it oversees. The panel has met privately 16 times but this week held its first public forum to solicit comments from nongovernmental individuals and organizations with an interest and expertise in the topic. Caroline Fredrickson, the American Civil Liberties Union's top lobbyist, said the group's first order of business should be to review surveillance aimed at innocent citizens.

Telecom
FCC's McDowell Weighs Response To Ethics Ruling
     Federal Communications Commissioner Robert McDowell plans to consult with the Virginia Bar if his agency permits him to participate in its review of the AT&T, BellSouth merger, according to sources. McDowell, who is a licensed attorney in Virginia, has been acting as if recused from the merger review because he previously worked as a lobbyist and attorney with Comptel, an industry association opposed to the deal. Republican FCC Chairman Kevin Martin has asked the agency's general counsel to "authorize" McDowell to vote on the matter. The sensitivity of that decision is underscored by McDowell's plans to consult with the Virginia Bar about its conflict-of-interest rules. He has voiced concern about violating those guidelines. "It is unseemly to try to force the commissioner to violate the ethical constraints not only of the commission but of the Virginia Bar as well," Public Knowledge President Gigi Sohn wrote in a statement.