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Editor Cooper Levey-Baker (Pic by Cliff Roles ) Impact. It’s a word we at The Florida Independent throw around daily behind the scenes, but it’s not an idea we talk about much in public. Sure, it’s featured prominently in our statement of purpose ( to produce “news that impacts public debate and advances the common good” ), but in the daily What Have You Published in the Last 10 Minutes?

Well, it appears I was wrong. Several media outlets reported late Wednesday that unnamed Democratic officials said President-elect Barack Obama will likely tap

With all the focus on Massey Energy, it’s worth noting that they’re not the lone coal company facing fire over safety issues in recent weeks. Indeed, federal

In a full-page spread in today’s Washington Post, some players in the energy industry take an opportunity to congratulate Congress for allowing a 26-year-old

The Minnesota Senate race hit another bump today as the campaigns of Al Franken and Sen. Norm Coleman disagreed over which absentee ballots to count, to the

Wonk Room has identified six Senate races with serious implications for climate change or, as Brad Johnson puts it, in which a strong vote for climate runs a

The continued budget pressures on the City of Lansing have led officials to eliminate a rented space on the city’s south side that has most recently housed the investigation unit of the police department. Until 2010, the facility housed investigations and patrol personnel to service the south end of Lansing.

Many are fascinated by the behind-the-scenes campaign news/gossip reported in Newsweek’s election special. One of the more interesting tidbits to me was that

First the scuffle over WWE outfits, now this: A court in Minnesota has ruled against a collection of conservative groups, including Minnesota Majority, in

The Center for American Progress’ Michael Ettlinger and Michael Linden do quick work dismantling the GOP’s Pledge to America, a governing platform released with

As national climate legislation slowly simmers on the back burner of the Senate and expectations are lowered for the international climate conference in

After a jury acquitted Youssef Megahed, an Egyptian-born 23-year-old engineering student from Tampa, Florida, his ordeal with the law didn’t come to an end.

In a press release, West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin’s office announced that he will name a replacement for the late Sen. Robert Byrd during a 2 p.m. press

I spent a bright and lovely morning doing anthropology among the vaccine skeptics, an angry group who blame the government for their children’s medical

The Log Cabin Republicans and GOProud criticized former Gov. Tim Pawlenty for stating that he would reinstate the military’s ban on openly serving gay and lesbian servicemembers. Pawlenty told members of the Family Leader, a group that opposes rights for same-sex couples in Iowa, that if he was elected president in 2012, he would pull funding for the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.

One of Rep. Allen West’s 2012 Democratic challengers, Patrick Murphy, recently sent out an email to his supporters criticizing West for his consistently aggressive rhetoric.

The world has yet to catch-up with Blackwater’s business model. A disconcerting yet surprisingly entertaining Mother Jones piece takes a look at one part of

It’s still just the embryonic Barack Obama administration, of course, but the light-speed downfall of Bill Richardson, Obama’s nominee for Commerce Dept.

As the Republican governor of Texas, Rick Perry has walked both sides of the immigration line, at one point implementing a Texas-style Dream Act that some say was the model for the national act. On the other hand, he’s authorized local police to inquire about the immigration status of anyone they come in contact with.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has deported 350,000 people so far this year, more than half of whom had criminal convictions, the Sacramento Bee