Where's the pork?

Do you like to research? To puzzle together facts into a story? If so, check out EarmarkWatch.org. Launched today by the Sunlight Foundation and Taxpayers for Common Sense. This new tool offers OffTheBus members an opportunity to investigate what earmarks have been requested by today's presidential candidates who work on the hill. The details for checking out the tool are below. If you find something that's newsworthy or want to write up your findings, please send them to campaigntrail AT huffingtonpost.com.

Dear OfftheBus Citizen Journalists, Today, Sunlight () and Taxpayers for Common Sense () (TCS) launched EarmarkWatch.org (), a user-friendly, online investigative tool and social networking site that lets citizens like you determine if earmarks - the measures inserted by members of Congress into the various appropriations bills that direct funds to a specific project or recipient - address pressing needs, favor political contributors or are simply pure pork.

As an OTB journalist, you can dig into the earmarks requested by those members of Congress who are running for president to connect the dots between lawmakers, lobbyists, campaign contributors and earmarks. You don't have to be an expert on earmarks -- EarmarkWatch.org gives you the power to easily research, evaluate and comment on the pet projects favored and funded by members of Congress.

Right now, you can investigate earmarks from the House Defense Appropriations Bill and the House and Senate versions of the Labor, Health and Human Services Appropriations bills. EarmarkWatch.org will guide you through a series of steps that an investigative reporter would follow, associating different kinds of political information with each earmark, and will also show you how to use online resources to find out whether recipients of earmarks hired lobbyists, made campaign contributions to members of Congress, or won federal contracts and grants. You can also add information to earmarks others have researched, or comment on what others have found.

We hope you can join us in this effort to bring transparency to earmarks. To get started, create an account and pick an earmark at www.earmarkwatch.org.