Yesterday evening the Senate passed a watered down version of the energy bill that the House of Representatives passed last week. The oil and gas industry, and their allies in the Senate to whom they’ve given millions in campaign contributions, kept their billions in tax giveaways; while investment in alternative energy sources was deferred.

Looks like the opponents to more transparent campaign finance disclosures in the Senate have won a round.  A bill that would require Senators to file campaign finance reports electronically, as the House already does, has been bouncing around all year.  Now, an amendment by Sen. John Ensign (R-NV), designed to "poison" the bill, looks to have derailed its progress for the year.

In his speech on the floor of the Senate announcing his intention to introduce a full public financing bill, Assistant Majority Leader Richard Durbin (D-IL) asked his colleagues to think beyond initial ethics reform to a more comprehensive solution: "I hope it will only be the beginning and that we can move, even in this session of Congress, to meaningful hearings and the passage of public financing of campaigns that will truly reform the way we elect men and women to office at the Federal level and restore respect to this great institution of the U.S. Congress, both the House and the Senate. " Read on for the full text of the speech.