This is just very cool. Dylan Ratigan talks to MAPLight.org's Daniel Newman about his web site's new tool where you can track how members of Congress are voting in relation to their campaign contributions.

MAPLight.org Shows Links Between Politicians' Votes, Campaign Contributions:

MAPLight.org, a non-partisan web site, hopes to change that. The site uses three data sets to create a detailed picture that illustrates money's influence over elected officials: campaign contributions, voting records, and the supporting and opposing interests of a bill.

Dylan Ratigan lavished praise on the web site during his show Thursday and interviewed MAPlight's director.

To show how MAPLight works, Ratigan used it to research Ron Paul's "Audit the Fed" bill. MAPLight showed that banks and others against financial reform donated $9.7 million to oppose Paul's bill. That figure was more than 250 times larger than the $37,000 donated by supporters of the bill.

They say sunlight is the best disinfectant. Looks like this might be a very good tool for doing just that.