Back in April, an explosion at the Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia killed 29 workers, in the deadliest mining disaster since the 1970′s. Prior to the explosion, the mine, which is owned by Massey Energy, was cited for thousands of safety violations, but took little corrective action.

Under the Obama administration, the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) — which did next to nothing under President George W. Bush — has been trying to build itself back up. In addition to taking a hard line with other Massey mines, the agency “has targeted 111 mines with high rates of safety violations, simplified the path to declare a ‘pattern of violations’ that allow MSHA to mete out stronger sanctions on troublesome mines and moved to ease a backlog of disputed violations that has tied up enforcement.”

But MSHA still lacks critical powers to shut down especially dangerous mines and to subpoena documents and witnesses during investigations. The late Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) wrote legislation addressing these concerns, but it has languished in Congress and, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the incoming chairman of the House Labor Committee doesn’t feel any urgency to get it moving:

The bill passed out of the House Education and Labor Committee on a party line vote in July but never made it to the floor. Now with Republicans taking control of the House, it likely won’t get there in the new Congress. Rep. John Kline, R-Minn., the likely incoming chairman of the Education and Labor Committee, has said he wants to wait until the investigation into the Upper Big Branch explosion is complete before legislating.

Punting on mine safety would make sense for Kline, as he has shown little but contempt for workers during his time in the House. He has voted against minimum wages increases three times, and is a top advocate of the anti-union Secret Ballot Protection Act. When the House Labor Committee held a hearing on the Upper Big Branch disaster, Kline couldn’t even be bothered to show up.

Even if the bill somehow made it out of the House, it would run into the buzzsaw of the Senate, where new members like Sen.-elect Rand Paul (R-KY) don’t believe in any mine safety regulations at all. According to Paul’s theory, mine safety rules will just magically appear, because if they don’t, “no one will apply for those jobs.”

The resurgence of the Labor Department (including MSHA) and its commitment to enforcing labor law has been one of the great successes of the Obama administration. Giving MSHA the tools to do its work effectively is critical, but it seems that such a step may no longer in the cards.

When the Supreme Court invalidated a decades-long ban on corporate spending in federal elections in their Citizens United decision, it was by the narrowest of margins — only one justice. The public is less split on the issue, however. A new poll by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, which was provided to the Huffington Post, shows that by a double-digit margin, voters want Congress to use a constitutional amendment to overturn that decision and once again restrict corporations from directly spending on elections.

Forty-six percent of voters said that “Congress should consider drastic measures such as a constitutional amendment overturning” Citizens United, while 36 percent disagreed. Only a fifth of voters were undecided on the matter. Rep. Donna Edwards (D-MD) has already authored such an amendment, and told the Huffington Post, “I really concluded that the Supreme Court actually put the challenge out to us, here in the Congress. They said…Congress, you have no authority to regulate. And when the Court says that so directly, it only leaves us one choice.” Sens. John Kerry (D-MA) and Max Baucus (D-MT) are also behind the amendment, which enjoys the strong support of many law professors and former attorneys general.

Short of a constitutional amendment, which would require a two-thirds vote in both houses of Congress and ratification by three-quarters of the states, the DISCLOSE Act offers another possible remedy to the worst aspects of Citizens United. Today in Roll Call, Norman Ornstein of the conservative American Enterprise Institute think tank wrote a stinging op-ed calling on Republicans to support DISCLOSE:

The first is the failure of any Republican Senator to step up and support the DISCLOSE Act, to bring sunlight to the outrageous, anonymous huge funders who played a major role in the 2010 campaigns, hiding behind the cloak of 501(c)(4)s run by groups cynically manipulating weak IRS enforcement of the law. [...]

So where are the previous champions of campaign finance reform? Where is Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), whose greatest legislative accomplishment was given a sharp stick in the eye by a 5-4 decision on the Supreme Court? Where are previous supporters of reform — and professed supporters of disclosure — such as Republican Sens. Susan Collins (Maine) and Scott Brown (Mass.)? And most important, where is Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine), who has always been an independent voice, whose Snowe-Jeffords amendment to the campaign reform law was the provision most assaulted by the Citizens United case, who stood up to immense pressure from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Republican leaders in 2002 to do the right thing?

With this kind of pressure building, PCCC cofounder Adam Green thinks it’s a ripe time for action. “It’s time to stop thinking small-bore. The solution to Citizens United is not merely disclosure, it’s to overturn Citizens United — and even last November’s Republican-skewed electorate agrees,” he told the Huffington Post.