The Washington Post had an interesting article late last week about how hard it is for the federal government to follow the money it is spending under the Recovery Act, even though transparency and accountability were heavily doubted during debate on and passage of the bill.

Enter Onvia, a company that supplies nationwide information about opportunities to government contractors. They put up a site called Recovery.org and have rapidly outstripped the federal government’s efforts to track its own money on Recovery.gov.

Draw your own conclusions about whether a government that can’t follow the money should get the money in the first place. In fairness, the public hasn’t really asked for all that much accountability in the past, but with this Internet thing opening windows onto much more of corporate and governmental activity, it’s time to for the government to step up and get good at running its own show. You’re paying for it – a little over $3,200 per U.S. family.