The Transparency President
So, President Barack Obama came into office loudly proclaiming "transparency" as a touchstone of his administration, calling forth a "new era of open government." He's gonna set up a website where average citizens can track where every dollar of stimulus money is being spent. His Attorney General issues a memo to all agencies requiring them to operate under a "presumption of disclosure" when evaluating requests for records under the Freedom of Information Act, and "not to withhold records simply because they can technically do so."
Following through on these promises to the American people, the White House has announced that the $328,835 snapshots of an Air Force One backup plane buzzing lower Manhattan last week will not be shown to the public.
Er, wait a minute. That's not really following through on promises of "transparency," is it? That's more like a cover-up and stone-walling. Hmmm.
Of course, the President has broken many, many promises before, but many of those lies broken promises have been justified on the grounds that those promises were just campaign promises and thus don't really count. But these weren't campaign promises. These were statements made by the President of the United States within hours of being sworn into office.
So all that hoopla about open Government and transparency? What Obama really meant was that he was going to be "open" about things that happened during the Bush administration and would be transparent about releasing classified interrogation documents and privileged legal memoranda authored by attorneys in the Bush Justice Department. With respect to his own White House, Obama clearly reserves the right to withhold any information he wants to, laws like the Freedom of Information Act be damned.
Sorry about the confusion.
6 comments:
You're trying to prove a large point using one example (the air force one thing). I won't be convinced unless I see more evidence, and more significant evidence at that (as in not disclosing where money from the stimulus bill is going). I'm not saying that definitely won't happen, I just don't think your argument holds water yet.
I understand your point, but you also have a horse in this race. You are an avid Republican; which there is nothing wrong with. You point out everything that is wrong with politics and why us as citizens will never advance. Politicians will always be Republicans vs. Democrats and it should be done this way, no it needs to be this way. In the end they end up pointing the finger. Just like everyone wants to claim, this administration is going to run up taxes because of the Stimulus Package, well Bush had one and the Republican Senate and House proposed one of their own. True it wasn't for as much, but they still had one and what is a
$1B when you are talking about hundreds? Secondly, if I reside in a state like LA, SC, or NM where the Governor's are rejecting stimulus dollars that will go towards unemployment benefits for their own political gain because they want to office. They then think people will vote for them because they were so noble to not take stimulus money? Give me a break everything is done for political gain to point out why I (fill in political party) is correct. In the end nobody wins.
I was talking to a client of mine the other day about Obama speaking at the graduation ceremony and he what I thought made a pretty good point. True, we don't believe in abortion, but what about the priests that have molested children just for the catholic church to pay off the family and send the priest to another area? That isn't right either, but it happens.
Barry O is a student of Sal Salinsky as is his climate czar. Their bible is "Rules for Radicals". They not only believe in incremental socialism but in "global governance".
The 2010 midterms can't get here fast enough.
I am not a Republican, but the press finally got revenge for the Gore defeat.
TBoneND
Not sure what Matt is saying except it's ok to Lie er break a promise because someone else did something else. Great moral fortitude. So someone else murders , guess its's nok to steal. Great logic Matt
All I am saying is that if I had a daughter that was 13 or 14 and was raped, I wouldn't ask her to keep it. Great for you if you would, but I wouldn't do that. That is all that I am saying.
I would be more interested in the transparency of Notre Dame's President.
In his letter to the 2009 Class Father Jenkins lauds Obama's stance on immigration, expanding health care and foreign policy , among other things as having a "deep resonance"
with Catholic social teaching.
Were the Freedom of Choice Act to pass Catholic hospitals MIGHT be forced to provide abortion services or close. To be fair I don't believe this is definite but such a possibilty certainly is something Father Jenkins might want to explain.
Immigration etc. are surely political issues. Indeed such political conduct{liberal or conservative} are why many of us have a hard time finding a church.
I always thought soul saving was a big enough job. Apparently not.
If I had kids I am not sure I would particularly care if they attended my Alma Mater at present.
I hope those of us who want change at the top look at the Commencement as a BEGINNING of the struggle for ND's soul.
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