Transparency: President Obama’s Perpetual Foe

On 01.29.10, In Transparency, By markboabaca

President Obama’s campaign promised transparency before he reached the Oval Office.

Unfortunately, when he made the transition from candidate to president, he checked transparency at the door.  You would almost get the impression that President Obama hated transparency given the amount of times he has chosen not to be transparent.

Some examples:

On healthcare “Obama skipped past a broken promise from his campaign — to have the negotiations for health care legislation broadcast on C-SPAN “so that people can see who is making arguments on behalf of their constituents, and who are making arguments on behalf of the drug companies or the insurance companies.” Instead, Democrats in the White House and Congress have conducted the usual private negotiations, making multibillion-dollar deals with hospitals, pharmaceutical companies and other stakeholders behind closed doors. Nor has Obama lived up consistently to his pledge to ensure that legislation is posted online for five days before it’s acted upon.”

Let the sun shine in on a few more of President Transparency’s glowing first year:

Obama Blocks Visitor Log Disclosure

HHS helped hide Jonathan Gruber’s status as a paid health care shill

Fed Seeks to Block Release of Bank Bailout Secrets

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AmeriCorps IG Shredded White House Docs per Spokeswoman

On 11.12.09, In AmeriCorps, Gerald Walpin, Transparency, By markboabaca

From CNSNews.com:

The acting inspector general of AmeriCorps said he shredded White House documents at the request of an agency press spokeswoman that pertained to the controversial firing of the previous inspector general, who was ousted after investigating a political ally of President Obama.

The e-mail message from agency spokeswoman Ranit Schmelzer seemed urgent, as she wrote: “WH documents were sent in error. Can you please destroy them? And can you confirm you receive this e-mail?” Acting IG Kenneth Bach responded 13 minutes later writing, “Confirmed, documents were shredded.”

Wow.  Is this the transparent administration President Obama promised?  From the WhiteHouse website:

Government should be transparent. Transparency promotes accountability and provides information for citizens about what their Government is doing.  Information maintained by the Federal Government is a national asset. My Administration will take appropriate action, consistent with law and policy, to disclose information rapidly in forms that the public can readily find and use. Executive departments and agencies should harness new technologies to put information about their operations and decisions online and readily available to the public. Executive departments and agencies should also solicit public feedback to identify information of greatest use to the public.

If “information maintained by the Federal Government is a national asset” why did Ranit Schmelzer order the acting IG to shred national assets?

More from CNSNews.com:

The email exchanges between Bach and Schmelzer, as well as other documents pertaining to the firing of the AmeriCorps inspector general, were obtained by CNSNews.com through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.

The documents referenced in the Bach-Schmelzer email exchange included a draft of a letter to be signed by President Obama that would be sent to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to inform her that Obama was firing Gerald Walpin as inspector general for the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS), which runs AmeriCorps, and also a set of talking points to be used in explaining to the media why Walpin was being fired.

So much for transparency.

Shredding documents = transparency?

Shredding documents = transparency?

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