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Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Obama makes a mockery of his own lobbyist ban

My column today, as heard on the Laura Ingraham show:

More than 40 former lobbyists work in senior positions in the Obama administration, including three Cabinet secretaries and the CIA director. Yet in his State of the Union address, Obama claimed, "We've excluded lobbyists from policymaking jobs."
Did Obama speak falsely?
Well, it depends on what the definition of "excluded lobbyists" is.
I asked the White House if he chose his words poorly, but the media affairs office defended the president's statement: "As the President said," a spokeswoman wrote in an e-mail, "we have turned away lobbyists for many, many positions."
So, the country may have heard, "we haven't hired lobbyists to policymaking jobs," but the White House tells us Obama meant, "we only hired some of the lobbyists who applied for policymaking jobs." In other words, they've excluded some lobbyists.
And this was in the context of reducing the "deficit of trust."

1 comment:

Senor Boyero said...

I am now a fan of yours from seeing Book TV on CSpan.
I like Obama but I now see some of the reasons Ron Paul made a lot of sense to me. Although I don't agree with Ron Paul or Obama completely I definitely think we need to make sure we are free from the grips of corporations and government. That is the real fight I think in politics. The little guy versus the big guy.
Anyway, I can't wait to read your book and learn more. Have you read Life Inc. by Douglas Rushkoff? Its amazing show of how lobbyists and government do whatever they want.