President Obama seems to be getting off to a good start:
From the link:
Obama rescinded Bush’s 2001 executive order allowing former presidents, vice presidents, and their heirs to claim executive privilege in determining which of their records get released to the public. Even better, he’s requiring the signature of both his White House counsel and the attorney general before he can classify a document under executive privilege.
Issued a memorandum to all executive agencies asking them to come up with a new plan for open government and complying with FOIA requests. He is also instructing three top officials, including the U.S. attorney general, to come up with a new policy on open government. The new policy would replace the existing policy, infamously set by a 2001 memo from John Ashcroft that instructed federal agencies to essentially to take every measure they can to refuse FOIA requests.
Put a freeze on the salaries of top White House aides.
Suspended the military trials at Gitmo, and is expected to issue an order closing Gitmo as soon as today.
Good job and keep up the good work!
Not much of a debate, I know. I am sure the mods will move it if they want.
I’ve been reading news articles about Obama freeing up funding for abortions and allowing stem cell research to go ahead. Sounds good to me. I’m cautiously optimistic, but I haven’t found much about the guy to NOT like yet!
He also prohibited members of his administration from going to work as lobbyists until he leaves office, and imposed a two year waiting period before lobbyists can work for his administration. That is a big deal.
Except, of course, that this seems to be a rule flouted at will when it is expedient. David Axelrod engaged in lobbying in his business as a consultant - he is now a special advisor to Obama. And headlines in the paper today concerned President Obama getting testy with Politico reporters asking him about William J. Lynn III - nominated to a top Defense Department job. He just left Raytheon, where he headed their lobbying efforts.
Mind you, I’m of the opinion that this was a stupid promise - but that doesn’t mean Obama shouldn’t have to explain why he is breaking it.
Bad idea. If he wants to do this preemptively, the signature of the White House counsel should be fine. The Attorney General should be out of this loop - as the Justice Department is not involved in these decisions and indeed, in cases of prosecutions against White House officials, would be the ones bringing these cases to the grand jury.
Worse than the president defending executive privilege claims independently would be him dragging the Justice Department into it.
He isn’t breaking it. These are not examples of “flouting.” Neither of these people are currently working as lobbyists or will be for two years after they stop working for the administration. Please explain how the new executive order is being “broken.” Are you quite sure you understand what it says?
Also, Obama wasn’t getting “testy” with those Politico sleazeballs because of their particular question, but because they were trying to turn an informal introduction into a press conference. it wasn’t WHAT tey were asking that was inappropriate, it was WHEN they were asking.
Why? White House Counsel alone is liable to be little more than a rubber stamp. Having the AG have to sign off on it provides an extra layer of protection for the people and helps prevent abuses like we saw under the last adminstration.
By the way, aren’t you still in the Navy? Where do you get off badmouthing your Commander in Chief?
As for your direct question to me, I haven’t been on active duty for more than ten years - the only president who was ever in my chain of command was Bill Clinton. So I can say whatever I like.
Even if Mr. Moto was still active duty, it seems to me that the anonymity his forum handle provides, allows him to express himself freely without bringing undue discredit upon the service.
Which sailor is he, exactly? Could be anyone of them… Heck, he may be lying about being in the service.
Active duty service members are allowed to attend political events, just not in uniform, nor publicly proclaiming that they are service members, if I recall correctly.
I fail to see any exemption there. The rule dictates what people areallowed to do during and (for a two year peiod of time) after they work for the administration. It says nothing about what they could have done before. Where’s the exemption?
ETA
Wait, never mind. I see. He would be working for Defense. Still, the waiver is warranted because there’s no conflict of interest and he would no longer stand to gain from prior lobbying intersts. It’s a rather pathetic objection, actually.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with setting a general rule and then making an exception to it. The President can do that if he wishes. But I agree that the Senate should expect an explanation for why the exception was made.
This is how our government is supposed to work. People often criticize the Democrats for their lack of unity when conflicts like this occur, but I think that Sen. Levin would be shirking his duty if he did not question Obama’s decision here just because they’re in the same party.
Whether this type of thing will lower my opinion of Obama depends on how many of these exceptions he chooses to make. We’ll see.
He certainly gets points in my estimation for the first item the OP mentioned. The idea of letting the heirs of former executives claim executive privilege was totally absurd.
Edit: DtC, you’ve misread. As Obama stated it, the rule applies specifically to the actions of lobbyists before they enter the administration.
It makes perfect sense to me for a rule to have the possibility of exceptions to the letter of the rule. If the exceptions are applied in a way that supports the spirit of the rule, great. If the exceptions re applied in a way that violates the spirit of the rule, that really sucks.
Mr. Moto, do you believe the exceptions mentioned so far violate the spirit of the rule? Or do you disagree with Mr. Pope regarding what comprises the hobgoblin of little minds?
It’s not usually possible to make a perfect rule that will be good in all cases. Sometimes you recognize that whatever problem the rule was intended to prevent isn’t an issue in a certain case.
You are right to suggest, however, that a multiplication of exceptions vitiates the rule. I said as much in my previous post: if Obama makes too many exceptions to his own rules it will reflect badly on him. But one exception doesn’t necessarily imply a cascade of future exceptions.
You’re right of course. If you kill someone you should die in the electric chair. Period. No exceptions.
It doesn’t matter if he was stabbing your wife at the time. Or had a gun in his hand and was about to kill you. Or was strangling you with a piano wire.
Rules have exceptions because creating a rule that covers every possible contingency is impossible. Thinking like that causes thirteen year old girls to be strip searched for Motrin because of zero tolerance drug policies.
Equating criminal justice to a very specific executive order is ridiculous. The rule was made to avoid influence of former lobbyists in the White House. A very, very narrow target.
There are many rules that have no exceptions. Such as being 18 in order to vote. Drinking age.
Look, personally I think it is silly to try to keep lobbyists out of government in the first place. They are where they are for a reason - generally a bit of expertise in their field. I don’t think a blanket rule keeping them out is particularly wise.
Especially if it leads to this sort of situation.
Now, nobody can really say this isn’t a violation of Obama’s policies - even he says a waiver of such was required. And while exceptions to a general rule may be warranted from time to time - why is this being tested right off for the man who headed lobbying efforts for one of America’s largest defense contractors and a high ranking position at - imagine - the Defense Department?
Current rules state that the nominee would have to recuse himself in decisions involving his former company - well, we’re talking about Raytheon here. What decisions will he be permitted to make if that purview is taken away? Whether to serve yakisoba or SOS on the chow lines?
