from the progress report...For all of the administration's promising early steps to restore transparency and accountability, however recent developments are less encouraging. Some of these stumbling points have been simple failures of implementation; many of the administration's budget transparency websites, for example, publish inconsistent numbers. Other transparency failures, however, suggest a more disturbing trend. Despite promises to end "secret meetings" and restore the White House as the "people's house," the administration has refused to disclose the names of individuals who have visited the White House since Obama took office, while echoing similar excuses by Bush administration officials who wanted to hide secret meetings with energy industry executives. But most disturbing are recent, tenuous invocations of "national security" to cast a shade over government transparency. After the Environmental Protection Agency uncovered nearly four dozen toxic coal ash sites in Tennessee that "could cause death and significant property damage if an event such as a storm, a terrorist attack or a structural failure caused them to spill into surrounding communities," the administration choose to keep the locations of the toxic sites secret from Tennessee residents because of fears that such disclosure could present a "security risk." Similarly, despite earlier disclosure of the infamous torture memos, the Obama CIA has thus far successfully kept secret a comprehensive account of that agency's interrogation practices. Although a heavily redacted version of the report was uncovered by the ACLU, the administration insists that disclosing the full report would endanger national security. Even more alarming, however, is the Obama administration's adoption of Bush's "state secrets" claim in court cases dealing with issues ranging from extraordinary rendition to warrantless wiretapping. The "state secrets" privilege allows the administration to withhold information in a lawsuit or even dismiss the suit altogether if the subject matter of the suit could potentially reveal information that puts national security at risk. In one suit, brought by an Islamic charity challenging the previous administration's warrantless wiretapping program, a federal judge finally threatened sanctions against the Justice Department if it did not comply with an order to turn over a document to the plaintiff's attorneys. Incidents such as these led the New York Times to lament that Obama has "backtracked, in substantial if often nuanced ways, from the approach to national security that he preached as a candidate, and even from his first days in the Oval Office."
the center for american progress, the publisher of this e-newsletter and the weblog, think progress, has lost a great deal of credibility with me over the past few years... i became a regular reader when i saw that they often got the goods on the multiple abuses and outright crimes of the bush administration ahead of the rest of the baying blogosphere... then it started to dawn on me that they too often played the fawning sycophant to anyone and everyone aligned with the democratic party, frequently turning a blind eye to the fact that we have been and are continuing to be just as thoroughly screwed by the democrats as we are by the republicans, the only difference being that, with the dems, there's no sand in the vaseline...
since obama's election and inauguration, they've taken a turn for the worse, spending WAY too much time, imho, vilifying the likes of bill kristol, bill o'reilly, glenn beck, rush limbaugh, karl rove, and the like, a tactic that only serves to give those despicable characters even more air time and exposure than they already have and thus reinforcing their loathsome presence on the american scene... the best strategy in dealing with such obvious dark forces is to not give them the energy of even recognizing them... the dark feeds on attention whether it be positive or negative, and these guys don't deserve to be fed...
so, now our center for american progress friends seem to be waking up to the fact that our dear sunshine-is-the-best-disinfectant president may well be just another stooge - albeit a very well-spoken, intelligent and polished one - for those who so blithely and heedlessly pull our strings along with the strings of most of the rest of the world...
speaking for myself, i believe obama has a good heart and i would prefer to believe that some of what's going on is the result of his bowing to his handlers... otoh, if he IS a good soul, he'd better start showing it or i will be permanently checking out of the hope hotel...Labels: ACLU, Barack Obama, Bush Administration, extraordinary rendition, liberals, national security, Progressives, state secrets privilege, Think Progress, transparent, warrantless domestic wiretapping
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