Lack Of Transparency

Lack Of Transparency:

Accountability: After a long legal battle, a federal judge has ruled that White House visitor logs are public and can be released under the Freedom of Information Act. So much for the White House's vaunted claim to openness.

It took the lawyers of Judicial Watch almost two years to pry open White House records on the matter of who visited the president and his advisers in the first seven months of Obama's administration.

That information was solemnly promised to voters by candidate Obama in his 2008 campaign as a means of distinguishing his governing style from the supposedly ominous, secretive Halliburton-scarred presidency of his predecessor, George W. Bush.

"My administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in government," the White House website intoned. "Openness will strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness in government."

That's not reality since Obama's arrival in the White House.

Visitor logs suddenly were off-limits, and it took a lawsuit to compel the White House to "voluntarily" release the names of those who visited after September 2009 to satisfy the transparency promise.

Team Obama used bureaucratic sleight of hand to keep anyone from browsing the lists, forcing inquisitive members of the public to "guess the visitor" on a given day and, only if they guessed correctly, to get the record...........................

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