Cheat Seeking Missiles

Posted by: Laer at 12:30 pm

I’m giving you this quote direct from the Prez - and it’s not provided in the context of the utterly opaque process the Porkasaurus stimulus spending bill went through:

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.

Sure, Obama puked all over that central element of his core beliefs (heh!) with his very first legislative initiative, but what I’m talking about here is RAT, a little hidden surprise tucked away, out of sight, within the Porkasaurus bill. Fortunately, Byron York uncovered the scam:

The provision, which attracted virtually no attention in the debate over the 1,073-page stimulus bill, creates something called the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board — the RAT Board, as it’s known by the few insiders who are aware of it. The board would oversee the in-house watchdogs, known as inspectors general, whose job is to independently investigate allegations of wrongdoing at various federal agencies, without fear of interference by political appointees or the White House.

In the name of accountability and transparency [heh!], Congress has given the RAT Board the authority to ask “that an inspector general conduct or refrain from conducting an audit or investigation.” If the inspector general doesn’t want to follow the wishes of the RAT Board, he’ll have to write a report explaining his decision to the board, as well as to the head of his agency (from whom he is supposedly independent) and to Congress. In the end, a determined inspector general can probably get his way, but only after jumping through bureaucratic hoops that will inevitably make him hesitate to go forward.

Why would Obama want something in his very first legislative initiative that would politicize the oversight function, thereby clouding transparency? After all, as York points out, the “conduct or refrain from conducting” language means the RAT board, whose chairman will be appointed by the president (Natch!), will be able to “reach deep inside a federal agency and tell an inspector general to lay off some particularly sensitive subject. Or, conversely, it can tell the inspector general to go after a tempting political target.”

So again, why would Pres. Transparency want such a thing as a RAT Board? Maybe he didn’t read the 1.073 pages; maybe he just didn’t know. Not on your life! York asked a Dem Congressman about it and was told the RAT Board was “something the Obama administration wanted included in this bill.”

We await the outrage from the Left, which we know is terribly concerned about presidential manipulation of due process.

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