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PrintFebruary 23, 2009
More Guards to Guard the Guards
Transparency is the name of the game, says former community organizer President Barack Obama. Don't let the broken promise of the White House to post the "Stimulus Bill" for 48 hours before the vote cloud your thinking.
According to Mike Allen at Politico,
President Obama will announce while meeting with the nation’s governors Monday that he is naming one of the government's most aggressive, experienced government investigators to oversee spending of the stimulus package, administration officials said.
The new board gets a new name: The White House's Recovery Act Transparency and Accountability Board, and will be headed by Earl E. Devaney.
Devaney became the Interior Department’s inspector general in August 1999. From his official bio: Mr. Devaney began his law enforcement career in 1968 as a police officer in his native state of Massachusetts. After graduating from Franklin and Marshall College in 1970 with a degree in Government, Mr. Devaney became a Special Agent with the United States Secret Service.
At the time of his retirement from the Secret Service in 1991, Mr. Devaney was serving as the Special Agent-in-Charge of the Fraud Division and had become an internationally recognized white-collar crime expert regularly sought by major media including USA Today, The Wall Street Journal and CNN.
The Obama team gives additional assurance of spending accountability to taxpayers by announcing that Vice President Biden will also be on board to provide oversight.
An administration official said that the President has asked the vice president, Joe Biden, to oversee the Administration’s implementation of the Recovery Act’s provisions -- meeting regularly with key members of the Cabinet, Governors and Mayors to make sure their efforts are speedy and effective. He will make regular reports to the President that will be posted on recovery.gov.
Transparency reigns, according to White House reports on the formation of this new watchdog group. The White House will account for the spending of the stimulus monies.
We have heard these promises before. The Obama Transition Team reassured citizens on its efforts at transparency when it performed an "internal review" in assessing possible ethics violations related to the transition team’s contacts with former Illinois Governor Blagojevich. The public was assured, after careful internal oversight, that all was well.
Now, the Obama White House will appoint a new internal "stimulus czar" to the Obama White House, to oversee the Obama White House. All is well. All is well. Keep repeating: All is well.
