Sometimes, blog posts just write themselves. Politico:

President Obama finally and quietly accepted his "transparency" award from the open government community this week - in a closed, undisclosed meeting at the White House on Monday.

The secret presentation happened almost two weeks after the White House inexplicably postponed the ceremony, which was expected to be open to the press pool.

This time, Obama met quietly in the Oval Office with Gary Bass of OMB Watch, Tom Blanton of the National Security Archive, Danielle Brian of the Project on Government Oversight, Lucy Dalglish of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, and Patrice McDermott of OpenTheGovernment.org, without disclosing the meeting on his public schedule or letting photographers or print reporters into the room.

"Our understanding going into the meeting was that it would have a pool photographer and a print reporter, and it turned out to be a private meeting," Bass told POLITICO. "He was so on point, so on target in the conversation with us, it is baffling why he would not want that message to be more broadly heard by reporters and the public interest community and the public generally."

Priceless. Gary Bass is as clueless as a newborn babe. All together now:

THE REASON OBAMA WANTED THE AWARD CEREMONY SECRET IS BECAUSE HE DIDN'T WANT TO LOOK LIKE A HYPOCRITE FOR HAVING THE LEAST TRANSPARENT PRESIDENCY OF THE MODERN ERA!

How's that Gary? Clear things up for ya?