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ZerO's Lobbyist Reform?

Mike

Well-known member
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Dickerson: Pandemonium at the First White House Press Briefing

By Anne E. Kornblut
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, June 23, 2007; Page A05

MANCHESTER, N.H., June 22 -- Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) has promised a "different kind of campaign," one that hovers above the political fray. And so on Friday, after a week of contentious exchanges between his campaign and those of his Democratic rivals, Obama returned to talking about his reformist agenda.

Obama promised to curb lobbyists' influence from his first day as president. Declaring there is "more cleaning up to do in Washington," he said he would ban political appointees in his administration from lobbying the executive branch after leaving their jobs. And anyone joining his administration would not be allowed to work on issues related to their former employers for at least two years.


And he has appointed someone that lobbied for Raytheon to work at the Pentagon?????????????????????

Posted January 22, 2009 11:06 AM

by Frank James

When is a ban on lobbyists in an administration not a ban on lobbyists in an administration? When you need a lobbyist who knows how the Pentagon works to help run the defense establishment.

That's the situation the new Obama Administration finds itself in. Obama nominated William J. Lynn III as his Deputy Defense Secretary in a role that would require Lynn to essentially be the chief operations officer in that mammoth bureaucracy.

But Lynn was among, other things, a lobbyist for Raytheon Co., one of the nation's largest defense contractors.

To not violate the new executive order the president signed yesterday, Lynn would require a waiver from the new administration.

That would seem to violate the spirit of Obama's ban, something which numerous people, including the Project on Government Oversight, are now pointing out:


"POGO believes strongly in the revolving door restrictions President Barack Obama has outlined to restore integrity and ethics to government," said POGO executive director Danielle Brian. "It is because we believe so strongly in the positive impact that such a change will have that we urge the President to withdraw his nomination of William J. Lynn III as Deputy Secretary of Defense. President Obama should not compromise his standards and the effectiveness of the Department of Defense by allowing a top defense industry lobbyist to receive a waiver from these standards. The defense industry is in a class of its own among all of the industries that have had a pervasive stranglehold on public policy to advance their own financial interests."

In a 2008 lobbying report, Lynn was listed as part of a Raytheon lobbying team on budget and appropriations issues including the Department of Defense Appropriations Bill, acquisition policy, missile defense, and Foreign Military Financing. The Obama Administration should not allow its ethics standards to begin with a series of waivers and loopholes which immediately undermine its good intentions.

Lynn's nomination is clearly contrary to the following excerpt from Obama's executive order:

"2. Revolving Door Ban All Appointees Entering Government. I will not for a period of 2 years from the date of my appointment participate in any particular matter involving specific parties that is directly and substantially related to my former employer or former clients, including regulations and contracts.

"3. Revolving Door Ban Lobbyists Entering Government. If I was a registered lobbyist within the 2 years before the date of my appointment, in addition to abiding by the limitations of paragraph 2, I will not for a period of 2 years after the date of my appointment:

(a) participate in any particular matter on which I lobbied within the 2 years before the date of my appointment;

(b) participate in the specific issue area in which that particular matter falls; or

(c) seek or accept employment with any executive agency that I lobbied within the 2 years before the date of my appointment.

According to the executive order, Lynn shouldn't have accepted the appointment though, of course, the order was only signed yesterday and Lynn presumably accepted the president's offer weeks ago. So he was arguably grandfathered in.

But because Raytheon is pervasive in defense contracting, it will difficult, to say the least, for Lynn to avoid involvement for two years in Pentagon matters that touch Raytheon.

An excerpt from a CQ Politics report:

According to the company's disclosure forms, Lynn was part of a team that lobbied on a wide range of defense issues, including acquisitions policy, force protection, space and intelligence, command and control, simulation and training, missile defense, sensors and radars, and munitions and artillery. The breadth of the work reflects the reach of Raytheon throughout the Defense Department.

If Lynn had to recuse himself from all these areas, I'm not sure what's left for him to manage. Maybe the Pentagon daycare facilities but that seems about it.

Here's more from CQ:

The text of the executive order would require Lynn to recuse himself from any involvement in Raytheon programs for two years after taking his post.

"I have no reason to impugn Mr. Lynn's integrity, but it's a problem," said Claire McCaskill , a Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee. "You can't just recuse yourself from huge programs at the Pentagon if you're going to do that job."

Following his Jan. 15 confirmation hearing, McCaskill, of Missouri, said she was considering placing a hold on Lynn's nomination because she doubts Lynn can separate his recent work on behalf of Raytheon from the job of chief operating officer at the Pentagon.

However, late in the day Wednesday her staff said McCaskill had decided not to put a hold on the nomination, although she has not said how she will vote.

The new lobbying rules might also give ammunition to Senate Republicans, who could raise ethical objections to the Lynn nomination as they did with the appointment of Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton .

Sen. James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma, the No. 2 Republican on the Armed Services Committee, said he wants clarification from the administration on how the Lynn appointment fits into the new rules.

"While I announced my support for Mr. Lynn's nomination, the announcement of the new ethics executive order is puzzling," Inhofe said.

This is what makes purity on Washington lobbying so hard to maintain. Some of the people most knowledgeable about how the nation's capital works are lobbyists. That's what makes them effective.

Cracking down on lobbyists sounds great in theory. Lord knows, the public loves the concept since citizens are fed up with Washington operators who enrich themselves at the public trough, especially when it leads to extreme forms of the practice i.e. corruption.

That notwithstanding, lobbyists know intimately how the federal agencies and Congress function. Ban them for a number of years and it's going to prove difficult to fill some of the most important jobs in the bureaucracy. Americans may not want to hear that, but it's the truth.
 
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