Washington Times - EDITORIAL: Obama secrecy

Washington Times - EDITORIAL: Obama secrecy: "You can't have a closed-door meeting about the need for fewer closed-door meetings and expect anyone to take you seriously. That's like writing a memo to order fewer memos. Such folly is business as usual in the Obama White House.

President Obama promised a historic level of transparency from his administration but hasn't delivered. On Dec. 7, the president had a 'workshop' on government openness that was closed to the public.

Perhaps Mr. Obama didn't want the public to hear about some of his less-than-glamorous transparency report cards. This comes on the heels of a purported transparency Web site - recovery.gov - delivering fake information to the public about fantasy jobs in imaginary congressional districts.

The political landscape is littered with broken promises for ever-greater transparency. Mr. Obama promised that all health care negotiations would be open to the public. Yet the day before the secret meeting to condemn secrecy, the president held a Democrats-only closed-door strategy meeting to push a new version of his partisan health care plan.

The president's purple prose continues nonetheless. 'The government should not keep information confidential merely because public officials might be embarrassed by disclosure,' he said. Talk is cheap.

The administration has sometimes released information only after weeks or months of pressing from watchdogs and reporters. There has been foot-dragging about what cars people bought through the 'cash for clunkers' program, rules about the interrogation of terror suspects and White House visitor logs, for starters."