On every Thursday and Sunday of each week, I listen to some podcast done by Adam Curry and John C. Dvorak named No Agenda. It is basically a podcast for those who are conspiracy theorists and think America is "Gitmo Nation Western Hemisphere". A "Gitmo Nation" they are willing to "fight against the tide" by saying no to forced vaccinations for swine flu, denying that climate change/global warming exists, believing that the GIVE Act is nothing more than the masses being "enslaved" by our government in "mandatory volunteering", opposing the "surtax" on the public option health care legislation, . And while I say whatever to those things, there is one thing that irks me about what Adam says on his podcasts. One thing that caused me to put my thoughts on this diary and wonder if the DailyKos members agree with me on this.
In the days and months since Obama was sworn in as President, all Adam Curry talks about is about the "lack of transparency" on the part of the Administration. That Obama "promised" transparency in his campaign and that as President, he hasn't delivered on that promise so far. I don't buy into that because Obama has been alot more transparent than George W. Bush ever was in his eight years as President. We have a Vice President, in Joe Biden, that doesn't have secret plans to implement "death squads" to kill people in foreign countries. And we don't have cabinet members of certain departments covering up the truth about what happened in Gitmo or the supposed WMDs in Iraq. Yet, here are the two reasons Adam Curry is not sold on Obama's transparency:
1.) In the latest episode of his podcast, he mentions about Obama's pitch during the All-Star game last week for the website Serve.gov. He says the following of the website:
And you see that there is all kinds of big pharmaceutical guys on the board of serve.gov. This is a whole windup of the GIVE Act, for the enslavement of our children. This is part of the "mandatory volunteerism".
If you look at serve.gov, and go to About Serve.Gov section, you find that the website is managed by Corporation for National and Community Service. Doesn't this sound like a "money maker", for profit?
Then Adam talked about what he thinks the Corporation for National Community Service is about:
It is all energy guys, pharma guys on the board. Its like government and big business are up each others ***. The government wants us to work for free. And the government wants to sign into law for us to work for free.
I know this sounds totally crazy, but Adam believes in this. I can't see how the GIVE Act implies that community service will forced for everyone and that is "enslavement". As for the website serve.gov, everything is there for us to click on and see. It is not like that information isn't there and that it is very difficult to find it. The website is transparent.
2.) In that same episode, Adam Curry mentioned the following about the official White House website:
Went to whitehouse.gov and looked at the featured legislation. If you go there, you will see the Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act. And you click on it, then it takes you to a page which shows you a video of the President talking about it. And then it gives you the White House summary and I immediately get suspicious (like you are only going to give me a summary?). Nowhere is there a link to the actual bill. You have to Google it. Then it has the "White House Fact Sheet" and it is a press release with highlights and no bill.
This bill actually allows the credit card companies to build a profile on you based upon your purchases and to give that information to the government. So they trump up this whole thing about "now the banks will protect me and the credit card companies can't raise rates". But in the fine print, that is what you read about what is actually going on, which is "now we can track you". So I'm just going back to cash.
I could go on and on about the nominees Obama has chosen for various cabinet positions and their ties to either Goldman Sachs or Monsanto, but it just becomes too much to believe in all of this. Is there more that can be done for the Obama Administration to become more transparent? Yes, but it will take time for that to happen. Not everything can be done in a day, week, month, or year and it seems as though that Adam Curry has really high expectations for a President and its Administration. That everything he is looking for on whitehouse.gov is available and that he doesn't have to do a Google search to find it. That the legislation he signs into law really is about what he says in his speeches and not something else. Yet, all he does is b**** and moan about Obama and the Administration and doesn't do a thing about it. He asks the listeners to be aware and stand up to protest about the bills signed into law, because he is too busy with Mevio. I just don't buy into Adam's argument at all, because if Obama wasn't that transparent, then why are there the websites set up by the White House in the first place? Obama could have decided to hide info about the bills signed into law. Obama could have decided that the people of this country don't need to know about the stimulus package and how the money is being used. Yet, he didn't do that at all. It is all there for us to see.
Does anyone think Obama has a "transparency" problem? So far, I don't think so.