Obama Likes Bush's Policies More and More

It's not a halo it's a camera angle.

The President of the United States invites executives and other experts to the White House to hold meetings on important policy matters… the executives file into the White House and meet with the president, give their advice, then leave.  Concerned activists clamor for the records so they can know who the president met with and what they might have discussed.  The president says he won’t release the records and a firestorm ensues in the press and among members of the opposition party.  Am I speaking about Dick Cheney, George W. Bush, and the “secret” energy meetings that took place in 2002?

Dick Cheney has taken a hard line against the General Accounting Office, refusing its efforts to get information on meetings held by his energy task force. Critics suspect that Cheney is stonewalling to conceal the Administration’s links with bankrupt energy giant Enron. But Cheney may be hiding more than that. Several other energy companies had opportunities to influence the Administration’s energy policy, with both persuasion and money.

The insinuation by Time Magazine in 2002 is clear… “Big Oil” bribed Bush Co. to get energy policies that they wanted.  The allegations continued until Bush left office in 2009.  What to make of this then:

[L]ast week public-interest groups were dismayed when his own administration rejected a Freedom of Information Act request for Secret Service logs showing the identities of coal executives who had visited the White House to discuss Obama’s “clean coal” policies. One reason: the disclosure of such records might impinge on privileged “presidential communications.”

"I will condemn Bush then do the same thing but you'll still love me."

They both sound the same, don’t they?  The only difference, thus far, is that the press has not come down on Obama for not only doing the same thing Bush did but for saying he wouldn’t do the same thing as the previous administration.  In yet another great irony of the Obama administration, a memo released on January 21, 2009 (the day after Obama became president) he said:

My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government.  We will work together to ensure the public trust and establish a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration. Openness will strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness in Government.

Transparency promotes accountability and provides information for citizens about what their Government is doing.  Information maintained by the Federal Government is a national asset. My Administration will take appropriate action, consistent with law and policy, to disclose information rapidly in forms that the public can readily find and use.

So what have we learned?  For starters, Barack Obama and George W. Bush are not so different and Obama said one thing and did another relating to a core issue of his campaign.  For Conservatives who knew Obama was a blimp filled with hypocrisy and shallow rhetoric this is no surprise.  For Liberals (and, of course, the press) I’m sure there will be more excuses and no moments of parapetia.

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