Journal pudge's Journal: Obama, Democrats, Ron Sims, and Transparency 1
President Obama's pick for Deputy HUD Secretary is Ron Sims, the now-former executive of King County in Washington. Sims is famous, or infamous, for many things around here, but most notable perhaps is his stonewalling -- for years -- of a public records request by Armen Yousoufian, which after more than a decade will in hundreds of thousands (maybe millions) of dollars in fines (the Supreme Court has ruled the original $124,000 fine was way too small, but we don't know yet how large it will be).
Today it was announced that his former administration is settling for almost a quarter million dollars in a separate public records lawsuit, with Stefan Sharkansky, the guy who runs Sound Politics.
Yesterday, Ron Sims had his nomination hearing. He was not asked a single question. The man who has shown complete disgregard for transparency -- costing the people not only adequate information to base their decisions on, but also lots of money -- was not actually questioned in his nomination hearing.
Obama said as the first words of his first executive order, "My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government."
Change you can believe in.
Cross-posted on <pudge/*>.
Yeah (Score:3, Insightful)
Kinda like, this, which ties in to your previous post as well:
Sunlight Before Signing: Too often bills are rushed through Congress and to the president before the public has the opportunity to review them. As president, Obama will not sign any non-emergency bill without giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days.
Source [barackobama.com]
At least he waited, what like almost a whole month to break that one.