Long an easy political target of politicians seeking to earn the trust
of the American people, lobbyists also took a verbal beating during
President-elect Obama's campaign for the White House. But the future
president, who recently professed his desires to limit the influence of
lobbyists and chastised his competitor John McCain for having former
lobbyists as part of his campaign staff, announced a much softer policy
towards them this week.
President-elect
Obama will now allow lobbyists to work for
him so long as they sign an ethics code that restricts their advocacy
efforts and cease to work in any field that they lobbied on in
the last year. The pledge also entails an agreement not to lobby the
Obama
administration for a period of one year in the future, but only on the
same matters they worked on as part of his transition team or cabinet.
In essence, the revolving door is being slowed, but far from stymied.
The new policy gives Obama's staff the power to hire any of the
22,000
federally registered lobbyists, despite the President-elect's harsh
words against them on the campaign trail. Any lobbyists hired would
likely become part of Obama's 450-person transition team sent out to
review the polices, practices, and states of over 100 federal agencies.
In this capacity, the expertise of various lobbyists - many of which
include former government employees - could be valuable. In theory, many lobbyists, such as those trying to improve
a broken immigration system or enact stronger environmental guidelines,
bring incredible expertise in subjects that potentially benefit all
Americans.
The
only problem with this logic is, the Obama administration has ruled out
the possibility that a lobbyist can work for his transition team in the
same field in which they lobbied in the past year. So an environmental
lobbyist could not consult for Obama on environmental issues. As such,
their value becomes questionable, along with the overall policy.
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