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June 10, 2009

Obama's 'transparency' not so transparent

Topics: Political News and commentaries

The Obama administration's web efforts are not tracking government spending. In fact, the government is spending so much cash that it has proven too much to monitor.

President Obama's announcement Monday that stimulus spending will be accelerated to create or save 600,000 jobs should be met with skepticism. Not only has unemployment continued to rise since the stimulus was passed in March, but there is no reliable measure to track how stimulus funds are spent and what effect that spending has. White House promises to let the sun shine on how that money is used haven't materialized.

It is simply not the case that taxpayers are "able to go online and see where and how we're spending every dime" of the $787 stimulus package, as Mr. Obama pledged in February. On the administration's self-heralded Recovery.gov Web site, there are some general details about program funding, but it is little more than spin with news releases buttressed by timelines and spreadsheets that the average person would be unlikely to decipher easily.

In a clear acknowledgment of the problem, the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board recently confirmed that the General Services Administration will soon announce a contract to redesign the site.

There is already a better, if not perfect, private-sector model. Seattle-based Onvia launched Recovery.org in March with the intent of tracking in real time every federal, state and local dollar spent. But even this more efficient effort is limited in what it can accomplish. The avalanche of cash the government is spending has proven too much to monitor.

Read it all.

Posted by Abdul at June 10, 2009 9:04 AM

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