Information in the open changes the way business was done in DC.

President Obama told the National Conference of State Legislatures last week that, “Decisions about how Recovery Act dollars are spent will be based on the merit…” and stressed that maximizing job creation, making health care affordable, rebuilding crumbling infrastructure, and other projects that manifest “enduring benefits” to taxpayers must take priority.

Under the recently issued guidance from the Obama administration (which some were hoping wouldn’t appear) lobbyists seeking an administration member’s time to discuss a “Recovery Act” project must submit their requests in writing so that correspondence can be posted online, just as with the topics of meetings between administration officials and lobbyists on stimulus efforts. This is not business as usual for DC lobbyists; this is a refreshing degree of openness at a time when voters are very curious about how their money is parceled out, and echoes his warnings to mayors last month that the President would “will call them out” on wasteful uses of stimulus dollars.

As history shows us, when we let Wall Street and lobbyists handle their own affairs in smoke-filled back rooms and over martinis at the country club, jobs and sustainable wealth fall by the wayside while cash flows to the wealthiest investors. Curiously enough, income disparities shrink while job creation and government revenues increase if, and when, the wealthy are taxed - it causes them to invest rather than hoard their capital.

Economic viability will come only through repudiating the unfounded faith many Republicans have exhibited in trickle-down voodoo and unregulated capitalism, paired with self-serving definitions of sound-bite terms such as educational choice. We need a return to an ethic of service, work, and strong family values such as the first family demonstrates.

We need to restore confidence - both here and abroad - that the United States is a leading force on economic and moral issues, not a duplicitous, arrogant bully guilty of not practicing what we preach. Obama’s walking the walk.

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