CHESSNOID

I just heard about this and quite frankly I would love to hear the negotiations that will affect every American one way or another on the final negotiations on the health care bill.  It is our tax money that is being spent so it should be within our rights to see how our politicians waste it.  Just like they wasted our tax money on wall street during the bail outs.

This is actually a chance to redeem himself on the many other broken promises.  This will not cost money and his empty promises so far on transparency has been a load of crap.  President Obama’s words of  “Change we can believe in” have so far been in a word: unbelievable.

Real Clear Politics:

Brian Lamb has put President Obama on the spot. Lamb is the CEO of C-Span, and today he wrote a letter to the leaders of Congress asking them to allow cameras in the room for the final negotiations on the health care bill. Lamb wrote:

President Obama, Senate and House leaders, many of your rank-and-file members, and the nation’s editorial pages have all talked about the value of transparent discussions on reforming the nation’s health care system. Now that the process moves to the critical stage of reconciliation between Chambers, we respectfully request that you allow the public full access, through television, to legislation that will affect the lives of every single American.

Indeed, this was one of Obama’s signature promises on the campaign trail:

Obama C-Span Promises

It’s hard to get more explicit than that.

But that was then. Today, when asked for the 3rd time whether President Obama believes that the “standard” he set during the campaign for transparency on health care negotiations is being met by the current process (which now appears to include bypassing the formal conference process), White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs gave a flaccid but telling response.

“I do not believe the American people have lacked for information on what’s in these bills – the political and policy arguments around different people’s positions – I think that’s been well documented,” Gibbs said.

With all due respect, the reporter did not ask Gibbs for his appraisal of what he thinks the public does and does not know about the health care bills. Rather, the question is very simple: will President Obama honor his campaign pledge and demand that the final health care negotiations are televised on C-Span? Judging from Gibbs’ response, the answer is an obvious “no.”