Lobbyists: White House sends meetings off-site to hide them

[cali]

Barack Obama leaves the White House to attend his State of the Union address. | AP Photo
The White House says there is no ulterior motive for scheduling meetings in meeting rooms. | AP Photo Close
By CHRIS FRATES | 2/24/11 4:41 AM EST

Caught between their boss’s anti-lobbyist rhetoric and the reality of governing, President Barack Obama’s aides often steer meetings with lobbyists to a complex just off the White House grounds – and several of the lobbyists involved say they believe the choice of venue is no accident.

It allows the Obama administration to keep these lobbyist meetings shielded from public view — and out of Secret Service logs collected on visitors to the White House and later released to the public.


“They’re doing it on the side. It’s better than nothing,” said immigration reform lobbyist Tamar Jacoby, who has attended meetings at the nearby Jackson Place complex and believes the undisclosed gatherings are better than none.

The White House scoffs at the notion of an ulterior motive for scheduling meetings in what are, after all, meeting rooms. But at least four lobbyists who’ve been to the conference rooms just off Lafayette Square tell POLITICO they had the distinct impression they were being shunted off to Jackson Place – and off the books – so their visits wouldn’t later be made public.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0211/50081.html#ixzz1Et9z8wAX

[Donnachaidh]

1. change we can believe in, right?

:kick:

[jberryhill]

7. There is an election coming, where should Obama conduct election-related activities?

Serious question.

Do you remember what they did to Al Gore over one alleged phone call?

[Segami]

2. Change? Nothing has changed except their tactics of misdirection.

[KittyWampus]

5. Actually, Politico's tactics are the very most predictable as is many DU'ers propensity to lap up

their crap simply because it reinforces their own predetermined cynical narrative.

[opihimoimoi]

3. This is their best?? Drama whiners revealing their pessimistic cynic shit

Fuck them Fascists

[KittyWampus]

4. Tamar Jacoby's Profile- do you really want her NOT to meet with Obama Aide's?

And why do DU'ers lap up the crap written by Politico which is ALWAYS intended to divide the Left?

Tamar Jacoby

Tamar Jacoby is a Senior Fellow at Manhattan Institute and writes extensively on immigration, citizenship, ethnicity, and race. Her 1998 book, Someone Else’s House: America’s Unfinished Struggle for Integration, tells the story of race relations in three American cities. Her newest book, Reinventing the Melting Pot: The New Immigrants and What It Means to Be American, is a collection of essays that argues that we as a nation need to find new ways to talk about and encourage assimilation. From 1987 to 1989, she was a Senior Writer and Justice Editor for Newsweek. Between 1981 and 1987, she was the Deputy Editor of The New York Times op-ed page. Before that, she was Assistant to the Editor of The New York Review of Books. In 2004, she was confirmed by the US Senate to serve on the National Council on the Humanities, the advisory board of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

[disillusioned73]

6. I don't think the issue is with her in particular..

it's the ones that go unidentified that may worry some folks.

"There are no records of meetings at the row houses just off Lafayette Square that house the White House Conference Center and the Council on Environmental Quality, home to two of the busiest meeting spaces. The White House can’t say who attended meetings there, or how often. The Secret Service doesn’t log in visitors or require a background check the way it does at the main gates of the White House."

[bvar22]

8. WooHoo...Another "PROMISE KEPT" !!!!

During the campaign, Obama promised not to have lobbyists "in the White House."
So those of you who are upset did NOT pay attention during the campaign!!!

Chalk up another WIN on the Obama "Promises Kept" list,
:patriot:

[frylock]

9. ftw

[GeorgeGist]

10. Cowardice and Stupidity.

How original.