Feed.TheHungryHead.com

Before
Barack Obama was President-elect — from the very beginning of his
campaign — he pledged to change the way Washington works. That meant
not accepting any financial contributions from lobbyists or political
action committees.

Voters often said this was one of the major reasons they supported
Barack, and they’ve been writing to the Transition to tell us how
important they think it is that this commitment continues.

Lexington from San Diego, CA, wrote:

“When I first learned of Barack Obama, I was encouraged by
his thoughts [on] ending the power of lobbyists and the negative effect
of the revolving door on the White House. I’d like to see an agenda
that focuses on promoting transparency and getting people into
government who sincerely want to serve the interests of the nation over
their own careers.”

John from Seattle, WA wrote, “I am so tired of special interests
getting the best of us all. I support you and hope that you will allow
the common guy to have a say in how we are to be governed from now on.”

Now Barack has taken the first step, with new rules
that restrict how lobbyists can participate in the transition — just
as he restricted how they could participate in the campaign.

The new policy, which ethics experts have praised as a bold step
forward, was only announced yesterday — but already people have
written in to show their support.

Sarah from Brockport, NY, wrote, “Today I read about the tough new
rules for lobbyists and it just further solidified the faith I have in
this administration to bring about a real change….I am feeling real
patriotic and in tune with my government for the first time in my 46
years.”

Carmen from Olympia, WA wrote simply: “Thank you for the transition ethics. Thank you.”

Source

————RULES———————

During a briefing today at the Presidential Transition Team
headquarters, Obama Transition Co-Chair John Podesta announced the
strictest, and most far reaching ethics rules of any transition team in
history. The rules are:

• Federal Lobbyists cannot contribute financially to the transition.
• Federal lobbyists are prohibited from any lobbying during their work with the transition.
• If someone has lobbied in the last 12 months, they are prohibited from working in the fields of policy on which they lobbied.
• If someone becomes a lobbyist after working on the
  Transition, they are prohibited from lobbying the Administration for 12
  months on matters on which they worked.
• A gift ban that is aggressive in reducing the influence of special interests.

Source