In a shocking story from the White House, it appears that President Obama has been hiding a secret so scandalous that it is only now, over two years into his presidency, that it has finally come to light—Obama is, in fact, highly transparent and accountable.
The administration has gone to such obsessive lengths to conceal this burning fact that they even made the award ceremony for this honor “closed” and “undisclosed.”[1] Journalists who were invited to attend the proceedings were also sworn to secrecy. Unfortunately for the president’s reputation, they were so awed by his openness that they became determined to proclaim his real nature for all America to see. One of the reporters at the ceremony expressed the general sentiment thus:
He was so on point, so on target in the conversation with us, it [was] baffling why he would not want that message to be more broadly heard by reporters and the public interest community and the public generally.[2]
Another journalist, apparently still wounded by how long it took for the truth to finally come out, had a somewhat more tempered view:
I don’t feel moved today to say “thank you, Mr. President.”[3]
He added that, considering the administration’s reluctance to admit its own candor, the award could perhaps be best understood as “aspirational.”[4]
-James Clark ’14