Lobbyists have complained regularly to National Journal over the past year about Barack Obama's anti-lobbyist rhetoric on the campaign trail. So I was interested to see The Washington Post editorial this weekend calling out the President-elect for some hypocrisy when it comes to transition rules regarding this group. The paper also criticized a rule that prohibits lobbyists from offering advice to the transition team in fields in which they have been registered to lobby or have been lobbying in the past year.
"It seems silly to prohibit lobbyists from giving advice in the very fields of their expertise," the Nov. 23 editorial said. "Well-qualified advisers will no doubt be excluded as a result. And it seems similarly odd to single out lobbyists for special prohibitions, when say, union leaders are free under the rules to give advice on the Labor Department transition or pharmaceutical company executives are permitted to participate in the health-care review."
So hey, K Street, The Washington Post is on your side.
-- Bara Vaida
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