Subject: FW: WSJ Blog- Report Calls for Eliminating White House Political Affairs Office
From: "Chris Lu" <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked], [email-masked], "Cassandra Butts" <[email-masked]>
Cc: [email-masked], [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2008 11:33:28 -0500

FYI --

 

From: Jordan Mishkin 
Sent: Wednesday, October 15, 2008 12:20 PM
Subject: WSJ Blog- Report Calls for Eliminating White House Political
Affairs Office

http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2008/10/15/report-calls-for-eliminating-wh
ite-house-political-affairs-office/ 

WSJ Blog- Report Calls for Eliminating White House Political Affairs
Office

John D. McKinnon reports on the White House.

Rep. Henry Waxman issued a strongly worded critique of the Bush
administration's use of the White House political affairs office to
coordinate campaign-related travel by cabinet officials in the runup to
the 2006 elections.

The report concludes that there's evidence previous presidents used the
office to coordinate campaign travel, but not to the extent it was used
by the White House under George W. Bush.

"The White House Office of Political Affairs has been controversial
since President Reagan created the office in 1981," the report states.
"There is evidence that other administrations, including President
Clinton's, used the office to coordinate travel for the President or
cabinet officials. But the extent of political activity by the current
White House and its deep and systematic reach into the federal agencies
is unprecedented."

The report urges Congress to get rid of the political affairs office.
"Congress should amend the Hatch Act, the federal law restricting
political activity by federal officials, to eliminate the White House
Office of Political Affairs. If the political affairs office is
retained, its activities should be restructured to ensure that it serves
the interests of the taxpayer, not the political party of the
President."

At the White House, spokesman Scott Stanzel dismissed the report as a
"transparent attempt to make political hay."

"With less than three weeks to go before Election Day, Democratic
Congressman Henry Waxman has released a draft report on political
activities in Washington in an attempt to score political points,"
Stanzel said. He went on to say that "For many, many years, throughout
Republican and Democrat administrations, there has been an Office of
Political Affairs. The office is there to assist the president in his
role as head of his party.

"For decades, administrations have briefed their political appointees on
the landscape in which they are working to implement the President's
vision and Cabinet officials have traveled to talk about the important
priorities of the administration.

"Rather than spend time focusing on Congressman Waxman's transparent
attempt to make political hay with his draft press report, we'll
continue to center our attention on more important matters like
stabilizing the economy, keeping America safe and working with state and
local officials in California to respond to the raging wildfires."

Rep. Tom Davis, the top Republican on the House Oversight and Government
Reform Committee, said in a statement that he was "deeply skeptical
about the methodology and seriousness" of Waxman's report.