Obama Appoints Lobbyist

Bob Robbins just forwarded this Newsmax article by Jim Myers.

"President-elect Barack Obama’s selection of former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle for Secretary of Health and Human Services raises questions about Obama honoring his vow not to employ lobbyists in his administration.

Newsmax reported earlier that in November 2007, candidate Obama said of lobbyists: “I don’t take a dime of their money, and when I am president, they won’t find a job in my White House.”

But since leaving the U.S. Senate following an election loss in 2004, Daschle has been a highly paid adviser to healthcare clients at the law and lobbying firm Alston & Bird.

Although Daschle is not a registered lobbyist, he “provides strategic advice to the firm’s clients about how to influence government policy or actions,” The New York Times reports.

Those clients include Abbott Laboratories and HealthSouth.

Stephanie Cutter, a spokeswoman for the Obama transitional office, said: “If [Daschle] is asked to serve in the Obama administration, he will represent the interests of the president-elect and not his former clients.”

Footnote: The former senator’s wife, Linda Hall Daschle, is one of Washington’s top lobbyists, working mostly on behalf of airline-related companies.