OMB Watch - Administration Stifles Dialog on Social Security

[struggle4progress]

The Bush administration has denied use of public facilities to a group critical of its version of Social Security reform, while using federal resources to pay for propaganda and promotion of its agenda. It refused to allow a women's group to hold a conference on Social Security at the National Archives because they did not have a speaker supporting private accounts. The same week three people were ejected from a federal government supported town hall meeting on Social Security in Colorado because their car had an anti-war bumper sticker.

On March 31, the National Archives and Records Administration told a coalition of women's organizations that it could not hold a forum on Social Security at the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Library in Hyde Park, NY, because the coalition opposes Bush's proposal for private accounts and did not have a speaker supporting the administration's view. The library's director claimed the forum would violate the Hatch Act because it would not present both sides of the debate and "may be perceived as being partisan."

However, the Hatch Act only prohibits use of federal funds for partisan electioneering and does not address issue advocacy or debate on legislative proposals. The government agency responsible for enforcement of the Hatch Act, the Office of Special Counsel, told the Washington Post that the Hatch Act does not apply to the meeting because it "does not seem to involve a partisan campaign or activity." The National Archives moved to correct the error after the issue became public by telling the press it would re-invite the groups, but the groups were unaware of any re-invitation and had already made alternative plans. <snip>

The National Council of Women's Organizations objected to the National Archives' action, issuing a statement that said, "In keeping with the Bush administration's determination to quash anyone who disagrees with them, federal agencies now consider it 'partisan' to hold any opinion that is not identical to the president's." The statement noted that Bush was touting his plan for Social Security at the Bureau of Public Debt, a federal facility in West Virginia, without providing for any speakers opposed to the personal account proposal. <snip>

http://www.ombwatch.org/article/articleview/2797/1/3?TopicID=1