By Emelie Rutherford
Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) outlined a government reform plan yesterday that calls for slashing government spending on contractors and requiring that congressional bill-writing sessions be held in public.
Obama pledged to “save billions of dollars by cutting private contractors and improving management of the hundreds of billions of dollars our government spends on private contracts,” and to “end the abuse of no-bid contracts for good,” during a speech in Green Bay, Wis., according to a transcript.
Obama yesterday released an 11-page “Plan to Reform the Greed and Excesses of Washington.”
“As president, I will make it impossible for congressmen or lobbyists to slip pork-barrel projects or corporate welfare into laws when no one is looking because when I am president, meetings where laws are written will be more open to the public,” Obama said.
Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), a longtime critics of congressional earmarks, also has promised to bring more openness to Washington.
During his speech, Obama pledged to “reform our special interest-driven politics.”
“When there is a bill that ends up on my desk as president, you will have five days to look online and find out what’s in it before I sign it,” he said. “When there are meetings between lobbyists and a government agency, we will put as many as possible online for every American to watch. When there is a tax bill being debated in Congress, you will know the names of the corporations that would benefit and how much money they would get. And we will put every corporate tax break and every pork-barrel project online for every American to see. You will know who asked for them and you can cast your vote accordingly.”