National Labor Relations Board: White House muzzled us in budget debate

[Bluebear]

by Gaius Publius

The NLRB is the National Labor Relations Board. As in, Labor.

To the extent you think that Obama's a Democrat, you would call that his base. And if you're a fan of political non-interference in "independent agencies," in the story below the non-political move for the White House would be not to intervene.

Instead, something else happened. Ryan Grim at the Huffington Post has the sorry tale (my emphasis):

When House Republicans targeted the budget of the National Labor Relations Board last month, the agency shot back, warning that such cuts would force it to largely cease operations for an extended period of time, creating a backlog of thousands of cases.

It was one of the few counterattacks from the Obama administration, which was otherwise busy proposing its own cuts and endorsing the Republican call for slashing spending -- and it didn't last long. The White House demanded that the NLRB scrub the statement defending the agency from its website, an NLRB spokesperson told The Huffington Post. ... The Office of Management and Budget, an arm of the White House, reached out to the NLRB and told the agency to back off and take down the statement, according to the NLRB spokesperson.

http://www.americablog.com/2011/03/nlrb-white-house-muzzled-us-in-budget.html

[JDPriestly]

1. So much for Obama's support for America's working people.

He was hired by Wall Street to do a job, and he is doing that job.

[Poboy]

2. Recommend

[Wilms]

3. .

[Tatiana]

4. I sense Bill Daley's heavy-handed message discipline here.

I honestly did not imagine when I first began working on Obama's Senate campaign that he would turn out to be this type of President.

I'm becoming more used to the idea now, but damn... what a wasted opportunity.

[Bluebear]

8. It's sad.

[Starry Messenger]

5. .

[SidDithers]

6. .

Sid

[blindpig]

7. We, the people, are on our own.

We should start acting like we know that.

[bobbolink]

9. what a surprise