A promise broken: Lobbyists remain unchecked

The Union Leader editorializes that the Obama Administration has failed to live up to its promise to drain the swamp of undue lobbyist influence.

Just a few hours after being sworn in last January, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner promised to draft rules preventing outside lobbyists from seeking the hundreds of billions of dollars in bailout money for their client banks. As of this week, those rules have not been adopted.

Thus, all this time, when we thought lobbyist influence was limited, there were no limits on lobbyists coming in and out of federal buildings, asking for their large banks and institutions to get billions in bailout money.