President Barack Obama frequently has vowed to make ethics in government a top priority. On January 21, his first full day in office, he announced, "Let me say it as clearly as I can: Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency." He had timed his words to coincide with separate executive orders that froze the pay of White House officials whose salaries exceeded $100,000, imposed gift bans on political appointees, and restricted lobbyists' access to government jobs. Yet this "new era of openness," as the president termed it, apparently hasn't extended to oversight of supportive organizations - like labor unions.
Readers of Union Corruption Update may have noticed something recently: a shortage of references to criminal investigations by the Labor Department's Office of Labor-Management Standards (OLMS). That's not a figment of the imagination. The main source of these references - 
Like any cabinet-level agency, the U.S. Department of Labor under the Obama administration has its share of political cronies. And the department has given more than a few indications that it intends to remake DOL into a vehicle for union advocacy. The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation (NRTW) for the past year has sought the full story. It's one of the less publicized aspects of the apparent lack of accountability in the current administration. This past December, attorneys for the Springfield, Va.-based foundation 
"We spent a fortune to elect Barack Obama - $60.7 million to be exact - and we're proud of it," Service Employees International Union (SEIU) President 
The Department of Labor (DOL) is one of the prime venues for President Obama's attempt to unite governance and community activism. But he's having an unexpectedly tough time conveying his enthusiasm to the Senate. Nearly four months ago, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee held a hearing on the confirmation of M. Patricia "Trisha" Smith to become the DOL's next solicitor general, which is the third highest post in the department behind secretary and deputy secretary. Yet the appointment remains up in the air. That's because Republicans on the committee are concerned Smith may replicate a program she recently initiated as current labor commissioner for the State of New York. 
It's no secret that many union-sponsored pension plans lack the assets needed to cover liabilities. And a major reason for this lies with the gullibility, and on due occasion dishonesty, of their fiduciaries. Major case in point: the theft of tens of millions of dollars from six union pension plans entrusted to Chicago-based equity fund manager 
of General Motors and Chrysler this week has to qualify as one of the most radical moves in the history of American industry. Not only would the Obama administration effectively place these companies under Treasury Department receivership, it would give the United Auto Workers (UAW) a huge financial stake in their operations. Indeed, that would seem to be the point: The administration and organized labor embody the Democratic Party Left. What strengthens one strengthens the other.
If transparency is one of the Obama administration's highest orders of business, it hasn't made much of an appearance at the Department of Labor (DOL). On January 20, immediately following the inauguration ceremony, President Obama's chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, issued a memorandum advising federal agencies to extend by 60 days the effective date of all regulations not yet published in the Federal Register. That gave the DOL under Secretary Hilda Solis exactly the wiggle room it needed to rescind new requirements to the annual financial reporting form for larger unions, LM-2, finalized during the waning days of the Bush administration.
