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THE "SAVE OBAMA'S BLACKERRY CAMPAIGN!" ACHIEVES ANOTHER CONVERT.
John Podesta takes to The LA Times to defend Obama's Blackberry:
An off-line Obama isn't just bad for Barack. It's bad for all of us.
The president's ability to reach outside his inner circle gives him access to fresh ideas and constructive critics; it underscores the difference between political "victories" and actual solutions; and it brings the American people into a battle we can only win by working together.
And beyond the Blackberry's obvious utility for soliciting feedback and criticism and ideas, connectivity is simply a feature of modern life. And retaining some connection to modern life is the sort of thing we tend to demand in our presidents. If Obama's Blackberry was outfitted with a special program that delivered the daily prices of a gallon of gasoline, a quart of milk, and a dozen eggs, could he keep it then?
But Podesta's op-ed suffers because it's not clear on the culprit. There's not some nefarious and shadowy "them" trying to grasp Obama's Blackberry. Rather, there's a nefarious and shadowy "it." More specifically, the Presidential Records Act of 1978, which was written 24 years before the Blackberry was brought to market. If Obama is to keep his Blackberry, Congress needs to reconsider the act. The speed and agility of the White House is too important to be hamstrung by a post-Watergate law that never considered the importance of cell phones, text messaging, IMs, or even e-mail.
COMMENTS (8)
Re the govt IM'ing and text messaging: be careful what you ask for.
1. Obama I trust. W and his cronies I didn't.
2. It's not exactly unheard of for people to violate laws by using text messaging instead of e-mail for their illegal activities.
Posted by: ostap | January 21, 2009 8:49 AM
I think you have to say a little more than just "reconsider the act." How? Are we really comfortable with the president having volumes of email correspondence that will be lost to history? If not, how can Obama's people get comfortable with the exposure such informal records entail? It's an actual dilemma.
Posted by: southpaw | January 21, 2009 9:35 AM
I think part of the problem is that blackberries are horribly insecure and are hacked easily. I've seen youtube videos where it's done in about 5 minutes remotely. Perhaps they're still trying to fix that for POTUS?
Posted by: Tokay | January 21, 2009 10:48 AM
But... will he Twitter?
Inquiring minds want to know.
Posted by: ShortWoman | January 21, 2009 12:32 PM
So if Obama is using his Blackberry to exchange emails with someone who is sitting at her desktop computer in the West Wing, the emails he writes, including the appearance of those emails in replies sent to him from her computer, should somehow be treated differently from the emails she writes? What could possibly be the basis of this distinction?
Posted by: matt m | January 21, 2009 12:44 PM
The technology exists to provide law enforcement everything that is sent from or received by your Blackberry; it should be a simple thing to deliver all of Obama's Blackberry traffic into a secure data archive to meet the requirements of the Presidential Records Act of 1978.
Posted by: Arun | January 21, 2009 3:03 PM
Tokay, really? Have you REALLY seen youtube videos? Or did you make that up?
Posted by: Tokay | January 21, 2009 3:04 PM
Ezra: I think you're being a bit elliptical here. All the articles I've read on the issue point to potential embarrassment and general lawyer paranoia being the main issue. Why not just suck it up and hoover up everything in sight?
What do you want done? Both this post and your previous one on the issue are maddeningly silent where the PRA should go from here.
As a citizen, I prefer more oversight and more recordkeeping, as expensive as that may be. If we're mature enough to have a President carry a Blackberry, we're mature enough not to snigger too loud when we read about sexy IMs between colleagues 15 years from now or whenever.
Posted by: Klug | January 21, 2009 3:55 PM