President Barack Obama may have offered that line in an effort to hold onto his beloved BlackBerry (apparently his pleadings were worth millions of dollars in product placement for the company and he will be allowed to keep it), but the question he wants asked of himself is a question he also seemed to pose to the country this week: “What are you doing?”
From the day of service on Monday to his inauguration speech Tuesday to the swift actions he took in his first few days of office, the theme of individual and shared responsibility echoed everywhere.
Here’s a quick recap of the steps taken and changes made by the new administration this week since Tuesday:
- Tuesday night: New administration halts all military tribunals for 120 days. The request issued together with the Defense Department will allow time for review of U.S. process on these hearings. The halt effects 21 pending trials.
- Wednesday: Obama issues two executive orders and three presidential memorandums. The gist of these included a pay freeze for White House employees making more than $100,000 (minding the economy here), allowances for more and easier access to presidential records and government information (the big deal here is repeal of restrictions placed during the Bush administration on the Freedom of Information Act, which was signed in 1966 to allow the public access to government documents by request), and tighter rules on lobbying—officials in his administration can lobby old colleagues for the entire length of his presidency and former lobbyists working for him can’t lobby agencies they lobbied in the last two years.
- Thursday: Obama signs executive orders toshut down Guantanamo Bay prison camp in one year and also close secret prisons and camps, which were set up by the CIA in 2002. The exact number of secret prison camps is not known.
The big picture
After years of dismay by the public and press about how tight lipped the government became post 9/11, Obama moved quickly in his first week to restore some of the basics set forth by the Constitution—that the U.S. is an open democracy that doesn’t hide behind a veil of secrecy—pleasing historians and the press in particular. Of course there’s a long road ahead of him with so many challenges but Obama certainly seemed to take responsibility for some of his campaign promises—demonstrating individual responsibility. And now the question is, what are you doing?
