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$18M Contract For Transparency Website Released — But Blacked Out
zokuga writes "The US government recently approved an $18 million contract for Smartronix to build a website where taxpayers could easily track billions in federal stimulus money, as part of President Obama's promise to make government more transparent through the Internet. However, the contract, which was released only through repeated Freedom of Information Act requests, is itself heavily blacked out. ProPublica reports: 'After weeks of prodding by ProPublica and other organizations, the Government Services Agency released copies of the contract and related documents that are so heavily blacked out they are virtually worthless. In all, 25 pages of a 59-page technical proposal — the main document in the package — were redacted completely. Of the remaining pages, 14 had half or more of their content blacked out.' Sections that were heavily or entirely redacted dealt with subjects such as site navigation, user experience, and everything in the pricing table. The entire contract, in all its blacked-out glory, is here."
To add insult to injury, I wonder if it was a no bid contract?
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
What amuses me is how many sheeple in this country still Trust the government to do what is best for them and to keep them safe.
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FACT: The Government can only always be trusted to take your money and rights away from you.
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Any government form is flawed as it is composed as many flawed individuals who are not good people. From the DMV clerk with an attitude, the City council member who taking kickbacks from the country clubbers, to the senator who is taking money from PACs, all of the way to the president who is taking money from companies like G.E.
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When will people learn that you need government but you need to be vigilant and limit their powers at every turn. We need to also teach people the common ideal that when you let or expect people to take care of a certain aspect of your life you lose some of your freedom. For every sugar coated promise a politician makes there is a equal price to pay in lost control, money or freedom over our own lives.
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The Instant Gratification ME, ME, ME culture of today's society feeds directly to the politician's sweet saccharine promises of how the government is going to take care of them. There used to be a time when people used to have enough pride in themselves that if you gave someone a free meal they would see to it that they would return the favor because they felt if they didn't they would be viewed a selfish loser. We used to bear the burden of our families and help take care of our grandmas and grandpas, aunts and uncles, cousins and children. These days those responsibilities are dropped upon the government who ends up doing a sub standard job of doing so. The politicians don't mind this, in fact they love this dependency on their special programs, they gain power in political capital which ensures that they get re-elected each term. These guaranteed votes allow them to be as corrupt as they want as they no longer fear reprisal. They no longer fear reprisal because they they have large voting block dependent on them.
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Put it this way, when you were a kid and were totally dependent on your parents and your parents grounded you, did you have the power to stand up against them in any meaningful way? No you didn't.
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Same with the government, the more of your life they control and make you dependent on them, the more they can get away with.
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The Government has so much of this control that they are no longer accountable to their own actions. It doesn't surprise me that they would black out information and manipulate documents even when it comes to a promise of transparency. They are all a bunch of corrupt schmucks because we let them be that way. Maybe if we are to be a ME ME ME generation who acts like children, then we really deserve Big Brother or Father watching over until we grow and wake up. What is the German word for Father again????
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We all have inherent human rights, the government's role is not to GRANT you rights, the role of government is to RESTRICT your actions when they infringe upon other people's rights. But people these days think that the government is their parents handing out things like rights, privileges and safety.
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Maybe we deserve exactly what we got.
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...