Obama's Whitehouse.gov launches, with problems
Caption: The most prominent feature of President Obama's new Whitehouse.gov site: a promise that change has come to America, and an oversize photo of Obama. On left, the outgoing Bush administration's site as of Tuesday morning.
As President-elect Barack Obama began his inaugural address at noon on Tuesday, his aides were busy switching over Whitehouse.gov.
Until 11:59 am EST, the Web site featured a photograph of former president George W. Bush leaving the White House for the last time. The relaunched site's most prominent feature is an oversize photo of the new president next to the slogan: "Change has come to America."
Because the presidential Web site launched under Bill Clinton's tenure, this is only the second time that Whitehouse.gov has changed hands. The Clinton-Bush handover was not without problems: The site on January 20, 2001, briefly sported the line "Insert Something Meaningful Here," and suffered from some broken links and 404 errors.
Obama's new site, too, has its bugs. The site administrators posted an entry saying Obama "was sworn in" before that happened; another post titled "Read the Inaugural Address" was blank an hour after Obama finished giving it; some photo captions were incorrect; and the search option didn't work reliably.
If you're interested in reading the inaugural address, our CBSNews.com sister site has posted the full text.
The White House also now has what it calls a blog, something that Bush didn't have, except for occasional features like his "Trip Notes" during an overseas visit. Macon Phillips, the White House's director of new media and one of the blog contributors, said in a post that "Whitehouse.gov is just the beginning of the new administration's efforts to expand and deepen this online engagement" in making this the most "open and transparent" administration in history. Phillips also asks for comments from the public through a Web form.
At least in its initial incarnation, the White House blog seems to be more a collection of press releases (a proclamation of a day of reconciliation) and Obama statements (remarks at a speech on Monday, and Tuesday's inaugural address). There is no opportunity to comment, the person posting the item is not automatically identified, and it doesn't include "trackbacks," meaning ways to identify who else is talking about the entry.
On technology policy, the new administration promises to support Net neutrality, encourage the development of Internet-filtering technologies for parents "while preserving the First Amendment," and "strengthen privacy protections for the Digital Age." In an echo of Obama's campaign Web site, it says intellectual-property owners should be "fairly treated," while copyright and patent laws should be updated.
The White House lists names of appointees for Cabinet positions, including well-known ones like Hillary Clinton for secretary of state and lesser-known ones like Robert Nabors for deputy budget director. But it missed the opportunity to post photos and even brief biographies of each of the nominees.
It does feature a reasonably flattering official biography of the outgoing President Bush, saying he worked "to create an ownership society and build a future of security, prosperity, and opportunity for all Americans. He signed into law tax relief that helped workers keep more of their hard-earned money" and took steps "to protect our homeland and create a world free from terror."
Elsewhere, though, another Web page lambastes Bush's "unconscionable ineptitude" in responding to Hurricane Katrina and promises that such a "catastrophic failure" will never happen again.
Declan McCullagh, CNET News' chief political correspondent, chronicles the intersection of politics and technology. He has covered politics, technology, and Washington, D.C., for more than a decade, which has turned him into an iconoclast and a skeptic of anyone who says, "We oughta have a new federal law against this." E-mail Declan. 
Change? Yeah now you can have left wing propaganda fed directly into your inbox from the source itself.
Be part of the problem or part of the solution. I would like to think that one facet of change is that lazy partisan griping that does nothing to move anyone forward - me OR you - is no longer acceptable.
Sythara: I hear Osama Bin Laden is looking for haters like yourself. Why don't you move to Pakistan where you'd feel more at home.
- by granyjoe2 February 4, 2009 5:13 PM PST
- Mr. Obama
- Like this Reply to this comment
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(12 Comments)Dear sir,
It has come to my attention that you only are giving the working folk a tax break of $500 for single person and $1000 for married couples. What the heck about us people who are on a fixed income like disability? I was rearended in the cab I was driving in 1983 and since then I had to endure 8 yes count them 8 back surgeries. I got the $300 stimulus check President Bush granted me but it had to pay my electrical bill or my grandson who was a year old at the time would have been in the cold. You said you would help us "little" people but reading your "stimulus package" you left us out. I know our economy is failing...shoot what money I do get is gone after rent, electric, water and some......SOME food put in here. I have to rely on food stamps to help....cause it is only a suppliment....yeah it isn't enought for a rat to survive on. I'm 55 when are you going to take care of us like the government takes care of nations that need food? We have starving people in the US and it isn't right.
I'm tired of people saying oh I'm gonna do this and that for you and when they get elected on the "false" promises we never see the help. Bitter you betcha sir. I am an AMERICAN, I LOVE MY COUNTRY, and I am tired of being treated like I am a small dust particle that means nothing. I worked for the government when I was younger and I worked with pre-school children to try to help them make it later in life. Now we have no hope, no hope we are going to be treated the same as before, frowned upon because we are disabled and thrown to the wayside as always.
Step up to the plate Sir and show the TRUE AMERICANS that you meant every word of your campaign talk. I'm tired of being pushed aside for Major Oil Companies and RICH people to get the tax breaks. Put them where they belong, us AMERICANS who fight for our country, who have built it from ground up, who do "grunt" work and no one cares about us.
I did not vote for you or McCain because I believe neither one of you cares, really cares about the people at the bottom. I see friends lose homes, their lives and struggle to survive. What's next, is our air we breathe going to be taxed??? It's up to you because I have lost all faith in the government.
PROVE ME WRONG!!
A TRUE AMERICAN
JoAnn Klinedinst
BALTIMORE< MD 21222