In response to the question, “What are the moral lessons of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA)?”

Does the ARRA mark the dawn of a new era of government accountability, from a government “of the people, by the people, for the people”?

President Obama seems to think so. He says as much in a video statement tied to the launch of Recovery.gov, “a website that lets you, the taxpayer, figure out where the money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is going.”

The site claims that “the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act will be carried out with full transparency and accountability — and Recovery.gov is the centerpiece of that effort.”

In his brief statement, President Obama says, “The size and scale of this plan demand unprecedented efforts to root out waste, inefficiency, and unnecessary spending.”

Your Money at Work from White House on Vimeo.

Call me cynical, but somehow I doubt that a package that was rushed through without time for reflection and public examination is going to ex post facto become accountable to the people.

Let’s just say that if the “transparency” of the way the TARP funds have been distributed and used is any model for what’s going to happen with ARRA, we’ll be a long way from a new era of government accountability. Recovery.gov looks a lot more like window dressing, or better yet an arranging of the deck chairs on the Titanic after the ship has already sailed.