Obama Appoints Lobbyist as Senior Policy Adviser

Matt Lewis | August 20, 2008 9:53 AM

The Obama campaign just appointed Daniel Shapiro as a senior advisor and Jewish outreach coordinator to the campaign. Interestingly, Shapiro is also a lobbyist for the American Petroleum Institute

. This, of course, is only interesting because of the appearance of hypocrisy. Obama has touted the fact that he will not accept money from lobbyists -- because he does not want to be influenced by them as president. Clearly, though, he has not banned lobbyists from providing advice and endorsements...

Update: A reader points out that Daniel Kurtzer’s (another Obama foreign policy adviser) trip to Syria was paid for by an oil company, as well.