President Barack Obama said during the 2008 presidential campaign that two commodities which absolutely need to be restored to government are trust and transparency. Both have become in short supply over the years.

The public is far less likely to trust what public officials and agencies are doing if there is insufficient openness about what they are doing. So Obama hit the ground running in his first full day in office when he instituted new limits on lobbyists in his White House and froze salaries of highly paid aides. He understands full well the terrible state of the United States and world economy and decided there is no justification for government people making more than $100,000 a year to have raises when so many citizens are out of jobs and are having trouble paying bills.

An element of trust was injected from the outset because the new president took action to back up his promise of “a clean break from business as usual.” The pay freeze will hold salaries at their current levels for the roughly 100 White House employees who make over $100,000 a year. “Families are tightening their belts and so should Washington,” the new president said.

Then he stressed that this aspect of government along with many others, including the lobbying issue, will be “wide open” for scrutiny to negate secrecy and potential fraud.

Obama’s new lobbying rules will not only ban aides from trying to influence the administration when they leave his staff. Those already hired will be banned from working on matters they have previously lobbied for, or to approach agencies they once targeted. Activities will be on the record.

Further on the issue of transparency, Obama said he will change how the federal government interprets the Freedom of Information Act. He believes officials should find reasons to make information public rather than looking for ways to withhold it. Just because a government agency has the legal power to keep information private does not mean it should, said the president. Reporters and public interest groups often make use of the law to explore how and why government decisions are made. They often are blunted by official claims of exemptions to sunshine legislation.

“For a long time now, there’s been too much secrecy in this city,” Obama said of the Washington scene. ” … I will, I hope, do something to make government trustworthy in the eyes of the American people.”

Two other terms that come up often in the discussions about how to deal with harmful aspects of our society are confidence and cooperation. By pushing the issue of trust, the new president can help pave the way to more public confidence in America, its government and its officials. This could lead to the kind of cooperation between citizens and the government to alter for the good many conditions that now are so injurious to America and its prospects for a brighter future.

So the two T’s — trust and transparency — and two C’s — confidence and cooperation — are getting special attention from the White House. Maintained and bolstered, these policies have great potential.