President Obama wants taxpayers to believe he is a fiscal leader who will make sure their money is spent efficiently and wisely, but if that were true, he wouldn’t have fired one inspector general and his administration wouldn’t be making life miserable for other government watchdogs.

I cover that subject in my latest column for the American Issues Project. Here’s a sample:

Iowa Republican Charles Grassley, a consistent Senate advocate for IGs, defended Walpin in a letter to Obama earlier this month. Grassley said Walpin “has identified millions of dollars in AmeriCorps funds either wasted outright or spent in violation of established guidelines. In other words, it appears he has been doing his job.”

But Obama apparently doesn’t want IGs to do their job on his watch. Walpin’s firing is just the most extreme example of his administration undermining the work of supposedly independent watchdogs.

Over the past few weeks, Grassley has fired off a series of IG-related letters. He wants the Treasury Department to explain its resistance to oversight of last year’s financial bailout program by special IG Neil Barofsky. Grassley also has voiced concerns about the independence of IGs at the International Trade Commission and Amtrak.

All of those developments so early in Obama’s tenure raise questions about just how free the government’s watchdogs will be to target waste, fraud, and abuse during his administration. That’s a shame because IGs provide a valuable, nonpartisan service to taxpayers.

Read the whole thing at the AIP site.