This sweet little piece of gossip seems well suited to an old-style longform RT: The nonprofit Project on Government Oversight group points readers to an article in the June 29, 2009 issue of the Nuclear Weapons & Materials Monitor (article not available online), which describes how journalists were asked to leave the room when Deputy Energy Secretary Dan Poneman spoke to ‘a group of lobbyists and private interests’.

“While no explanation was given at the time, according to those present, the move was apparently intended to ensure that journalists not only didn’t cover, but couldn’t even hear, a routine address on DOE’s priorities under the Obama Administration and efforts to address climate change. In what one can only hope was meant with a sense of irony, Poneman reportedly also stressed the need for improved transparency at DOE in a speech closed to the news media,” according to the article.