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Transparancy and Government
Topic Started: Mar 16 2010, 12:13 PM (51 Views)
Luke's Dad
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Emperor Pengin
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/TransparencyandOpenGovernment/

Quote:
 
My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government (Excuse any typos, the open and transparent Whitehouse Website won't allow copy & paste). We will work together to ensure the public trust and ....]
.


http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9EFRPJG0&show_article=1

Quote:
 
One year into its promise of greater government transparency, the Obama administration is more often citing exceptions to the nation's open records law to withhold federal records even as the number of requests for information decline, according to a review by The Associated Press of agency audits about the Freedom of Information Act.
The problem with having an open mind is that people keep trying to put things in it.
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George K
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Finally
Bush: Most Secretive EVAH!

http://www.antiwar.com/ips/fisher.php?articleid=13464
Quote:
 
The so-called "state secrets privilege" – invoked only six times between 1953 and 1976 – has been used by the Bush administration a reported 45 times, an average of 6.4 times per year in seven years. This is more than double the average (2.46) in the previous 24 years.

The "state secrets privilege" is a legal doctrine that contends that admission of certain information into court proceedings would endanger U.S. national security. The Bush administration has frequently invoked the privilege to dismiss lawsuits that would be embarrassing to the government, and the courts have generally been deferential to the government's claims.

National Security Letter (NSL) requests continued to rise; the 2007 numbers are still classified, but the recently unclassified new number for 2006 shows a 4.7 percent increase in requests over 2005. Since enactment of the USA PATRIOT Act in 2001, the number of NSLs issued has seen an astronomical increase.


at least he was until now..

http://rawstory.com/2010/03/obama-agencies-invoking-secrecy-provision-bush/
Quote:
 
One day after being sworn into office, President Barack Obama instructed federal agencies to ensure government transparency by complying with the spirit of the Freedom of Information Act law.

"All agencies should adopt a presumption in favor of disclosure, in order to renew their commitment to the principles embodied in FOIA, and to usher in a new era of open Government," Obama wrote in a memo to federal agencies Jan. 21, 2009. "The presumption of disclosure should be applied to all decisions involving FOIA."

"The presumption of disclosure also means that agencies should take affirmative steps to make information public," the newly-installed president continued. "They should not wait for specific requests from the public. All agencies should use modern technology to inform citizens about what is known and down by their Government. Disclosure should be timely."

One year later, Obama's requests for transparency have apparently gone unheeded. In fact a provision in the Freedom of Information Act law that allows the government to hide records that detail its internal decision-making has been invoked by Obama agencies more often in the past year than during the final year of President George W. Bush.

Major agencies cited that exemption to refuse records at least 70,779 times during the 2009 budget year, compared with 47,395 times during President George W. Bush's final full budget year, according to annual FOIA reports filed by federal agencies.

An Associated Press review of Freedom of Information Act reports filed by 17 major agencies found that the use of nearly every one of the law's nine exemptions to withhold information from the public rose in fiscal year 2009, which ended last October.

The AP review comes on the heels of another bit of government transparency news: that the Obama Administration has threatened to veto a congressional intelligence bill because it objects to efforts to increase intelligence oversight.

Among other things, the proposed legislation would subject intelligence agencies to General Accountability Office review. US intelligence agencies are currently immune from review by the Congressional auditing office.

...

All told, the 17 agencies reviewed by AP reported getting 444,924 FOIA requests in fiscal 2009, compared with 493,610 in fiscal 2008.

That pushes the denial rate for the current administration to almost 16% as opposed to the evil Boooosh's rate of 9.6&

I'm sure that Rachel Maddow, Keith Olbermann, Chris ("Tingles") Matthews will be all over this story.
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