Saturday, July 05, 2003

Anniversary of Freedom of Information Act. (This should have been included in a previous post I made) Anniversary of Freedom of Information Act. "George Washington University's National Security Archive, the leading non-profit user of the U.S. Freedom of Information Act, today released its annual Freedom of Information Act birthday posting, 37 years to the day after President Johnson grudgingly signed the U.S. FOIA into law on July 4, 1966. The Archive reported that documents released under federal, state and local freedom of information acts sparked more than 6,000 news stories in 2002 and the first half of 2003 (according to the Archive's searches of on-line databases), including revelations of major public interest such as the use of electronic highway toll data in criminal, administrative and civil probes, the failure of government agencies to prosecute water pollution violations, the misuse of federal student aid, defective military airplanes, and the loss of explosives, mines, mortars and firearms from U.S. stockpiles. The report features an itemized list of 20 significant news stories from the last 18 months that cited documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act." [via beSpacific] 9:46:18 AM    comment [] Government Information Awareness   Information and the US Government: My subversive little self really loves this! [via LISNews.com] In other government information news, I heard Peter Kornbluh speaking on Alternative Radio (via my local public radio station KOPB) the other day. His topic was his forthcoming book, The Pinochet File and how the National Security Archive had finally been able to get a number of documents released (censored, of course) regarding the US Government's involvement in the overthrow of then elected President Allende and subsequent support of General Pinochet (not that I was overly surprised to learn about this). What I found so fascinating is that then President Nixon and Henry Kissinger recorded almost every word they ever spoke and had to know that eventually, some of that material would be released to the public. It was amazing to hear Kornbluh quote Kissinger from his memoirs and then quote directly from transcribed phone calls and hear the outright lies that Kissinger wrote in his memoirs. I'm not sure why but I've been interested in Latin American politics for a number of years and nothing I learn about our government's involvement down there surprises me. Still, I can only take it in small doses and I tend to focus on Guatemala more than other Latin American countries. Despite that, I might just have to pick up a copy of this one.   9:04:18 AM    comment []

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