President Obama: “Let me say it as simply as I can: Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of my presidency”
President Barack Obama in a statement to the press on his first hours on the job said, “Let me say it as simply as I can: Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of my presidency.” Now that is good news.
Peter Scheer, executive director of the California First Amendment Coalition (CFAC), flashed the word about Obama’s new press policy in a special communique.
Scheer reported, “Obama apparently has signed executive orders whose effect, among
other things, is to reverse the so-called “Ashcroft Memorandum,”
which (in)famously authorized executive branch agencies, when
responding to FOIA requests, to use their discretion under the law to
err on the side of withholding government information rather than
disclosing.