Posted on 03/17/2015 9:46:43 PM PDT by Syncro
President Barack Obama says he's running the most transparent administration in history, but transparency advocates aren't applauding.
By
March 17, 2015 | 6:56 p.m. EDT
The Obama administration announced Tuesday it will ditch regulations that subjected large portions of White House correspondence to public records requests, a decision derided by transparency advocates who wryly noted it was issued during a week celebrating open access to government.
The notice exempting the White House's Office of Administration from the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act was contained in Tuesday's Federal Register, reversing a three-decade-old policy during Sunshine Week, the annual celebration of the FOIA law.
Anne Weismann, interim executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), says the step "makes mockery of the administration’s commitment to transparency, especially given that it's Sunshine Week.”
“The White House has reversed a decades long practice of opening the files of [the Office of Administration] to the public,” she says. “Apparently they have abandoned even the appearance of transparency."
[READ: Obama Won't Disclose Spy Agency Budgets]
USA Today reports the change formalizes a 2009 appeals court ruling that found CREW did not deserve access to millions of Bush White House emails because the office is not subject to FOIA.
The appeals court ruled the White House still has to preserve emails under a different law, the Presidential Records Act, for release at least five years after the end of a presidential administration.
"This rule is published solely to align relevant provisions of the Code of Federal Regulations with well-settled law," the administration's public notice says, and therefore it does not require public comment or a 30-day delay in implementation.
Tom Fitton, president of the conservative transparency group Judicial Watch, tells U.S. News he doubts the move is merely long-overdue housekeeping.
[WATCHDOGS: Obama Administration Became Less Transparent Before Election]
“I have no doubt this move is to try to cut off any public inquiry into Barack Obama’s emails,” Fitton says. “We won’t be put off and are taking steps to find out what the White House wants to hide about the president’s emails.”
The White House has won other battles against transparency activists, such as a 2013 appeals court ruling against Judicial Watch that found the White House is not required to release its visitor logs. The White House began voluntarily releasing some visitor logs dated from Sept. 15, 2009, after a district court ruled in favor of a lawsuit from CREW that sought mandatory disclosure.
"I continue to be mystified as to how this administration, which came to office on the promise of positive change and transparency, continues to promulgate policies that are antithetical to that aim," says Jack Abramoff, a former Republican lobbyist who emerged from prison a transparency advocate. "Unless there are real national security issues involved, how can President Obama permit this?"
The current black one has no plans on ever leaving.
Well, he’s pretty transparent about that.
Decree of the Reich President for the Protection of the People and the State (Reichstag Fire Decree), February 28, 1933
(Translated from Reichsgesetzblatt I, 1933, p. 83.)
In virtue of Article 48(2) of the German Constitution, the following is decreed as a defensive measure against communist acts of violence endangering the state:
Article 1
Sections 114, 115, 117, 118, 123, 124, and 153 of the Constitution of the German Reich are suspended until further notice. Therefore, restrictions on personal liberty, on the right of free expression of opinion, including freedom of the press, on the right of assembly and the right of association, and violations of the privacy of postal, telegraphic, and telephonic communications, warrants for house searches, orders for confiscations, as well as restrictions on property, are also permissible beyond the legal limits otherwise prescribed.
Article 2
If in a state the measures necessary for the restoration of public security and order are not taken, the Reich Government may temporarily take over the powers of the highest state authority.
Article 3
According to orders decreed on the basis of Article 2 by the Reich Government, the authorities of states and provinces, if concerned, have to abide thereby.
Article 4
Whoever provokes, or appeals for, or incites the disobedience of the orders given out by the supreme state authorities or the authorities subject to them for execution of this decree, or orders given by the Reich Government according to Article 2, is punishable-insofar as the deed is not covered by other decrees with more severe punishments-with imprisonment of not less than one month, or with a fine from 150 up to 15,000 reichsmarks.
Whoever endangers human life by violating Article 1 is to be punished by sentence to a penitentiary, under mitigating circumstances, with imprisonment of not less than six months and, when violation causes the death of a person, with death, under mitigating circumstances, with a penitentiary sentence of not less than two years. In addition the sentence may include confiscation of property.
Whoever provokes or incites an act contrary to public welfare is to be punished with a penitentiary sentence, under mitigating circumstances, with imprisonment of not less than three months.
Article 5
The crimes which under the Criminal Code are punishable with penitentiary for life are to be punished with death: i.e., in Paragraphs 81 (high treason), 229 (poisoning), 306 (arson), 311 (properties), and 324 (general poisoning).
Insofar as a more severe punishment has not been previously provided for, the following are punishable with death, life imprisonment, or imprisonment not to exceed 15 years:
1. Anyone who undertakes to kill the Reich President or a member or a commissioner of the Reich Government or of a state government, or provokes such a killing, or agrees to commit it, or accepts such an offer, or conspires with another for such a murder;
2. Anyone who under Paragraph 115(2) of the Criminal Code (serious rioting) or under Paragraph 125(2) of the Criminal Code (serious disturbance of the peace) commits the act with arms or cooperates consciously and intentionally with an armed person;
3. Anyone who commits a kidnapping under Paragraph 239 of the Criminal Code with the intention of making use of the kidnapped person as a hostage in the political struggle.
This decree is in force from the day of its announcement.
Berlin, February 28, 1933
The Reich President von Hindenburg
The Reich Chancellor A Hitler
The Minister of Interior Frick
The Minister of Justice Dr. Gürtner
"I am your King and Caliph. Now, bow".
If the GOP were smart there’d be an FOIA bill on Obama’s desk next week. Let him veto it every month until he leaves.
My loathing for that pusillanimous pustule increases exponentially day by day.
The primary enabler to this (beyond his Majesty) are the progressive-activist judges. There are some that say that they need a lynching.
Nancy Pelosi promised Americans THE MOST ETHICAL CONGRESS EVER following the DNC-MSM coordinated “Culture of Corruption that rises to the top ranks of the GOP” meme of 2006.
Stalinists lie. ALWAYS
well let’s see now ....control internet, police, etc
*****
and meddling in leadership of foreign countries
The article uses the word "regulations," not "laws."
Perhaps the WH has merely reversed what the executive branch has imposed under its own powers?
I dunno.
I do know that both federal and state legislatures have created FOIA law.
It is not the White Mosque that is transparent, it is the occupant that is transparent... except to those ‘moderate’ Dhimmicrats, RINOs and ‘journalists’ who refuse to see.
There should be a law against anyone doing this by themselves.
Seems to me you are right that state republican groups could.
"...State AGs can bring criminal charges"
Sounds reasonable.
The DOJ? Not likely, Holder has made "his people" a protected class.
Good point about MS.
I was there with the TPX doing what we could to help McDaniel. Great conservative as far as I could see.
Really showed the collusion between the dems and the repubs.
Yup, classic Alinsky.
If you really think there is any possibility that I am expecting any DemocRAT to really be transparent-—YOU haven’t been paying attention.
I was speaking only of the legality, not the prospect.
IMHO, McDaniel’s destruction was perhaps the lowest thing the GOP has ever done, worse even than what was done to Bill Simon.
Yes, how true!
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