Tag Archives: Freedom of information laws by country

Unfortunately Both Political Parties Are Involved In Benghazi

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The Republicans control the House of Representatives and the Senate. Therefore,it should be easy to investigate what happened at Benghazi, despite the fact that the Democrats involved are experts at stonewalling. Well, new information that has come to light indicates that part of the problem with the investigation may be that there are also Republicans involved that would like to keep the details of what happened at Benghazi secret.

On Thursday, The Daily Caller posted an article about some new information that has come out as a result of the emails that are finally getting released.

The article reports:

Perhaps most intriguing in the recent email batch is a one-line note to Mrs. Clinton from a top advisor, Deputy Chief of Staff Jake Sullivan. The subject of the September 10, 2011 email is simply “Rogers.” The note in its entirety reads: “Apparently wants to see you to talk Libya/weapons.”

“Rogers” is then-House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, a Republican. The email was unearthed at the deep end of the document dump and first noted in a piece by Catherine Herridge and Pamela Browne of Fox News.

Chairman Rogers and other GOP House committee chairman spent a good deal of time opposing the formation of the Benghazi Select Committee. As Eli Lake reported last year, Rogers “warned his colleagues” about the committee. Lake reported that “the chairmen of the House Intelligence, Armed Services, and Government Reform committees — Reps. Rogers, Buck McKeon, and Darrell Issa, respectively — all opposed the formation of a select committee on Benghazi.”

The story goes on to detail the connection between Representative Rogers and his wife and Benghazi. In 2014, Representative Rogers abruptly resigned from the House of Representative. About the same time his wife left an executive position at Aegis Defense Services, a private defense contractor. This may be totally coincidental, but it illustrates one thing–America has developed a political class that sometimes puts its personal interests ahead of the interests of our country. That is a major problem in our government right now.

Please follow the link above to The Daily Caller to read the entire story. This story is one more example of why term limits are a good idea. There seems to be something in the water in Washington that makes people compromise the principles they claimed to have before they got there. Maybe if we limit their terms of office, the effect of the water will be minimal.

We owe a debt to Representative Trey Gowdy for continuing this investigation despite opposition from his own party.

Changing The Law For Political Convenience

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USA Today posted an article today about White House plans to remove a federal regulation that subjects its Office of Administration to the Freedom of Information Act.

The article reports:

The White House said the cleanup of FOIA regulations is consistent with court rulings that hold that the office is not subject to the transparency law. The office handles, among other things, White House record-keeping duties like the archiving of e-mails.

But the timing of the move raised eyebrows among transparency advocates, coming on National Freedom of Information Day and during a national debate over the preservation of Obama administration records. It’s also Sunshine Week, an effort by news organizations and watchdog groups to highlight issues of government transparency.

Amazing. Historically, the Office of Administration has responded to FOIA requests.

The article reports:

In 2009, a federal appeals court in Washington ruled that the Office of Administration was not subject to the FOIA, “because it performs only operational and administrative tasks in support of the president and his staff and therefore, under our precedent, lacks substantial independent authority.”

The appeals court ruled that the White House was required to archive the e-mails, but not release them under the FOIA. Instead, White House e-mails must be released under the Presidential Records Act — but not until at least five years after the end of the administration.

In a notice to be published in Tuesday’s Federal Register, the White House says it’s removing regulations on how the Office of Administration complies with Freedom of Information Act Requests based on “well-settled legal interpretations.”

The White House has stated that there will be no 30-day comment period on this change, and thus the change will be final.

I understand that sometimes security needs require that information be kept from the public. However, we live in a representative republic. The government represents us. The American people have every right to know the details of what is going on in our government. We need more sunshine in our government–not more secrecy.

Following The Law Has Become Optional

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On Monday, John Hinderaker at Power Line posted an article about the number of illegal work permits that have been issued by the Obama Administration since 2009

The article reports:

…it has come to light that the Obama administration has been handing out illegal work permits for years. The Center for Immigration Studies has received documents in response to a Freedom of Information Act request that indicate millions of such illegal work permits have been issued since 2009.

The Center for Immigration Studies report is posted at Power Line. Follow the link above the view the entire report.

Some highlights of the report:

Government data reveal that more than 7.4 million work permits (formally known as Employment Authorization Documents) were issued to aliens from 2009 to 2014. Because neither lawful permanent residents (green card holders) nor temporary work visa holders need a work permit, this amounts to a huge parallel immigrant work authorization system outside the numerical limits and categories set by Congress. …

Approximately 2.1 million work permits were issued to aliens with temporary visas or who entered under the Visa Waiver Program. Of these, about 1.4 million (66 percent) had a visa status for which employment is generally prohibited under the law, except in what are supposed to be rare cases. For example, more than 548,000 work permits were issued to aliens on tourist visas and 593,000 were issued to foreign students. More than 213,000 were issued to dependents of students and guestworkers — all categories in which the law prohibits employment except in rare circumstances. …

More than 2.2 million work permits were issued over this time period to illegal aliens or aliens unqualified for admission. Nearly all of these (2.1 million) were illegal aliens who crossed the border illegally (Entered Without Inspection). Inexplicably, 2,860 work permits were issued to aliens who were denied asylum, were suspected of using fraudulent documents, were stowaways, or were refused at a port of entry….

A huge number of work permits, 1.9 million, were issued to aliens whose status was unknown, not recorded by the adjudicator, or not disclosed by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), the agency that processes the applications.

How many Americans have left the work force because they could not find job? How many of the people with these illegal work permits are working at jobs that Americans would love to do? This is only a small taste of the damage President Obama’s illegal amnesty will do.

 

Further Information On The Internal Revenue Service Court Appearance

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Yesterday the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) appeared in Federal Court to explain why Lois Lerner’s emails are missing (see rightwinggranny.com). Fox News reported on the results of that hearing.

The article reports:

A federal judge has ordered the IRS to explain “under oath” how the agency lost a trove of emails from the official at the heart of the Tea Party targeting scandal. 

U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan gave the tax agency 30 days to file a declaration by an “appropriate official” to address the computer issues with ex-official Lois Lerner. 

The decision came Thursday as part of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch, which along with GOP lawmakers on Capitol Hill has questioned how the IRS lost the emails and, in some cases, had no apparent way to retrieve them. 

The IRS first acknowledged it lost the emails in a letter to senators last month.

It was revealed during that hearing that a Treasury Department inspector general is looking into the matter.

The article reports:

The lawyer representing the IRS, Geoffrey Klimas, argued that any further discovery in this case might impede the IG‘s investigation. 

Sullivan seemed leery of that argument and also asked that the IRS official speak to that subject in the explanation the agency submits. 

Further, Sullivan ordered that the IRS official explain how Lerner’s files may be recovered through “other sources.”

It is interesting to me that the lawyer representing the IRS would cite the IG’s investigation as a reason to stop the discovery aspect of this case from proceeding. This excuse has been used before by the Obama Administration to block investigations of misdeeds by the Administration.

 

What Is Happening To My Country?

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Yesterday I posted a story about Audrey Hudson, a former Washington Times reporter and current freelance reporter (rightwinggranny.com). Yesterday the Washington Times posted a story about the incident.

The Washington Times reported:

The Washington Times said Friday it is preparing legal action to fight what it called an unwarranted intrusion on the First Amendment.

“While we appreciate law enforcement’s right to investigate legitimate concerns, there is no reason for agents to use an unrelated gun case to seize the First Amendment protected materials of a reporter,” Times Editor John Solomon said. “This violates the very premise of a free press, and it raises additional concerns when one of the seizing agencies was a frequent target of the reporter’s work.

“Homeland’s conduct in seizing privileged reporters notes and Freedom of Information Act documents raises serious Fourth Amendment issues, and our lawyers are preparing an appropriate legal response,” he said.

Keep that story in mind as you read the rest of this article.

On October 21, I posted an article about the behavior of the Park Police during the government shutdown (rightwinggranny.com). The source of that article was a John Fund article at National Review Online. The question being asked in the article was if the Obama Administration can use the Park Police to fight a political battle, what other federal agencies can they co-opt? Again I ask, when were the shut-down signs and the barricades ordered and who authorized the order?

On October 23, The Blaze reported that a total of nine commanding generals have been fired this year. The article lists the generals and contains a video of an interview with the reporter investigating this.

Where were you when you first heard the expression “shelter in place?” That was mainly added to the American vocabulary after the Boston Marathon Bombing. Think about that for a moment. In the past, when a criminal escaped from jail, we were told to lock our doors and windows and be alert. I don’t ever remember hearing the expression “shelter in place.” Shelter in place implies Martial Law. Is that something that is going to become routine?

I list the above incidents for your consideration. They may mean nothing, they may mean a lot. Think about them the next time you have the opportunity to vote. I don’t like the direction our country seems to be heading in. The only way to change that direction is to change the people running the country. The only way to change the people running the country is to vote the current people out and elect new people. We need to do that.

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