For those who may have missed it, this is Sunshine Week. What is Sunshine Week?

“A national initiative to open a dialogue about the importance of open government and freedom of information. Participants include print, broadcast and online news media, civic groups, libraries, non-profits, schools and others interested in the public’s right to know.”

In recognition of this special time, Henry Waxman’s Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is proudly announcing the passage of four bills that promote the goals of Sunshine Week:

• H.R. 1255, The Presidential Records Act Amendments: approved by a vote of 333-93, makes clear that presidential records belong to the American people, not the president who created them. The Presidential Records Act Amendments of 2007 will nullify a Bush executive order which gave former presidents – and their heirs – nearly unlimited authority to withhold or delay the release of their own records. If it becomes law, this legislation will ensure that a complete historical record is available to researchers.
• H.R. 1254, The Presidential Library Donation Reform Act: approved by a vote of 390-34, will require organizations that raise money for presidential libraries to disclose information about their donors. This will eliminate a major loophole that allows presidential supporters to secretly give millions in support of a president’s legacy while that president remains in office.
• H.R. 1309, The Freedom of Information Act Amendments: approved by a vote of 308-117, will strengthen the Freedom of Information Act and improve public access to government information. One key element of this legislation would restore the presumption of disclosure under FOIA that was eliminated by the Bush Administration in 2001.
• H.R. 985, The Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act: approved by a vote of 331-94, offers improved protections to federal whistleblowers who report wrongdoing to authorities. Federal employees and contractors are privy to information that enables them to play an essential role in ensuring government accountability.

These bills are good start in undoing some of the damage that the Bush administration has done to the concept of an open and honest government. There is still more to be done and, of course, these bills have to pass in the senate and be signed by the President. On that score, Bush has already threatened to veto two of them: The Presidential Records Act and The Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act. He has also expressed opposition to the Freedom of Information Act. All three of these bills passed in the House with a margin greater than the two thirds required to override a veto, so the threat may never come to pass. The process is far from over and it is still discouraging to see how many legislators were willing to vote against these common sense measures to make government more accountable. But in honor of Sunshine Week, I’m going to focus on the positive and celebrate a Congress that is starting to do work that represents the people’s interest for a change.

The escalating hostilities in Afghanistan were evident today when a suicide bomber launched an attack intended for a convoy of American Marines. Initial reports estimate that the blast killed 16 civilians and injured up to 34. Witnesses say that following the attack, the Americans fled, firing indiscriminately at vehicles and pedestrians along a six mile stretch of a busy road. Accounts of these events come primarily from victims of the shootings at a local hospital as well as other eye witnesses on the road. But accounts from local media may not be forthcoming:

“U.S. forces near Sunday’s bombing later deleted photos taken by a freelance photographer working for The Associated Press and video taken by a freelancer working for AP Television News. Neither the photographer nor the cameraman witnessed the suicide attack or the subsequent gunfire. It was not immediately known why the soldiers deleted the photos and videos. The U.S. military didn’t immediately comment on the matter.”

I’m not sure where these soldiers got the idea that they had the authority to interfere with local journalists. I’m not sure how they came to believe that it was acceptable to destroy their photos and video. But I am sure that this is not the way to promote freedom. The Afghan people will certainly hear of these events and it will undoubtedly exacerbate the anti-American sentiment in the region. But suppressing the media, and the truth, will only make things worse by inciting further resentment, distrust, and hostility. And it doesn’t make for a very good example of American values either.

Slate’s editor at large, Jack Shafer, disputes the notion that the Bush administration is at war with the media. His support for that position is that the New York Times’ James Risen and Eric Lichtblau aren’t imprisoned at Gitmo. He further imagines that…

“A president intent on making war on the press would surely have carpet-bombed Dana Priest and the Washington Post for her secret prisons journalism. By now, Seymour M. Hersh of The New Yorker would have been executed on general principle.”

The entire thrust of his opinion rests on whether or not you take the word “war” literally. Since no one I can think of would ever do that in this context, it seems silly to base his whole argument on it. What kind of idiocy would it require to assert that a war on the press meant sending in the Marines? Shafer knows what war on the press means and he gives a pretty good description of it later in the article:

“…it’s true that the Bush administration hates the press and shouts it out frequently, that it tells lies, that it makes the lives of reporters as miserable as it can, that it plays propaganda games at every step, overclassifies, manufactures “phony news,” and intimidates the press…”

If that’s not a war on the press, I don’t know what is. Shafer ought to admit that the tactics he ascribes to the Bush administration constitute actual hostility to a free press and pose a clear and present danger to honest and independent journalism.

Last April it was reported that the FBI intended to seek documents from the estate of investigative reporter, Jack Anderson. I wrote at the time that this presented some ominous threats to freedom of the press and the well being of reporters:

“News sources, whistleblowers, and others with information, the disclosure of which is in the public’s interest, would be far less likely to come forward if they know that their identity could be revealed in the event of the reporter’s death […] The government cannot presently force the reporter to reveal his sources without the intervention of the courts. But if the reporter were to die, under the principle being advanced here by the FBI, the government could retrieve the data they want from the reporter’s estate. Consequently, it would be in the government’s interest for the reporter to die.”

It seems that the FBI has decided to back off. James H. Clinger, an Acting Associate Attorney General, responding to questions from the Senate Judiciary Committee, now says that…

“The FBI met with the Anderson family in an effort to review the files with their consent. At this time, the FBI is not seeking to reclaim any documents.”

There was no further comment from the FBI or any explanation for the change. For the time being we should just be glad that the inquisition is over. But there is still a need to be vigilant given the history of abuse of the press by this administration.

The passing of former President Gerald Ford will produce a torrent of retrospectives and remembrances. The media will undoubtedly focus on the Nixon resignation, the end of our “long national nightmare,” and the pardons that probably cost Ford the election in 1976. But there is a lesser known story that may have an even longer reach. It’s a story that touches on some of the core values of our liberties and introduces us to a cast of characters that remain on stage today.

The original version of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) of 1966 was a controversial document that prevailed despite some bitter debates and opposition by President Johnson. As Johnson’s press secretary, Bill Moyers, describes it:

“LBJ had to be dragged kicking and screaming to the signing ceremony. He hated the very idea of the Freedom of Information Act; hated the thought of journalists rummaging in government closets; hated them challenging the official view of reality. He dug in his heels and even threatened to pocket veto the bill after it reached the White House.”

This was not an uncommon point of view for presidents, who are generally protective of their executive privileges. Nonetheless, Johnson signed the bill, but its form at the time made it nearly impotent.

Congress endeavored to shore up FOIA and produced legislation to amend it in 1974. The bill was dumped in Ford’s lap at the commencement of his promotion to the White House. Ford’s position on the new bill was that it was negative on its merits but could be problematic to veto in the wake of his ascension to the presidency. He had promised open and honest government, and vetoing a Freedom of Information Act might not be viewed as consistent with either openness or honesty.

Ford eventually was persuaded to veto the bill with the help of a trio of advisors: his Chief of Staff, Donald Rumsfeld; his deputy Chief of Staff, Dick Cheney; and the head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, Antonin Scalia. An ominous early assemblage of an evil cabal we know only too well today.

The veto was overridden by Congress and the amendments became law. In the intervening years it has proven to be an invaluable tool to rein in the kind of government arrogance and abuse that is exemplified so well by the Nixon era that preceded its passage.

It’s just too bad that the people responsible for the veto could not also have been overridden so that today we would not have to be suffering still from their destructive, self-serving, and hostile policies. Thousands of American families, and hundreds of thousands in Iraq, have paid dearly for their misguidance. We should keep those families in our thoughts and prayers, today and going forward, just as we do the Ford family.