We’ll look forward to getting back to bashing Pelosi and Hoyer and Reid soon enough (Are they really still in charge of Congress? And is that really “change we can believe in”?) But for now, today’s action in the House is certainly praiseworthy, and — if we’re lucky — a sign of things to come? (There we go again, being all optimistic and stuff.)
Read on for some good news, for a change, via Reuters…
The measure, which drew bipartisan support and passed by a veto-busting 333-93 margin, was among White House-opposed bills the House passed that would widen access to government information and protect government whistleblowers.
“Today, Congress took an important step toward restoring openness and transparency in government,” House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman said.
The presidential papers bill nullifies a November 2001 order, criticized by historians, in which Bush allowed the White House or a former president to block release of a former president’s papers and put the onus on researchers to show a “specific need” for many types of records.
Among beneficiaries of the Bush order was Bush’s father, George H.W. Bush, a former vice president and president.
The order gave former vice presidents the right to stop the release of their papers through an executive privilege that previously only presidents could use. And it extended to deceased presidents’ designees rights to keep their papers secret indefinitely.
The House bill would give current and former presidents 40 business days to object to requests to view their papers, allow a sitting president to override a former president’s claim of executive privilege and strip former vice presidents and the designees of deceased presidents of the power to use executive privilege to block access to their historical documents.
And, as if that’s not encouraging enough to hear, the article adds that two other long overdue bills were passed as well:
A third bill, which passed 308-117, was aimed at speeding requests for government information made under the Freedom of Information Act. The White House stopped short of threatening to veto it but said it could not support the bill.
Are we seeing the beginning of a return to transparency and sanity? We’ll not get too excited just yet, but today was very encouraging…
Expect a mysterious fire soon or a hack
Or some more plane crashes….
Very good news…..guardedly hopeful…still got the blankets over my head…are we sure there are no more monsters in the closet?
Like Cheney’s going to start obeying the law now? I doubt it.
Thanks for pointing this story out Brad. I missed it. This is a promising development and I am guardedly optimistic. I’m with Joan. After the past 8 years it’s difficult to not expect this to turn into severe badness even when you think it’s all good.
Good news?
I’ll believe it when I see the faces Sibel hinted to indicted and seriously discussed. Or even the Stevens/ attorney-gate scandal. It’s hard to keep track of all this corrupt nonsense. The corporate media sure ain’t doing it.
Oversight, like impeachment. Indictments for oath breaking. Deactivation of DHS — a waste of money, and direct conflict to civil rights–for example the right to protest without having freaking fascists shooting your ass with rubber bullets, tear gas, pepper, plastic orange fences, zip-strip handcuffs, and substandard jails denying constitutional rights all around.
The transparency of “the fed” who purposely papered over the recession. I’ll believe it when I see it. Oh and don’t forget that interest is a compound function – that is, it is an exponential function. So were going to make more F-ing debt of the same to paper over a problem that already has too much debt. No transparency there, but you better hope these clowns don’t completely destroy our monetary system and our government–by proxy. If they manage to crash the bond market, what do you think dollars are going to be worth? If that happens, how will government operate with zero?
Freedom of your and my information to be snooped on and used against us. ala the unconstitutional oath breaking votes by our corrupt officials in favor of FISA. Freedom to vote but not have it counted because indicted officials created HAVA and spawned un-validatable electronic voting machine hell on us all. A FOIA request should be free. Especially when the officials are breaking their oath.
I’d rather see an AIPAC, PNAC, CFR, Iran-Contra, Vietnam/Laos cleansing (cough, I mean removal) of people holding security clearances in the pentagon, cia, nsa, and fbi. Never to contract, or work or be elected to/for MY government again. But the reality is they see us/you as their property. It’s all exactly backwards.
And what up with Israel? Stealing land? Being a murdering jackass with our F-16’s and 2000LB bombs! Why do we fund/help them again? With friends like that, the whole middle east ought to be our enemy pretty soon. Oh wait…
History will show this administration and congress are pure shit. Unless they re-write history!?
Bush rewrite history?!, never gonna happen.
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/1114-30.htm
http://www.progressive.org/mag_wx082207
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/12/15/bush-taliban-eliminated/
http://www.jimhightower.com/node/6695
The Bush Legacy Project… outlining what a great president/leader/awesome super cool guy he was, AND HE WAS..
Those who disagree must just be godless terrorist liberal commie hippie organizers who read the brad blog when not bathing in patchouli.
I don’t even know what patchouli is, but I lauged anyway. 🙂
Now that we disposed off Nero and his pet-chimp…
Ummmm, the Reuters story that is referenced is dated Mar 14, 2007.
[Whoops! Thanks, Randy! Good catch! Will update the original article w/ correction ASAP! – BF]
Good catch on the date:
Here’s a later piece of information on the bill from the Dallas Morning News
http://www.newser.com/story/7857/senator-blocks-presidential-papers-bill.html
“Senator Blocks Presidential Papers Bill
Posted Sep 20, 07 12:03 PM CDT in Politics, US
(Newser) – An unidentified Republican senator is blocking a bill that would overturn President Bush’s 2001 executive order allowing presidents to keep their papers permanently classified. The bill, approved by the House 333-93 in March, would easily survive a presidential veto if it passed the Senate. A hold is essentially a promise to filibuster, and may be filed anonymously.
Three senators are likely candidates for having submitted the hold, the Dallas Morning News reports: Ted Stevens and Tom Coburn, whose aides deny any such bill-blocking attempts, and George Voinovich, whose camp is keeping quiet. Historians are frustrated by the delay in ensuring presidential records stay public. As one points out, “the best way to undermine the historical record is to close it down.”
Source: Dallas Morning News “
Yeah, I can see my senile sinator blocking it.
Goes to show that one year does not make a difference, except that a we are now paying the price for ignoring people who complain. I am sure that plenty of people were ignored today to make next year’s crisis worse.
[ed note: Comment from banned poster deleted. Get help Soc. –99]
[Ed Note – Comment deleted. Again posted by previously banned user who continues to ignore our commenting rules by posting under multiple names. – BF]
By posting the source of the information the error was found, and keeping the thread active with an apology/retraction (rather than a complete removal of the thread) was the 100% proper way to deal with a genuine and understandable mistake.
In fact we should be questioning in this case …. will the bill be UNblocked or reintroduced under the new Congress? The bill sounds like something that SHOULD be passed. Transparency in government, even if its stuff that is decades old.
What Disillusioned said. That’s why I like this place.
What Disillusioned said. Good comment.
Despite the error I like this post. It just shows Dems have been on the ball and that they’ve been trying to make government work better.
That somebody blocked it is a burden that senator’s electorate has to bear.
Now, let’s see Congress pass it and get it signed by Pres. Obama.
I have discovered a Trojan Horse in 41 states. I have only confirmed that 24 va state troopers work in 100% supported insurance fraud program.
the police are trained and work excllusivly for the insurance community.
I beleive that the same program exist in 41 states. I belleive that there are 100’s of state troopers in america, that are owned by the insurance community.
In va, 0.5% of 1.0% of all gross receipts of insurance comanies doing business in va, have to pay 100% of insurance fraud cost of operation.