CPJ Report: the Obama Administration and Press Freedoms

dryriver writes "Committee To Protect Journalists reports: U.S. President Barack Obama came into office pledging open government, but he has fallen short of his promise. Journalists and transparency advocates say the White House curbs routine disclosure of information and deploys its own media to evade scrutiny by the press. Aggressive prosecution of leakers of classified information and broad electronic surveillance programs deter government sources from speaking to journalists. In the Obama administration's Washington, government officials are increasingly afraid to talk to the press. Those suspected of discussing with reporters anything that the government has classified as secret are subject to investigation, including lie-detector tests and scrutiny of their telephone and e-mail records. An 'Insider Threat Program' being implemented in every government department requires all federal employees to help prevent unauthorized disclosures of information by monitoring the behavior of their colleagues. Six government employees, plus two contractors including Edward Snowden, have been subjects of felony criminal prosecutions since 2009 under the 1917 Espionage Act, accused of leaking classified information to the press—compared with a total of three such prosecutions in all previous U.S. administrations. Still more criminal investigations into leaks are under way. Reporters' phone logs and e-mails were secretly subpoenaed and seized by the Justice Department in two of the investigations, and a Fox News reporter was accused in an affidavit for one of those subpoenas of being 'an aider, abettor and/or conspirator' of an indicted leak defendant, exposing him to possible prosecution for doing his job as a journalist. In another leak case, a New York Times reporter has been ordered to testify against a defendant or go to jail."

Comments

Re:You asked for this

[whistlingtony]

Uhm. Wait. Sanity check. Obama did NOT nationalize the auto industry or the healthcare industry.

I know you're refering to the government buying a controlling interest of GM stock. GM was in trouble and needed some money to stay afloat. The government bought a ton of stock (which I happen to think is better than just GIVING them money), it did NOT tell the company how to run, and then it SOLD the stock(I think even at a profit) once GM was on it's feet again. It did all this to prevent GM from folding and causing huge job losses.

I also know that you're refering to Obamacare, AKA, the ACA. I WISH the government had nationalized the healthcare industry, but mandating that you buy insurance from a NON GOVERNMENT insurance company is a far cry from nationalizing anything.

So, basically, you're so wrong we can't even talk to you. Obama didn't nationalize squat. Look to Venezeula if you want to see a country nationalizing private industries. There's none of that here. Your belief is a fantasy. Kool-Aide indeed.

Re:You asked for this

[ak3ldama]

Sanity check: It was sold at a loss. Not even close to a profit. From wikipedia: A White House report sent to Congress in August 2012 estimated the sale of the remaining G.M. stock acquired by the United States Treasury during the company's bankruptcy will result in a loss of $25.1 billion to the American taxpayer. The government is basically selling the stock at half the value we would need to be selling it at. I wish people would pay attention and remember the basic details of this shit. So in review: the GM market cap is ~$48 Billion and we the people are losing about half of that, maybe more.