Two seemingly unrelated news stories appeared in my laptop emails on Monday, one noteworthy for nothing more than its abject absurdity and the other even more so for the ominous threat it poses to the ability to hold elected officials accountable.
And while LouisianaVoice rarely delves into national politics because, well, truth be told, it’s admittedly way beyond my pay grade (and I was always taught to “write what you know”), both these stories have potential trickle down repercussions if any legislator is dumb enough to take his (or her) cue from the Man with the Golden Hair.
In the first story, Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway issued a dire warning, heavy with legal overtones, to “be careful” BE CAREFUL what we say about her boss. Her remarks, of course, were directed to retiring Senate Minority Leader, Nevada Democrat Harry Reid.
Reid last week said the election of Trump “has emboldened the forces of hate and bigotry in America” And that, in the minds of Conway—and presumably Trump—borders on libel (and, of course, “crooked Hillary” is simply campaign rhetoric).
It’s no secret that Trump, on the one hand, champions tort reform whereby corporations can be better protected from lawsuits over such trivial oversights as exploding batteries, toxic dumping, sexual harassment, etc. On the other hand, however, Trump has made it equally well know that he favors more liberal libel laws which would make it easier for public officials to sue.
Well, Trumper, you can’t have it both ways. The landmark case Sullivan v. New York Times makes it quite clear there must be a “reckless disregard for the truth” for a public official to recover damages.
Were that not the case, there might well have never been a Watergate scandal, the White House plumbers, Bebe Rebozo Iran-Contra revelations, Sen. John Edwards, the all-too-cozy relationship between Wall Street and The Clintons, Bushes, and even Obama or any number of other investigative pieces about public corruption. And to quote an old Baton Rouge State-Times editor responding to a reader who was irate over the treatment the paper was according Richard Nixon: “Exactly what is it about Watergate you would rather not have known?”
And out in Arizona, we have a bill pending BILL PENDING before the state legislature that appears to be right out of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) playbook and if it is, you can look for clones of this bill to pop up across the landscape, including, in all likelihood, Louisiana.
State Sen. John Kavanagh, R-Fountain Hills (wouldn’t you just know it would be a Republican who wants to put the kibosh on the public’s right to know?) has introduced a bill that would make it more difficult to obtain public records if public officials feel the requests are “unduly burdensome or harassing.”
That’s pretty open-ended and a decided advantage to any public servant who feels my request might be “unduly burdensome.” Wouldn’t Kristy Nichols have loved that? No, wait. It wouldn’t have mattered with her; she simply ignored my requests until she was damned good and ready to comply—if she even decided to comply. Okay, Mike Edmonson. He’d feast on a law like that.
Lest you think such a bill would never pass, consider this: this is Kavanagh’s second attempt at passing the bill and last it passed the Senate by a 22-7 vote, but lost in the House by a 40-19 vote.
LouisianaVoice will be watching closely to see if any similar such legislation is introduced in the 2017 session. If it is, then we will know without a doubt that this is an ALEC-sponsored bill.
ALEC, you may recall, meets at retreats, mini-conventions and conferences to draft “model bills” for members to introduce in their respective legislatures back home.
More recently, it has launched a sister organization, American City Council Exchange (ACCE) that has the same goals as ALEC, only on a municipal as opposed to state level. One of ACCE’s objectives, outlined in an Indianapolis conference last July, is to have its members become familiar with public records laws and to “be on the lookout for frivolous or abusive requests.”
Sen. Kavanagh couldn’t have said it better himself.
But what he conveniently overlooks is this: In any company, be it a mom and pop hardware or one of those mega box stores, management has the unchallenged right to know what its employees are doing when representing the company, be it processing orders, reducing errors, or one-on-one contact with the customer.
The President, Congress, 50 governors, Kavanagh, his fellow legislators and other elected officials throughout the land are chosen by the people. They in turn hire subordinates to carry out the day-to-day functions of government. So Kavanagh and every other elected or appointed public official in this country works for…the people.
And we, the people, have a right to examine the work they’re doing on our behalf.
Louisiana Voice 
Perhaps, “we the people” have neglected our administrative duties to hold those that work for and serve us accountable. It does take time and effort to keep up with laws and it takes a very determined person to avoid false and biased news and seek facts. BUT, if “we the people” do not do a better job, our losses will be greater than we could have ever imagined. Thank you for doing your part to keep Louisiana informed and aware of things that are important to us and that should move us to action. I did not know about the ACCE.
Not only that — the information belongs to the public. Or at least that is what I thought when I handled public records requests for DHH. It is so easy to comply that I wonder why state operators get so defensive about requests.
Meanwhile, Obama just signed into law a bill by Congress that further erodes freedom of speech and the rights of a free speech. I didn’t see Trump’s handprint on that
Do you have the number of this bill or more information?
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-12-24/obama-signs-countering-disinformation-and-propaganda-act-law
Please explain just what this has to do with freedom of speech. This bill is primarily a military appropriation and for a counter to foreign propaganda. I don’t see a single restriction on our own freedom of speech.
…and your news source, “Zerohedge” is quite suspect as a credible news service.
And by the way, when I googled “Zerohedge,” I came up with this little jewel:
“…Zero Hedge’s content is conspiratorial, anti-establishment, and economically pessimistic, and has been criticized for presenting extreme and sometimes pro-Russian views.”
ouch.
Which bill was that? This is the only reference I can find on such a bill which, by the way, was initially signed into law by Nixon.
http://www.factcheck.org/2012/05/obama-criminalize-free-speech/
The only thing this bill does is restrict access to areas under Secret Service protection.
You have been victimized by the “faux news” that has become so widespread on the internet.
I guess the basis of this kind of goes back to the old question of whether free speech includes the right to yell “fire” in a crowded theater when there is no fire. And, although nuclear war was barely avoided in this recent case of disinformation:
http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/26/middleeast/israel-pakistan-fake-news-nuclear/
…it is certainly difficult to define what is okay and next to impossible to control what is not.
Speaking of information, and more to the point of Tom’s actual column, I think we can expect less, not more, factual information in the future. When no one is really held accountable for telling the truth, much less releasing it to the public, where is their incentive to do so? So, amen Edith!
I don’t care about the source. I was trying to give you the name of the bill. If you can’t see this has implications for the press, then I don’t know what to tell you. Do a google and figure it out for yourself.
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/12/26/under-cover-christmas-obama-establishes-controversial-anti-propaganda-agency
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Love these folks who link a wordpress blog to their “screen name” and then lock down the blog. Whatcha hidin’ in there you don’t want folks to see? 😝
Well, I do see that the bill was authored by Republican Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio. And if you “don’t care about the source,” you’re setting yourself up to be fooled by bogus news stories on a very regular basis.
Because the President does not have the line-item veto, so he either signs it or vetoes the entire bill—which was the National Defense Authorization Act.
But if the bill does what you say, it only underscores what I wrote about the ongoing effort to deprive the public of “public information.” And unfortunately, Trump’s “handprint” is all over his desire to stifle free speech.
As I have said many times, I’m no fan of Obama and Hillary was no better. We could debate the merits of Repugnantcans vs. Democraps from now on but the bottom line is I don’t trust any of them—and I suspect before his term is up, you will have more than enough of Trump
President Obama proclaimed he would have “the most transparent administration in history.” (Hmm, just like Bobby Jindal did in Louisiana.)
Here’s how the non-partisan Sunlight Foundation critiqued the Obama administration’s record on FOIA compliance, media access to the President, treatment of whistleblowers, and other related topics.
http://sunlightfoundation.com/2016/09/02/how-should-history-measure-the-obama-administrations-record-on-transparency/
“a bill that would make it more difficult to obtain public records if public officials feel the requests are “unduly burdensome or harassing.”
It would take a court a nanosecond to determine the complete unconstitutionality of such a statute, with “public officials” being the ones to determine whether public records/FOIA requests are convenient for them or not. Why not just repeal the federal Freedom of Information Act and state public records statutes and be done with it? Good luck with that.
It’s not surprising that such bills are being floated – notice by a republican – but it is so ironic. Repubs have been shrieking for eight years that President Obama has been shredding the Constitution, while they propose laws that clamp down on First Amendment guarantees. The incoming president threatens anyone who disagrees with or criticizes him with legal action for exercising First Amendment-guaranteed free speech, so it won’t be long before some repub congressperson proposes legislation to criminalize comments critical of the president. Even a conservative Supreme Court would have to rule such legislation unconstitutional. Criticizing our elected leaders is a time-honored national pastime that even Bush 2 could not stop with his insistence that dissent with his war plans was tantamount to treason.
(I say the following knowing that such remarks could draw the attention of the personal comment police and put a target squarely on me; to that I say come on, and good luck with that.) Trump will present the greatest threat to the First Amendment that we have seen, but I truly believe he will fail. The most avid trump supporters will become disenchanted with him early on when they wake up to the fact that they have been duped into voting for the greatest con artist ever to occupy the White House. Because there are some people who will would attempt to meet threats to First Amendment freedoms with Second Amendment solutions.
“Trump was the least qualified candidate ever nominated by a major party for the presidency. Come January, he will become the worst president in American history, and a dangerously unstable player on the world stage… Over the next four years, our problems are going to get much, much worse. Winter is coming.” George RR Martin, creator of Game of Thrones
Winter, or not, a change is coming. POTUS-elect Trump seems bent on making a joke of our government, based on his appointments and his statements about pretty much everything. If winter is coming, it may be sooner rather than later, in which case there isn’t much we can do to stop it. If the chill lingers and we enter an information vacuum, how will we even know what is happening,
Clearly, some things other than Bond’s martini, need to be shaken, not stirred, but at what cost? We’ll see. Or, will we?
I saw this in an older LouisianaVoice post and was surprised.
“…But when a governor—or any of his minions—touting his openness and transparency instructs his staff to use private email accounts when discussing state business so as to avoid disclosure under the state’s public records laws, something is terribly lacking in the overall character makeup of the man with whom we have entrusted the state’s leadership.”
Luckily, Texas circumvented this tactic. Anything regarding government business that is done on private email is subject to release. The responding entity is required to redact private email addresses and cell phone numbers; unless the cell is government issued.
During the jindal years, we state employees were instructed by the governor’s staff to call them or make an appointment to discuss any business that might be controversial or difficult, We were instructed not to use email because they stated that email could be examined under public records laws, and could also be obtained easily by people who might use it against them. The jindal people were very conscious of the need for, and the means to maintain secrecy. They would call (very infrequent) meetings of the public information staff to avoid conference calls and emails.
This is the first I’ve heard about their shredding documents but I’m not a bit surprised. The only thing that surprises me is that none of the jindal minions have gone to jail and he is walking around free after all the outright payroll fraud and other wrongdoing,
“The only thing that surprises me is that none of the jindal minions have gone to jail and he is walking around free after all the outright payroll fraud and other wrongdoing,” – Ironically, this surprises me least, and the precedents he set here and others set elsewhere have made the path to greater secrecy even easier for Trump and others in the future.
As I have noted before, civil laws have come to mean nothing and now criminal law seems headed down the same road, except, of course, when it affects people already at a severe disadvantage and/or politically weak.
I wd tell other state workers that a directive to use their personal phones to avoid the public records laws was an illegal directive. But there were rumors that this was happening. I never heard anything about shredding. Rather they wd put public records requests in the hands of an employee who they could control. The good thing abt the Jindal administration is thT it prepared me for PEOTUS/45.
Yep. And that same governor (whose name we won’t use, but his initials are Piyush Jindal) had his staff shredding documents in the governor’s office the entire weekend before he left office.
Which, of course, raises the obvious question: what was he afraid we’d learn?
That’s one of the big advantages to keeping a video (audio) library of corruption. To Earthmother’s point, here’s an 11/5/12 audio of a young lady who would LATER (12/9/13) be cited for payroll fraud instructing the members of the board for which she serves as Executive Director (Auctioneer Board) how to circumvent public records requests entailing emails:
I’d like to also just say that, from my observations, blocking public records access is an act engaged in equally by Democratic and Republican public officials. For example, here’s Larry Bankston (prominent Democrat) on video guiding this same group of corrupt members of that same Board to deny access to auctioneer files:
In a strange way, these folk by their actions prove in ways we could never dream of demonstrating that they are corrupt!! We just have to stay “on their case” long enough!! I’m now getting more help than I ever could have imagined toward exposing Auction Board corruption because of the mountain of examples of the members’ practices. That, in turn, is having a significant impact with various law enforcement agencies with whom I’ve recently corresponded regarding those actions. Personally, I’m more optimistic going into 2017 than I’ve been in a LONG, LONG time!!
It’s difficult to keep from laughing my a– off when Bankston referencing what a “burden” it would impose on the LALB’s “one employee” to pull 10 auctioneer files every month or so!! I mean, how dare people like me or Tom infringe on her vacationing in Orange Beach or Disney World while SIMULTANEOUSLY reporting being “on the clock.”
Anyway, we continue to review files to make it easy for members of the public to easily conduct a sort of background check on a prospective auctioneer. Here’s the link for anyone considering attending an auction as a bidder or consigning merchandise for auction:
http://www.auctioneer-la.org/Auctioneer_Reviewed_Files.htm
Bankston simply doesn’t want this information readily available to the public! It is LITERALLY that simple!! After all, you KNOW it’s bad when a FARA representative (FARA was the entity to whom many of ORM’s functions were subcontracted to) has to apologize to an 84-year-old widow for Bankston’s terse phone call with her: http://www.laboards-commissions.com/Wax_Bankston.pdf