DOJ Drops FOIA Rule To Permit Lying 151
schwit1 writes "The Department of Justice has canceled a controversial revision to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) rules that opponents said would have allowed federal agencies to lie about the existence of records. In a letter to Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley on Thursday, the DOJ wrote that the proposed rule 'falls short' of its commitment to transparency, and it 'will not include that provision when the Department issues final regulations.' The concern now is that the DOJ has been lying for some time and this rule was an attempt to provide cover for past denials concerning the existence of documents."
Re:The secret to a good FOIA enquiry... (Score:5, Informative)
FOIA, used in the right way, is a fantastic way to embarrass public authorities into telling the truth. When you already have the information (they don't know that - yet) and you ask them what you already know, they should be aware that a certain percentage of the questions they get asked are already answered; their credibility hence qualification to govern depends entirely upon their answer. Since such enquiries are covered under a Statutory Instrument, their responses are also covered under the same SI. Ergo, if they lie and they caught in it on a public forum [whatdotheyknow.com] then that is all the proof needed to legally disqualify them from their positions.
Gentlemen, call your lawyers.
Re:5 Step Program (Score:2, Informative)
At no point did he say he was pulling us out of afghanistan, he specifically campaigned on sending more troops there, because the war had been completely mismanaged and neglected by bush while he burned through our money fighting in Iraq. Obama was right then and he is right now.
Re:Face it (Score:2, Informative)
That's the natural consequence of huge blocks of voters voting for politicians that overtly state that as their goal. The GOP's prime objective last session was to prevent anything from happening, and they didn't even bother lying about it.
Re:What if they are lying about not lying? (Score:2, Informative)
Jaxoreth's solution is also correct.
The untruthful guard would answer the question 'which door is the correct one?' with the wrong door. If you ask him what his answer to that question would be, he will lie about it, i.e. indicate the correct door. (There's one negation coming from the question and one negation coming from the question within the question.)
The truthful guard will trivially indicate the correct door in response to the indirected question.
Re:Except (Score:5, Informative)
He's not being a troll.
The concern is not simply that they're American-made. It's that the executive branch (you know, the one Obama and his appointees lead) intentionally sold those 2000+ guns to known members of Mexican drug cartels. They knew at the time that these people were murderous thugs. But the officials overrode the objections of the gun dealers and some of the field agents to sell them anyway. This was allegedly to track where the guns would go, but A) the operation lost track of where most of the guns went, until B) some of those weapons were later used to kill a Border Patrol agent, not to mention in numerous Mexican crimes.
The debacle was called "Operation Fast and Furious". While investigations are ongoing, it's been reported that at least one of Obama's Cabinet members knew of the program - Attorney General Holder was briefed mid-program, in contradiction of his testimony to Congress.