Reminder About Abrams Reading
Just a quick reminder about our first "additional reading" of the term. The book "Speaking Freely" by Floyd Abrams is available by accessing ebrary.com through Drexel's library. Simply search the name of the book, and an "electronic resource" link will be there for the clicking.
Here's what I'd like you to read:
pp. 1-32, 33-62, and 94-124.
Consider these questions:
If you were the publisher of the New York Times, would you have published the Pentagon Papers in the first place? Why or why not? What factors would have gone into your decision?
Do you see any parallels between the conduct of the Johnson and Bush administrations in how they treated the press and how they expected the press to treat sensitive information?
How far should the government be allowed to go in labelling documents "secret?" Check out Public Citizen's site detailing how far the Bush Administration has gone in this area. I'm curious about your reactions to what you read there. Please post, email, or bring your reactions to class.
See you Thursday.
posted by Ron Bishop @ 9:58 AM
3 Comments
3 Comments:
I think some information needs to be kept secret, but not necessarily all information. In fact, the more info Bush keeps secret, and makes it a point to say he's keeping it a secret, the more likely the public won't trust the government. Because of this issue, I'm happy the FOIA was established. We all have the right to information, and Bush and his administration needs to be aware of this.
Hear, hear! We'll talk in class about how John Ashcroft made it his mission (not to mention policy)to make it as hard as possible for folks to successfully file FOIA requests.
First of all, I would like to say that I believe that the citizens of the United States have the right to know what is going on in their own country and abroad, and that the government should not hinder this freedom. I understand that some information like Homeland Security must be kept secret because if it got into the hands of the wrong people it could be used to harm the country. However, the Bush administration keeps on classifying items under national security that shouldn’t necessarily be there, which is wrong, as noted on the website.
What really surprised me in the Bush and his administration wanted to keep secret,
“…the severe danger presented by Zonolite insulation, which contains a form of asbestos that is far more cancerous than normal asbestos and is found in attics and walls of homes, schools and businesses,” according to bushsecrey.com.
Why anyone want to keep life saving information from the American public? The answer is sick and simple: money. The lawsuits filed against manufacturers of the insulation were causing the companies problems. Dick Cheney was the former CEO of Halliburton, a company that received many asbestos claims. It would hurt Bush to publicize this information because his Vice President and sponsors (the oil industry among others), were also sponsors many of the companies that have Zonolite in their products. This would injure all the parties involved. Apparently, this is more important then the health of millions of Americans. As I stated previously, I believe in the public’s right to know. What scared me is that if the government is hiding this kind of useful information that citizens would be happy to have, what kind of facts are they hiding that we wouldn’t want to know?
It will be interesting to find out what information was hidden in the documents that are being declassified from the Cold War era. Maybe the information there can give us some clue or solution of what to do or what not to do with the issues the United States is facing now.
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