Leading gubernatorial candidates Meg Whitman and Jerry Brown need to show voters, by their own actions, that they are committed to transparency in government. Promises won’t cut it.

BY PETER SCHEER—As California voters begin the process of selecting the next  Governor of the ungovernable Golden State, the leading candidates owe them a demonstration of their commitment to government transparency.
All politicians are supportive of open-government “in principle;”  the question is whether they are committed in practice. The best test for that is a candidate’s [...]

Reader-comments sections of news websites needn’t be cesspools. Editors should EDIT comments as they would letters-to-the-editor.

BY PETER SCHEER–Some people have no choice but to live in a cesspool. (Consider the young protagonist in Slumdog Millionaire, leaping into a pool of human waste in order to escape a locked latrine.) But news organizations are not among them.
The cesspool that many newspapers occupy is the “Comments” sections of their websites. This is [...]

Obama should back up Google with more than rhetoric: The US should challenge China’s “firewall” before the WTO.

PETER SCHEER—The US government is not powerless to influence China’s policies for censoring the internet. As Google has taken extraordinary steps–bordering on corporate civil disobedience–to challenge China’s stranglehold on the flow of information to and among its people, the Obama administration has acted as though its hands were tied. In fact, however, the administration does [...]

Are Myths Killing the Newspaper Business?

Are newspapers dead, dead, dead? If you can believe everything you read in them, apparently so. Hal Fuson, a veteran of 44-years in the news business, didn’t think those obituary writers had their stories straight. In fact, they were reporting myths about the dire state of the industry as though [...]

Supreme Court order blocking online access to video of Prop 8 trial is a mistake the camera-phobic justices will regret

PETER SCHEER—It’s hard to imagine a video of lawyers debating points of constitutional law going viral on YouTube, but the audience for the Proposition 8 trial — a lawsuit seeking to overturn California’s voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage — is potentially vast. Unfortunately, that audience will have to wait. As the trial began, the U.S. [...]

More power to Google for its civil disobedience in China. Why does US-backed rival Baidu.com get a free ride?

BY PETER SCHEER—It’s not every day that a public corporation engages in what amounts to civil disobedience. But that, in effect, is what Google has done in halting censorship of search results on Google.cn–the Chinese language version of Google that is available inside China–in defiance of China’s laws.
More power to Google. Its unilateral action, coupled [...]

In Separate Moves, State and Federal Courts in California OK Policy Changes Allowing Greater Public Access

BY PETER SCHEER — The courts in California are often criticized for being out of step with the rest of the country. A willingness among judges to deviate from national orthodoxy is not necessarily a bad thing, however.
Just this week the administrative arm of the California Supreme Court adopted a rule providing public access to [...]

What kind of Governor would Jerry Brown be? Don’t try to check his gubernatorial record. It’s locked up until 2038.

BY PETER SCHEER—-Attorney General Jerry Brown has taken the first formal steps toward declaring himself a candidate for Governor of California. He is, or soon will be, the deja vu candidate in a race to become the deja vu governor.
What kind of governor would Brown be? While the resumes of most candidates provide, at best, [...]

In taping a reporter, AG Brown’s spokesman showed bad judgment, but did he break the law?

BY PETER SCHEER — Attorney General Jerry Brown’s spokesman Scott Gerber was unceremoniously “disappeared” from Brown’s incipient gubernatorial campaign this week because of a lapse in judgment that, quite frankly, has been overblown. Gerber’s mistake: to surreptitiously record a  phone conversation with a reporter,  which was later discovered because Gerber, in a plea for changes [...]

With news jobs vanishing, why are journalism schools still enrolling students?

BY PETER SCHEER—As I read about the latest contractions in the newsroom of the New York Times (100 reporters and editors) and the San Francisco Chronicle (investigative reporting staff–gone), the question occurs: Why are universities across the country continuing to churn out journalism graduates? Do they know something that the rest of us don’t? Do [...]

Woodward’s “leaked” Aghanistan report was declassified. How could that happen without Obama’s OK?

BY PETER SCHEER—On Monday, Washington Post investigative reporter nonpareil Bob Woodward caused a tremor inside the Beltway with an exclusive account of  Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s 66-page report to President Barack Obama, warning that without the deployment of more US troops, the administration’s Afghanistan policy will fail.
There has followed the usual Washington parlor game of pundits [...]

NEW name, NEW website, Bigger role, Same mission

Welcome to our new website. In addition to a new home (and address) on the internet, we are also announcing our new name. Instead of “California First Amendment Coalition,” the name given this organization at its birth in 1988, we are now just “FIRST AMENDMENT COALITION.” We shrunk our name to confirm our expanding role [...]

Government officials use personal email and texting to avoid public access laws. Why not use technology to enhance accountability instead of to subvert it?

By PETER SCHEER—All public officials favor open government in principle. Who would dare say otherwise? In reality, however, they are in a perpetual search, guided by clever lawyers, for new ways to circumvent disclosure requirements–at best, because they view requests for records as a nuisance, and at worst, because they have something to hide (which [...]

How to get judges, lawyers and Sharon Stone to follow open-court rules?

BY PETER SCHEER—With one unforgettable gesture–the uncrossing and crossing of her legs—actress Sharon Stone famously demonstrated that, physically speaking, she has nothing to hide. Her legal affairs, however, are another matter.
Despite court rules mandating openness in judicial proceedings, Stone was recently allowed to file a suit in Los Angeles Superior Court under conditions of secrecy [...]

Information wants to be free, but the creators of information need to eat. Whether to charge for journalism online is fundamentally a question about legal rights.

By Peter Scheer
A debate rages in what remains of the newspaper industry over the question of whether papers should charge for their content online or, as most papers now do, give it away for free in hopes of reaping faster overall revenue growth through internet advertising. As more and more publications contemplate their own [...]

Newspaper finance crisis: Nonprofit model no panacea but may be part of the answer

By Donal Brown
Like the economy generally, the newspaper industry’s financial crisis deepens daily with reports of bankruptcies, layoffs and closings. The prospect that this downward spiral could leave the country, or large parts of it, without a vigorous press to uncover news of vital interest has fueled interest in alternative business models–notably [...]

To take the sleaze out of judicial elections, ethics rules should bar lawyers who contribute money to judges from practicing before those judges

By Peter Scheer
In America, a judge ordinarily may not take a “gift” of money from a person or company appearing before him in a legal case. Such a brazen assault on judicial independence is plainly unethical and potentially criminal.
Suppose, however, we alter the facts slightly so that the money is offered as a contribution to [...]

Prop 8 Supreme Court hearing is best evidence yet for allowing cameras into the courtroom

By Peter Scheer
The California Supreme Court’s hearing yesterday in the Prop 8 case–broadcast live over the internet via streaming video–erased any doubt about the wisdom of allowing cameras into the nation’s courts.
Let’s hope US Supreme Court Justices David Souter, Stephen Breyer, Anthony Kennedy, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas were watching the oral arguments on [...]

Nonprofits to downsizing law firms: Loan us your laid off junior lawyers; we'll return them when the economy recovers

By Peter Scheer
A mind is a terrible thing to waste. So is a highly skilled and expensively trained junior lawyer at a large law firm.
That is what law firms across the country must be thinking as they hand out pink slips to very talented, but now underutilized, young lawyers (aka “associates”): over 1,200 in just [...]

Proposition

Psst: Wanna buy Barack Obama’s email address?
By Peter Scheer
What would you pay to have President Obama’s new private (and secure) email address?
Two weeks ago I wrote in this space about efforts by Barack Obama’s aides to get him to surrender his Blackberry, on which Obama had relied to escape the bubble that descends on leading [...]

Obama's new openness policies are a big deal, and NOT just for journalists

By Tom Blanton
NPR, All Things Considered—Wednesday, in his first set of presidential orders, President Obama instructed federal agencies to be more responsive to Freedom of Information requests. It’s part of his promise to increase transparency in government.
Every military veteran, every senior citizen, every private business ought to be cheering the president on because those are [...]

Commentary

AG Jerry Brown’s decision to oppose Prop 8 in the Supreme Court will, ironically, only help the pro-Prop 8 forces
By Peter Scheer
The California Supreme Court, in one of its most important cases, is weighing a challenge to Prop 8, the constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. If the Court upholds Prop 8, one of the people [...]

Commentary

Obama should just say ‘No’ to aides who, worried about FOIA, say he must give up beloved Blackberry
By Peter Scheer
Barack Obama, so far as we know, has two addictions: cigarettes and his Blackberry cell phone. While his wife leans on him to give up the cigarettes, his staff aides have been insisting he retire the [...]

Commentary

Prop 8’s victory, reinstating ban on same sex marriage, is big loss for California Supreme Court, but damage not irreparable
By Peter Scheer
Although its name did not even appear on the ballot, the California Supreme Court was perhaps the state’s biggest loser in Tuesday’s historic elections. The voters’ narrow approval of Proposition 8 effectively reverses the [...]

Commentary

Disclosure–or the lack of it–is a major cause of the current financial crisis
By Peter Scheer
Economists and historians will be debating for years the causes of the financial crisis that, like a global array of dominoes, now threatens to take down the “real” economies of countries big and small, both “developed” and “emerging,” in a massive [...]

CFAC awards

CFAC announces awards to FOES and friends of free speech, open government. “Darkness Awards” zap Orange County judge, Capistrano school board, San Bernardino assessor
The California First Amendment Coalition has named the 2008 recipients of its “Darkness Award,” given in recognition of conduct that thwarts freedom of speech and the public’s right to know. The [...]

News

New state law adds protections for anonymous online speech
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed a bill that greatly strengthens the right to anonymous speech online. Assembly Bill 2433 raises procedural obstacles to out-of-state companies that subpoena California-based internet service providers for the IDs of anonymous posters. Unless there is a demonstrable basis for [...]

Editorial

LA Times editorial backs CFAC suit against State Bar
The LA Times, in its lead editorial in today’s newspaper, endorsed CFAC’s lawsuit (filed together with UCLA Professor Richard Sander) to force the California State Bar to make available records needed for Sander’s research on affirmative action in law schools. CFAC’s mission is to provide access–subject [...]

Response

Equal Justice Society Criticizes CFAC Suit against State Bar for records on affirmative action. Group Says Issue is Privacy, not Political Correctness.
CFAC’s lawyer responds.
CFAC’s executive director recently criticized the California State Bar for its refusal to cooperate with a UCLA professor who is seeking bar records for academic research on affirmative action in law school [...]

Commentary

Recent court decisions transform legal tools for protecting free speech into an instrument for the suppression of the public’s speech and access rights
By James Chadwick
Recent decisions by two California Courts of Appeal have turned California’s anti-SLAPP law into a legal Frankenstein’s monster. In doing so, they have turned a law designed to protect the [...]

CFAC News

Using Trade Agreements As a Tool to Further Rights of Free Speech
By Luke Eric Peterson
Embassy: As the curtain fell on the Beijing Olympic Games, a U.S.-based coalition is striving to keep the spotlight squarely focused on China.
The California First Amendment Coalition (CFAC) is urging the U.S. government to launch a formal complaint against China at [...]

Commentary

CFAC files suit in affirmative action case to defend researcher’s academic freedom and oppose State Bar’s claim that it is above the law of access
By Peter Scheer
Richard Sander, a highly regarded UCLA law professor and statistician, is conducting research with important implications for higher education. To complete the research, which has been the subject [...]

CFAC News

CFAC, scholars sue CA State Bar for access to records on affirmative action
A debate about the effects of affirmative action in higher education has moved from the classroom to the courtroom following the filing today of a lawsuit against the State Bar of California to force it to disclose years of statistical records on bar [...]

Commentary

Security plans for the Democratic convention in Denver must be changed to make room for dissent
By Benjamin Grant Ladner
The upcoming Democratic National Convention inspires optimism among many advocates for free-speech and open government; an Obama presidency, should it come to pass, is seen as a welcome opportunity to redraw the balance between government secrecy [...]

Press Release

Foreign media at Olympics urged to press home governments to demand China lift internet censorship
(CFAC, 8/1/08) A free speech organization leading a legal challenge to China’s internet-censorship has called on news media covering the Olympics to demand that China tear down “The Great Firewall”–the elaborate system of filters blocking access to online content deemed objectionable [...]

CFAC News

Judge Kozinski, controversial conservative and free speech supporter, to speak at Oct. 18 Assembly
Acclaimed–and controversial–jurist Alex Kozinski, Chief Judge of the US Court of Appeals (for the Ninth Circuit), will be the featured speaker at CFAC’s 2008 Free Speech and Open Government Assembly at UC Berkeley. He will speak on Saturday, Oct 18.
Judge Kozinski, appointed [...]

Self-evident truths

On Independence Day 2008, words to remember from Independence Day 1776:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among [...]

Commentary

Don’t pass new laws to try to curb the abuses of paparazzi. To force the paparazzi to clean up their act, turn the cameras on them.
By Peter Scheer
You know summer is here when hordes of paparazzi descend, locust-like, on southern California beaches, angering locals as they pursue money-shots of sun-tanning celebrities—while politicians, seeing an opportunity [...]

Commentary

PLAYING HIDE AND SEEK WITH PUBLIC RECORDS
By Karl Olson
It’s not unusual for newspapers, or lawyers in Public Records Act or Freedom of Information Act cases, to accuse the government of trying to “hide” things. Now a San Bernardino County case has revealed what may be a criminal attempt at hiding public records, just in [...]

CFAC News

California First Amendment Coalition to Tell Congressional Commission that China’s Internet Censorship Violates WTO Treaties

CFAC, June 16, 2008–The California First Amendment Coalition (CFAC) will testify before a Congressional commission this week concerning the Chinese government’s system of internet censorship, which CFAC is challenging as a violation of free trade treaties enforced by the World Trade [...]

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