While Janet Reno was Attorney General, the Justice Department's policy in considering Freedom of Information Act requests leaned towards disclosure. Attorney General John Ashcroft revised the policy In October 2001, imposing new restrictions on the information. He directed agencies "to carefully consider national security, effective law enforcement and personal privacy before releasing information."

Ashcroft also said the Justice Department would defend agencies' decisions not to release information if there was a ``sound legal basis'' for such withholding under FOIA. Under the Reno policy, Justice would defend an agency's withholding information only when the agency reasonably foresaw that disclosure would harm an interest protected by an FOIA exemption.

Turns out, Ashcroft's restrictions have had little effect on the amount of information released. A report released today by the General Accounting Office surveyed almost half of the FOIA officials at government agencies. Some findings:

Forty-eight percent of surveyed government officials who handle FOIA requests said they noticed no changes in what their agencies release to the general public since Ashcroft changed the Justice Department's FOIA memorandum. Only a third of the officials -- 31 percent -- said their agencies release less information to the public because of Ashcroft's 2001 directive, according to the General Accounting Office, Congress's watchdog arm. Of that 31 percent, only 8 percent saw more than a slight decrease, the GAO report said. [link via Behind the Homefront]

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It should be any day now--maybe even tomorrow. Wesley Clark has summoned his top aides to Little Rock to strategize his presidential bid.

Top advisors include: George Bruno, a New Hampshire activist; Mark Fabiani, former spokesman for the Clinton White House; Ron Klain, a strategist in Al Gore's 2000 campaign; and Washington lawyer Bill Oldaker.

Is it too late? Probably not.

A Clark White House bid would grab the political spotlight and undercut the strength of several in the nine-way Democratic race. However, he would be competing against more experienced politicians with more money and deeper staffs. An Internet-fueled draft-Clark movement has developed the seeds of a campaign and more than $1 million in pledges.

There's a nice profile of Clark today in the Memphis Commercial Appeal.

Right now Dean and Gephardt are tied in the latest Iowa poll. Kerry moves backward (in our view) as his top communications director resigns over campaign differences. Dean leads Kerry in the latest New Hampshire polls. Kerry challenged Dean to a one-on-one debate yesterday and Dean refused, saying it would be unfair to the other challengers.

We won't be surpised to see the race boil down to Dean and Clark, although Gephardt clearly has some support. Daily Kos sees it much the same way, except for Lieberman, who he thinks is stronger than we do.

Kerry looks like he's floundering, especially with Lehane's resignation. And Clark upstages him on the military credentials front. Edwards now has to share the stage with another Southerner. Graham is literally irrelevant.

Gep and Lieberman, while losing some support, should do fine. As should Dean. If Clark enters, this race will come down to those four. Everyone else will just be garnish.

If Bill Clinton endorses Clark, that could be a major plus for Clark.

Update: Why the recall decision is correct.

Just off the wires:

A federal appeals court postponed California's Oct. 7 gubernatorial recall election, ruling the historic vote cannot proceed as scheduled because some votes would be cast using outmoded punch-card ballot machines. [link via Atrios]

Here's more from the San Francisco Chronicle:

a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Monday it is unacceptable that six counties would be using outdated punch-card ballots, the type that sparked the "hanging chads" litigation in Florida during the 2000 presidential election.

The appellate panel agreed with the American Civil Liberties Union that the voting machines were prone to error and that Davis' fate could be decided later. By that time, the counties have promised to replace their punch-card machines under a court order in separate litigation.

The counties include the state's most populous region, Los Angeles, in addition to Mendocino, Sacramento, San Diego, Santa Clara and Solano. They represented 44 percent of the state's registered voters during the 2000 election.

You can read the 66 page opinion here.

Update: As always, Howard Bashman of How Appealing has the bottom line on the decision:

Cheers for The Boss, Bruce Springsteen. An opponent of the death penalty, Springsteen allowed an anti-death penalty group to have a booth at his North Carolina concert this past Saturday. He did the same in 2000.

When Springsteen played shows in Charlotte and Raleigh in 2000, he dedicated a song each night to the statewide death penalty abolition group and encouraged the audience to support it. Before the shows, PFADP volunteers met members of the E Street Band and Springsteen met with PFADP's executive director.

"Bruce Springsteen makes the connection between the lives portrayed in his songs and the ones reflected in our death penalty system in North Carolina: people struggling through hard lives, a random few of whom are extinguished by this broken, corrupt system we call capital punishment," said PFADP Executive Director Stephen Dear. "We are grateful that he is willing to make this statement time and again. We only wish he did not have to."

Presidential contender John Edwards (D-NC) will be officially announcing his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for President tonight on Jon Stewart's The Daily Show, on Comedy Central.

The Charlotte Observer has an excellent series on Edwards beginning with Easy smile hides iron will to win.

Wesley Clark's troops are ready for action. They are opening offices in Manchester, NH and Columbia, SC.

Meetups are taking the place of town hall meetings. Clark supporters organized 200 around the country that were held last Monday. Howard Dean has the largest meetup congregation with 110,000 members who have signed up to go to meetings in 600 cities. [thanks to Hamster for the Edwards link]

Denver's Rocky Mountain News features Colorado bloggers today. We think they did a first-rate job and hope you will give it a read.

It seems like every other day there's a new poll showing Bush's approval rating dropping. Today's comes from the latest ABC News / Washington Post poll:

A new ABC News/Washington Post poll finds significant trouble for the president on domestic issues and the war alike. Disapproval of his work on the economy, jobs, the deficit and health care has spiked to career highs. His request to spend an additional $87 billion on Iraq is unpopular; concern about getting bogged down there has jumped and most say the administration doesn't have a clear plan to deal with it.

The poll shows Americans think the economy is a bigger problem than Iraq:

By a 24-point margin, 61-37 percent, Americans now say the economy is a bigger problem than terrorism...Overall, 70 percent say the economy is in bad shape, up dramatically from 29 percent when Bush took office; and while 28 percent think it's improving, 31 percent say it's getting worse.... Bush's approval rating for handling the economy is its lowest since he took office — 42 percent approve, 56 percent disapprove.

The poll has Bush's overall approval rating down to 58%. His approval rating on Iraq is down to 52%--from 70%... and his ratings on the handling of the federal budget and health insurance are the lowest since he took office.

ABC News was invited to Guantanamo to report on conditions. It's important to note that they were not given unrestricted access. Nor were they allowed to film everything they saw. It sounds like a Government-censored visit -- one that was conducted for the purpose of attempting to boost the public's image and opinion of the prison camp. Several months ago we spoke with a cameraman right after he returned from a trip there to film a segment of Jim Lehrer's News Hour. He told us everything he saw looked fine, but they were kept at a distance from the where the prisoners were held. It was a very controlled tour. It sounded like the equivalent of being shown a "model unit" of a new housing development

The Administration is planning on keeping the detainees for many years--most of them will continue to be held without charges, trials or lawyers. Conservative legal columnist Stuart Taylor says, ""I think it's maybe the most lawless set of actions the United States government has taken in my lifetime."

Then there is this chilling disclosure:

In fact, even as the military at Guantanamo Bay tried to show ABCNEWS that life behind the prison's fences is more than humane, some top Bush administration officials are said to like the idea that Guantanamo frightens its inmates. They are said to be investigating whether it would be possible to send some Iraqi prisoners there.

A top administration official estimated it could take the better part of 10 years before many of those held at Guantanamo get out. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has said most probably will be held until the war against terrorism ends.

A recent report we read said there are about 650 detainees in Guantanamo. The ABC News report says they come from 42 different countries, three are teenagers and 31 have attempted suicide. None, as far as we know, have been charged with a crime.

We were curious why Pete Rose was on our plane to Denver yesteray--he sat in the row in front of us. He is a really big, beefy guy. We couldn't figure out who he was at first, but after a few people approached for autographs, we figured it out. Anyway, this might have something to do with his Denver appearance: The John Elway golf tournament which is going on this week.

From the Boulder Daily Camera:

Baseball Hall of Famer Mike Schmidt, who's also playing this week at the Elway Classic, has been one of the major big-name backers of Pete Rose in his bid to be reinstated by major league baseball. Schmidt, a former teammate of Rose, and Johnny Bench and Joe Morgan met this summer with commissioner Bud Selig to make their case for Rose, who was banned for allegedly gambling on the game.

Rose "is a good friend and he needs support, so I've been working with the commissioner," Schmidt said Thursday, adding that Selig will likely announce a decision on the matter during the World Series. "I'm optimistic, but that's just my feeling," Schmidt said.

A decision is due on Rose this fall.

A mock trial was held at Harvard in July over whether he should be reinstated. Catherine Crier presided, Johnny Cochran represented Rose and Alan Dershowitz argued against reinstating Rose. The jury came back in favor of his reinstatement. You can watch a video of the trial here.

We agree with the mock jury. We don't think the fact that he had a gambling problem and may have bet on baseball games should keep him out of the Hall of Fame, if he otherwise deserves to be there.

Here's our Sunday reading wrap-up. The weather is too beautiful for us to stay inside any more today. Back tonight.

Daily Kos on the Observer's count that there are 6,000 dead and wounded US in Iraq.

David Neiwert of Orcinus on the impropriety of the L. Jean Lewis appointment to a high level Pentagon post. Atrios has more.

Jeanne D'Arc of Body and Soul on Arnold's illegal pose--seems he came to America as an undocumented worker.

Skippy on the irony of Tommy Chong's jail sentence for internet bong-selling.

Happy birthday to Jim Capazzola of Rittenhouse Review who turns 40.

For something completely different, Andrew Northrup of Poor Man reports on rapper 50 cents recent brush with death.

Chesa Boudin (son of recently paroled Kathy Boudin) on Children Left Behind in the Nation.

Eric Olson at Blogcritics has a roundup of Johnny Cash links. [link via Instapundit.] We rode past San Quentin Friday and Saturday on the way to Sonoma from the San Francisco airport and could not stop thinking about Johnny Cash. We're still thinking about him. He was so large a figure to us. Maybe because among the first songs we learned to play on the guitar way back when were Cocaine Blues, Folsom Prison Blues and Long Black Veil. We played them incessantly--the chords were really easy. And even though we can't carry a tune, we sang them really loud while we played. We don't have a guitar around the house, but we'd bet if someone handed us one, we could still play them by heart. The only other song we can say that about is the Rolling Stones' "Dead Flowers."

The Associated Press reports that anti-terror laws are being used increasingly against "common criminals."

Bush is calling for expanded Patriot Act powers.

The San Francisco Chronicle says the Patriot Act went too far and Americans are rising up against it. The Miami Herald notes the sweeping new powers have few checks:

Two years into the war on terrorism, federal law enforcers conduct secret searches, indefinitely detain ''special interest'' suspects and mine data bases for personal information on Americans. Yet we still don't know how effective our government has been in protecting our homeland.

It's time for Congress and Americans to press the administration for straight talk and smart policy. In no case should Congress grant greater federal policing powers unless the administration demonstrates that it hasn't abused the broad power it now wields with the Patriot Act and that there would be sufficient oversight.

Doug Giebel in Counterpunch says we are ending America as we know it.

Here's why Bush's call to bypass grand juries and for unprecedented subpoena powers is likely to meet with resistance. We posted the defense bar's objections here .

Don't miss Infoshop News' sourced and footnoted article on the dangers and false solutions in the Bush War on Terror.

The hypocrisy of the U.S. "war on terrorism" may be quite shameless, but this doesn't mean that anti-U.S. terrorism is a myth. It's a deadly serious matter that requires a serious response. The Bush administration has indeed responded -- with foreign invasions, high profile arrests that lead nowhere in particular, the black hole of Guantanamo Bay, endless hyped alerts, and the Patriot acts -- that is, with publicity and fear. But looked at practically, its "war on terrorism" is a fraud. It has only increased the dangers of terrorism abroad without protecting us from terrorism at home. It has used the issue of terrorism and the "war on terrorism" to further concentrate power and wealth in the hands of the few. Ashcroft has declared that those who criticize the Patriot Act are aiding terrorism.²³ Bush says we are either with him or against him in his "war on terrorism." If we care about our safety, not to mention justice and liberty, we'd better be against him.