News & Opinion

Anonymous speech, although constitutionally protected, is mostly digital graffiti. Freedom of expression means taking responsibility for what you write. By Peter Scheer A Chinese blogger, defying a government censorship decree, publishes information about the crash of a military transport plane. Another blogger, an Egyptian, posts photos of the scarred body of a teenager who was tortured by Egyptian police. Both bloggers are anonymous. No one can doubt these speakers’ need to hide their identities. Their

Readers respond to article criticizing anonymous postings Amen. -Mark Baird Alameda CA — The author reveals to us that his name is Peter Scheer and he works for something called the California First Amendment Coalition. However we do not know who financed and established the organization or whether the author represents a client, or who that client may be. I suspect he does in fact represent a client organization that he is reluctant to reveal

2007 Open Government Legislative Roundup: Some successes and some failures By Nick Rahaim The 2007 legislative session started with a host of promising bills that would have created more transparency and would have reversed recent judicial and Attorney General opinions permitting excessive secrecy. There were some successes and some disappointments. The major disappointment was the failure to overturn the 2006 state Supreme Court decision in Copley Press v. Superior Court, which effectively sealed all police