The Obama administration is appealing a judge’s ruling that Secret Service records of White House visitors come under the Freedom of Information Act and must be disclosed to the public. The Justice Department claims the records are presidential records not agency records so not subject to the FOIA. -db From Politico, October 14, 2011, by Josh Gerstein. Full story
The Catawba Valley Community College dropped charges against a student, allowing him back on campus after they suspended him for two semesters for criticizing the college’s aggressive marketing of a debit card company to its students. But the college has yet to change its policy regarding free speech online and is still requiring the student to notify the college when using computers on campus. -db From a commentary for Foundation for Individual Rights in Education
The Electronic Freedom Foundation criticizes a plan concocted by the Conservative government and the Christian group, Mothers’ Union to provide filters to customers who want to block sites offering pornography, gambling, information about self-harm, etc. Eva Galerin and Jillian C. York say that the plan’s flaws include the vagueness of the blocked categories, the unknown origins of the list of sites and the leeway for overblocking. -db From a commentary for the Electronic Freedom Foundation,
The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the case of a California man held criminally liable for lying about his military exploits. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the man’s lies were permissible under the First Amendment. A dissenting judge wrote that the Supreme Court had already established that false statements of fact are not protected speech. -db From the Courthouse News Service, October 17, 2011, by Barbara Leonard. Full story
A federal judge in California ruled that writers and producers of “The Hurt Locker,” a film about bomb-disposal in Iraq, were protected by the First Amendment in presenting important information about a public issue. A soldier sued the film-makers for benefiting from his identity without permission. “The court found, however, that on-screen depictions of the lead character were sufficiently ‘transformative’ to bring the material within the scope of First Amendment protection,” writes Kristen Rasmussen for