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GSA Turns To GPO’s Partnership With Google To Offer Free Government Publications Online
Press Release from GPO: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: April 5, 2011 No. 11-17 GSA TURNS TO GPO'S PARTNERSHIP WITH GOOGLE TO OFFER FREE GOVERNMENT PUBLICATIONS ONLINE WASHINGTON-The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) is working with the U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO) and GPO's relationship with the Google Book Partner Program to make popular Government publications available for free electronic download through Google. The program is making available 100 consumer-related Federal Government publications distributed through GSA's Federal Citizen Information Center (FCIC) on Google Books. The public can view and download PDF copies of these publications on desktops, laptops, and various e-readers. The FCIC plans to add more consumer publications to the program. The public can also order hard copies of the publications on Google Books and through the GPO's Online Bookstore. The FCIC will coordinate delivery through GPO's Public Documents Distribution Center in Pueblo, Colorado. "GPO and GSA have been partners in distributing federal government publications to the American people for 40 years," said GPO's Business Products & Services Managing Director Herb Jackson. "GPO looks forward to expanding that partnership with Google in providing the public with free electronic access to popular consumer publications." ... Continue reading
Open Government and Watergate
Today, when there are active threats to open government and OMB is preparing to shut down several important open government web sites, it is a good day to remember why we have several of our most important open government laws. The Nixon Presidential Library and Museum has opened a new Watergate exhibit. Jon Wiener, who teaches history at UC Irvine and is a contributing editor to The Nation, tells the story:
- At the new Watergate Gallery, the truth finally wins out, By Jon Wiener, Los Angeles Times Op-Ed, (April 5, 2011). The Nixon Presidential Library and Museum's original exhibit about Watergate, designed in 1990 by Nixon loyalists before the National Archives took over operation of the library, explained Watergate as a third-rate burglary exploited by the president's enemies to reverse the results of the 1972 election. Now, with the long-awaited opening of the library's new Watergate exhibit, the public finally has a museum that tells the full story... ...Textbooks and journalists almost always conclude with Ford's pardon of Nixon. But the Nixon Library goes one big step further, closing with the legislation that resulted from Watergate: the broadening of the Freedom of Information Act to give individuals and journalists more tools to uncover government abuse of power; the Presidential Records Act, which forbids presidents from destroying their records; the creation of the Federal Election Commission to monitor campaign finance; and the Ethics in Government Act, which established the office of the special prosecutor. [emphasis added]
Landmark Open Government Legislation Introduced
Landmark Public Online Information Act Jointly Reintroduced In House And Senate, by Daniel Schuman, Sunlight Foundation (April 4, 2011)
Today Senator Jon Tester (D-MT) and Representative Steve Israel (D-NY) reintroduced the landmark Public Online Information Act. If enacted, POIA would bring the government into the 21st century by requiring the government to embrace the presumption that government-held information, already required to be public, must be available online. Data should be free from the shadows of obscurity and brought into the sunlight of the Internet.More: Continue reading
FBI Launches New Electronic Reading Room
The Vault is a new "electronic reading room" at fbi.gov. It contains more than 2,000 documents that have been scanned from paper into digital copies including more than 25 new files that have been released to the public but never added to the FBI website, dozens of records previously posted but removed as requests diminished, and files from the FBI's previous electronic reading room. Check out:
Hat tip to Sabrina I. Pacifici: FBI Launches New Electronic Reading Room, (April 03, 2011). Continue readingFederal Reserve releases secret loan documents
Bloomberg has obtained previously secret loan documents from the Federal Reserve Bank and has made those documents available for download (see zip file link below).
- Fed Will Release Bank Loan Data as Top Court Rejects Appeal, By Greg Stohr and Bob Ivry, Bloomberg (Mar 21, 2011). The order marks the first time a court has forced the Fed to reveal the names of banks that borrowed from its oldest lending program, the 98-year-old discount window. The disclosures, together with details of six bailout programs released by the central bank in December under a congressional mandate, would give taxpayers insight into the Fed's unprecedented $3.5 trillion effort to stem the 2008 financial panic.
- Fed Releases Discount-Window Loan Records During Crisis Under Court Order, By Craig Torres, Bloomberg (Mar 31, 2011). The Federal Reserve released thousands of pages of secret loan documents under court order, almost three years after Bloomberg LP first requested details of the central bank's unprecedented support to banks during the financial crisis.
- Foreign Banks Tapped Fed’s Secret Lifeline Most at Crisis Peak, By Bradley Keoun and Craig Torres, Bloomberg (Apr 1, 2011).
Bloomberg News is posting the Fed documents here for subscribers to the Bloomberg Professional Service as well as online at www.bloomberg.com.
- zip file [135 MB, unzips to 175 MB and 894 PDF files].
- The Bank Run We Knew So Little About, By GRETCHEN MORGENSON, New York Times (April 2, 2011)
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