Get ready for Legislative Day or the next legislative action that needs your support! ALA Washington Office Offers FREE Online Advocacy Training (from ALA) Just in time for Congress' return to Washington, D.C, and designed for both veteran library advocates and those who are new to Capitol Hill, the three-part online course "Messaging and Talking with Congress: An Interactive Workshop" will help library supporters build or hone effective messages and successfully communicate library needs to Congress. The ALA Washington Office is making this course, led by popular Advocacy Guru Stephanie Vance of AdVanced Consulting, available free to ALA members! "Messaging and Talking with Congress" guides users through the process of developing messages, teaches users to communicate effectively with Members of Congress and other elected officials, and offers strategies on building lasting relationships with Congressional staff. Users may navigate the course at their own pace and download and print helpful worksheets. Visit their site to access the course. Click on the blue "course catalog" tab at the top of the screen. Select the first class "ALA Advocacy Classroom." Click "Add to cart". ALA members can take the course free of charge by entering "library" into the coupon code field and then clicking "Apply code." For more information or if you need assistance accessing the course contact: Erin Haggerty. I thank Ailine Soules at CSU East Bay for this post! Continue reading →

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Good news on for open government and better government information:

After holds dropped, Senate clears database bill By Rob Thormeyer, Government Computer News (09/08/06).

Legislation to create a central database that will track all sorts of federal spending passed the Senate last night, ending a dizzying turn of events in which a handful of senators placed and removed opposition to the bill since it cleared a committee in late July.

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Project Censored has just released their annual list of 25 socially significant news stories of social significance said to have been missed, underreported or self-censored by mainstream press in the US. I found it amazing the number of stories on their list that have to do with governments and government information. So much for the "liberal" media myth. Check out this year's stories:

1. Future of Internet Debate Ignored by Media
2. Halliburton Charged with Selling Nuclear Technologies to Iran
3. Oceans of the World in Extreme Danger
4. Hunger and Homelessness Increasing in the US
5. High-Tech Genocide in Congo
6. Federal Whistleblower Protection in Jeopardy
7. US Operatives Torture Detainees to Death in Afghanistan and Iraq
8. Pentagon Exempt from Freedom of Information Act
9. The World Bank Funds Israel-Palestine Wall
10. Expanded Air War in Iraq Kills More Civilians
11. Dangers of Genetically Modified Food Confirmed
12. Pentagon Plans to Build New Landmines
13. New Evidence Establishes Dangers of Roundup
14. Homeland Security Contracts KBR to Build Detention Centers in the US
15. Chemical Industry is EPA’s Primary Research Partner
16. Ecuador and Mexico Defy US on International Criminal Court
17. Iraq Invasion Promotes OPEC Agenda
18. Physicist Challenges Official 9-11 Story
19. Destruction of Rainforests Worst Ever
20. Bottled Water: A Global Environmental Problem
21. Gold Mining Threatens Ancient Andean Glaciers
22. $Billions in Homeland Security Spending Undisclosed
23. US Oil Targets Kyoto in Europe
24. Cheney’s Halliburton Stock Rose Over 3000 Percent Last Year
25. US Military in Paraguay Threatens Region

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Bruce Craig reports on the release of a volume of the Foreign Relations of the United States (Foreign Relations, 1964-1968, Volume XXIX, Part 2, Japan, Editor: Karen L. Gatz, General Editor: Edward C. Keefer, United States Government Printing Office, Washington, 2006, DEPARTMENT OF STATE PUBLICATION 11321).

• Controversial FRUS Volume on Japan Finally Published, Bruce Craig, writing in the newsletter of the Coalition for History (8-24-06).

What makes this volume unique is that it has been nearly ready for publication for over seven years, but owing to a handful of controversial documents relating to covert operations in Japan that for years intelligence screeners would not permit the HO to include in the volume, PART 2 JAPAN is only now seeing the light of day...but minus the intelligence agency covert operations documentation. One of the first things a reader of this volume will notice as different is the inclusion of not only the usual "Preface" but also a "Note on U.S. Covert Actions" and an "Editor's Note" posted at the beginning of the volume. Collectively, the preface and these notices serve, in essence, as disclaimers for the HO. ... Though readers of this particular FRUS volume are being denied access to the raw documentation by intelligence agencies and there is not the level of detail that one would characteristically expect to see in a volume in the FRUS series, the HO asserts it is not permitting history to be entirely rewritten because of deletions. Nevertheless, one source inside State views the volume as being "minimally acceptable" in terms of meeting FRUS legislative directives. One does wonder, however, whether the JAPAN volume is merely an anomaly, or is this practice expected to be employed more frequently in future FRUS releases in order to sidestep CIA and other intelligence agency objections.

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CNet News.com reports that surveillance of Americans by the federal government has steadily increased; that spending on securing classified information has increased to $7.7 billion; and that new justifications for not releasing unclassified government documents to the public are proliferating. None of this is good news for advocates of open government and the freedom to read.

• Post-9/11 privacy and secrecy: A report card By Declan McCullagh and Anne Broache, CNet News.com, September 8, 2006

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