{"id":5899,"date":"2004-07-01T13:19:12","date_gmt":"2004-07-01T20:19:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/2004\/07\/01\/we-want-information-6.html"},"modified":"2004-07-01T13:19:12","modified_gmt":"2004-07-01T20:19:12","slug":"we_want_informa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/07\/01\/we_want_informa.html","title":{"rendered":"We want … information<\/i>"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Bush Administration is not known for being forthcoming with information (even compared to the normal bureaucracy). This particular excuse<\/a>, though, takes the cake.<\/p>\n

The Bush administration is offering a novel reason for denying a request seeking the Justice Department’s database on foreign lobbyists: Copying the information would bring down the computer system.
\n“Implementing such a request risks a crash that cannot be fixed and could result in a major loss of data, which would be devastating,” wrote Thomas J. McIntyre, chief in the Justice Department’s office for information requests.<\/p>\n

Wow. Hope Mr McIntyre is looking for another job pretty quickly.<\/p>\n

“What they’re asking for is a lot, and it’s not something at this particular point in time we have the technical ability to do,” Justice Department spokesman Bryan Sierra said Tuesday.
\nMcIntyre explained in a May 24 letter that the computer system — operated in the counterespionage section of the Justice Department’s criminal division — “was not designed for mass export of all stored images” and said the system experiences “substantial problems.”
\n“It sounds like incredible negligence for an agency that is keeping public records to keep them in such a precarious condition,” said Stephen Doig, interim director at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University. “I’ve never heard the excuse that making the equivalent of a backup copy would somehow cause steam to rise out of the computer.”
\nThe government said an overhaul of the system should be finished by December and copies should be available then.<\/p>\n

Well, there’s a difference between a backup copy and a full report of all the data in the database. That’s probably a heck of a lot of data.<\/p>\n

Still, it all sounds pretty dubious to me.<\/p>\n

Paper copies of records still are available for review four hours each day for people willing to travel to Washington, the Justice Department noted. Williams said the index available to researchers there is at least 12 months outdated, “which kind of renders it useless.”<\/p>\n

Indeed. So the system is so precarious that even creating an index of just the last year is beyond its capability? Gimme a break.<\/p>\n

(via Doyce<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Bush Administration is not known for being forthcoming with information (even compared to the normal bureaucracy). This particular excuse, though, takes the cake. The Bush administration is offering a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics-law"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":13207,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/06\/24\/justice_may_be_blind_but.html","url_meta":{"origin":5899,"position":0},"title":"Justice may be blind, but she’s leaning a bit to the right","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 24-Jun-08 1:12pm","format":false,"excerpt":"The Justice Department's Inspector General has found significant bias in an honors hiring program in the federal prosecutors department -- a bias toward recruiting conservatives and rejecting liberals. \u201cMany qualified...","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12526,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/04\/02\/do_what_thou_wilt.html","url_meta":{"origin":5899,"position":1},"title":"“Do What Thou Wilt”","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 2-Apr-08 6:57am","format":false,"excerpt":"Spiffy -- a newly declassified 2003 Justice Dept. memo (rescinded 9 months later) that told the Defense Dept. it could do pretty much anything it wanted when it came to...","rel":"","context":"In "Geopolitical Brouhaha"","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9250,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/08\/01\/feds_appeal_rul.html","url_meta":{"origin":5899,"position":2},"title":"Feds appeal ruling loss in the EFF\/AT&T case","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 1-Aug-06 3:05pm","format":false,"excerpt":"A few weeks back, Judge Vaughan Walker ruled that the EFF suit against AT&T for allegedly turning over phone records to the NSA -- an arguably illegal act -- could...","rel":"","context":"In "Homeland Security"","block_context":{"text":"Homeland Security","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/homeland-security"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":135022,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/10\/09\/well-president-means-not-illegal.html","url_meta":{"origin":5899,"position":3},"title":"“Well, when the president does it, that means it is not illegal”","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 9-Oct-17 3:13pm","format":false,"excerpt":"That was Nixon's comment to David Frost\u00a0, and seems to be the Justice Department's response to civil suits raised regarding the Trump administration hypothetically destroying records that it's required by law to retain. Such shenanigans have been mentioned in various news reports, but an effort to put the White House\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/unnamed-3.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":13017,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2008\/08\/15\/seeking_justice_from_just.html","url_meta":{"origin":5899,"position":4},"title":"Seeking justice from Justice","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 15-Aug-08 7:10pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Given the failure of the Attorney General to follow up on the illegal politicization of attorney hiring at the Justice Dept (which included the odd statement for an Attorney General...","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":271,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/05\/12\/99_by_515.html","url_meta":{"origin":5899,"position":5},"title":"99 by 515","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 12-May-03 7:30pm","format":false,"excerpt":"One song. 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