Journalists: Obama all about secretive government
By Steven Thomma, McClatchy
WASHINGTON — Despite a promise of transparency, President Obama has run a secretive government that’s chilling the flow of information to reporters while it tries to channel its version of news through its own government media, according to a new report from a journalists’ group.
The report says the Obama administration has curbed the disclosure of government information, limited the use of the Freedom of Information Act, launched a program of internal surveillance to stop people from talking to reporters and conducted an unprecedented number of investigations of journalists.
The search for leaks, the report’s author said, is the most aggressive since President Richard Nixon.
“In the Obama administration’s Washington, government officials are increasingly afraid to talk to the press,” says the report by Leonard Downie Jr. for the Committee to Protect Journalists.
“There’s no question that sources are looking over their shoulders,” Michael Oreskes, a senior managing editor of the Associated Press, says in the report.