An employee at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis was (sort of) absolved this month after being reprimanded for reading a book about the history of the Ku Klux Klan during a break from his janitorial work last November.
The employee, Keith Sampson (also a student at the university), apparently hit a nerve with coworkers when they noticed […]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Freedom of Speech on Mar 9th, 2008
The website Stop the ACLU posted an interesting video this week of a 1986 “Crossfire” segment in which rock musician Frank Zappa takes issue with the practice of censoring explicit song lyrics.
In the clip, Zappa is under attack from all sides—especially from Washington Times reporter John Lofton and conservative pundit Robert Novak—in defending his notion […]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Uncategorized on Mar 9th, 2008
A Connecticut high school junior is suing her school after administrators disciplined her for using “vulgar speech” on a personal blog.
The student, who was upset about the cancellation of a music festival, called the administration “douchebags” and implored other students contact the school superintendent and “piss him off.”
The school subsequently banned the girl from […]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Uncategorized on Mar 9th, 2008
After releasing more than 4,000 pages relating to presidential pardons issued in the final days of Bill Clinton’s presidency (documents obtained this week through a FOIA request entered in 2006…!), Clinton’s legal counsel announced it would withhold an additional 1,500 pages relating to the pardons.
Clinton’s camp claims the exclusions are permitted by the FOIA’s exemption […]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Freedom of Religion on Mar 9th, 2008
An Army soldier who says his promotion was denied because he is atheist filed a new suit this week against several military leaders.
Spc. Jeremy Hall had attempted to hold a meeting with fellow soldiers last fall during which he planned to discuss atheism and other subjects. When his commanding officers told him he could not […]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Uncategorized on Mar 3rd, 2008
Learn to become a master of FOIA-Filing in 4 Easy Steps!
Read Full Post »
Posted in Freedom of Speech on Mar 3rd, 2008
In a rather odd case that has snaked its way through the courts for more than two years, the Virginia Supreme Court upheld charges against a man charged with violating a Virginia state law against sending unsolicited commercial “spam” emails.
The statute prescribes felony charges for anyone who:
“Uses a computer or computer network with the […]
Read Full Post »
A student at Valdosta State University in Georgia, expelled last year for posting activist flyers on Facebook, says he still doesn’t understand why the administration took such extreme action against him.
The student, Hayden Barnes, was attempting to raise awareness about a new parking garage development being built on campus when he posted the flyer in […]
Read Full Post »
The Huffington Post reports that despite city officials’ initial insinuations that the entire “City of St. Paul” would be fully open to demonstrators during the Republican National Convention this fall, new city plans say otherwise:
“The guidelines include a primary event area… a secondary event area (a wider perimeter, the boundaries of which are yet […]
Read Full Post »
Another update of a previous story: A federal judge ruled Friday that the leaked-documents website WikiLeaks would be allowed to re-open after initially being shut down for posting confidential bank documents.
The unusual case involved internal documents from the Cayman Islands branch of Swiss bank Julius Baer, purported to include highly damaging information regarding money laundering […]
Read Full Post »
