I was canvassing in Louisiana in favor of the restoration of the Gulf Coast.  While doing so, I encountered certain ordinances or other restrictive regulations that restrict access to housing in certain areas, like closed subdivisions or limit access at certain times.  I believe that having an executive government in place at the federal level that tries so hard to keep information from its citizens, allowing these type of restrictions that negatively impact canvassers's ability to disseminate information to the public is very bad.  Since it seems to be local government bodies and public officials that have either put these restrictions into place directly or else have allowed them to be adopted, we need to take a closer look to see if these actions run afoul of the First Amendment.

Newsweek has a story this week revealing that up to 30 high-ranking members of the Department of Justice threatened to resign after then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales and Chief of Staff Andrew Card tried to coerce a gravely ill John Ashcroft to authorize their domestic wiretapping program. You can read commentary here and here.

From the article:

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Let's not let Republicans take credit for a bill they wanted to kill.  The leadership were sure to drag their feet as long as they could on this bill before pushing it through the house in a matter of hours.

These are my thoughts on why they did it, how it went down, and what it means for the Progressive movement.