freedom of the press - THE RIDGEWOOD BLOG.

Posted on October 19, 2017 October 18, 2017

Reader Explains Glen Rock Police Statement on Photos and Video Taping

This was in part prompted by an incident in which someone taking photos of an accident in Glen Rock (involving adults only with very minor injuries) was verbally assaulted by a woman who claimed to be a relative of one of the accident’s victims. Despite being told by police officers that the person had a legal right to take photos and to leave the individual alone, she continued with her verbal tirade. She was finally ordered by a Glen Rock police sergeant off the sidewalk into a waiting ambulance with her supposed relative. Turns out the woman is a Ridgewood resident and a practicing attorney. So much that fancy law degree from Fordham. Hopefully neither she nor her parents spent their life savings on it. A big Amen to freedom of the press and to freedom of assembly.

Posted on March 31, 2017 March 31, 2017

Judge Removes Order Blocking Newspaper From Reporting on Boy

A New Jersey judge has overturned an order preventing a newspaper from reporting on a child services complaint involving a kindergartener who brought drugs to school twice.

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — A judge has overturned an order preventing a newspaper from reporting on a child services complaint involving a kindergarten student who brought drugs to school twice.

Judge Lawrence De Bello ruled Monday that he found no evidence to support the state’s argument that a reporter for the Trentonian newspaper illegally obtained the complaint from the boy’s mother.

Government lawyers sought the injunction against the newspaper, saying child welfare complaints must be kept confidential under state law. The state had alleged that Trentonian reporter Isaac Avilucea stole the complaint from the mother, but he said she knew he was reporting on the story and gave it to him. She had met with him at his office earlier in the day.

The newspaper and open-government advocates argued that the previous order was a clear violation of the First Amendment. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that the government cannot prevent the press from publishing information except in extreme circumstances involving a clear and present danger.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/new-jersey/articles/2017-03-30/judge-removes-order-blocking-newspaper-from-reporting

Posted on March 20, 2015 March 20, 2015

Reader says Please keep growing TRB.com, PJ! We need it here in Ridgewood, now more than ever.

Reading_theridgewood_news_theridgewoodblog

Reader says Please keep growing TRB.com, PJ! We need it here in Ridgewood, now more than ever.

Yes, thank you PJ, and please bear in mind that if for whatever reason you stop providing this local service, not only will the sheer quantity of local public discourse immediately plummet, but its tenor and quality will also take a big hit. This is so in no small part because others whose personal political stock in trade appears to be in gratuitous humiliation and vilification of well-meaning colleagues and private citizens will be emboldened to increase the frequency and scale of their misbehavior.

With all the difficulties you can’t avoid, and must therefore endure, as a modern digital publisher of smallish size, you deserve to be recognized for your inspiring creativity, civic-mindedness, and clear devotion to essential Western values such as freedom of conscience, speech and association, virtuous self-government based on sound morality and a decent respect for the interests of one’s neighbors, and a healthy American skepticism when it comes to the stated, implied, or hidden motivations of elected and appointive government actors at all levels.

Local officeholders and policymakers, and municipal managers, employees, appointees, board members and volunteers know, or at least should know, that when it comes down to brass tacks, TRB.com exists purely for the long-term benefit of the Village, its citizens, its taxpayers, and other residents. Any solicited or unsolicited criticism that comes their way from these parts or at public meetings is meant not for the sake of negativity or to drag anyone down, but to further the best interests of the village as they are perceived in good faith by your very neighbors. Because this fact may not be readily apparent when current issues are being hotly discussed, or when commenters insist on exercising their right (within reason) to remain anonymous, it should not go unmentioned for very long, and it ought to be called to mind by all local actors on a regular basis so that as few people as possible end up with their respective noses out of joint when the dust settles. (How’s that for a public civility strategy, Mr. Mayor?)

Please keep growing TRB.com, PJ! We need it here in Ridgewood, now more than ever.

Posted on March 18, 2015 March 18, 2015

Ridgewood continues civility roundtable talks

file photo

Ridgewood continues civility roundtable talks

March 16, 2015 Last updated: Monday, March 16, 2015, 10:49 AM
By Mark Krulish
Staff Writer |
The Ridgewood News

Another round of discussions on the concept of civility took place last week, this time in the more informal and intimate setting of the first floor senior lounge at Village Hall.

The discussion, which was led by the Rev. Jan Phillips, began with the reiteration of the purpose for holding these meetings, which was not to dictate comment or limit speech, but rather to eliminate hate speech and promote understanding between people.

“I had done a program with Pastor [Gregory] Lisby of Christ Church,” Philips said. “We were talking about backlash that has been happening because of these committee meetings and he said there’s this notion that telling people how to behave civilly is such a classist thing. That’s not where we’re coming from.”

The group explored how communication and behavior can shape a person’s perspective and examples of incivility during public meetings, while also branching off into various topics that affect the community.

Hans Jurgen Lehmann, a member of the Ridgewood Zoning Board of Adjustment, noted there have been times when audience members at meetings express skepticism that professionals testifying on behalf of applicants are being truthful with the information they give to the board.

“When they listen to the experts from the applicant, they don’t trust any of those people,” Lehmann said. “They just think they’re out there to scam them, but they are very factual.

“I’m constantly puzzled, in this society that’s supposedly very democratic, why we’re so suspicious about government. I just don’t get it,” he added.

https://www.northjersey.com/news/civility-discussion-continues-in-ridgewood-1.1289918

Posted on March 14, 2015 June 27, 2021

Congressman Leonard Lance (NJ-07) Calls FCC Release of Depression-Era Net Neutrality Regulations regulatory overreach and job-killing

Congressman Leonard Lance (NJ-07) Calls FCC Release of Depression-Era Net Neutrality Regulations regulatory overreach and job-killing
Mar 12, 2015
the staff of the Ridgewood blog

WESTFIELD, N.J. — Congressman Leonard Lance (NJ-07), New Jersey’s only Republican member of the House Energy and Commerce Communications and Technology Subcommittee, commented on the Federal Communications Commission’s release of its Depression-era rules to regulate the Internet.

In January Lance stated ,the obvious to everyone except the Obama administration, “The Internet is a medium that continues to experience tremendous technological growth and today’s action by the D.C. Circuit Court striking down the FCC’s efforts to regulate the Internet protects consumers, increases competition and encourages new investment and innovation in broadband. As a member of the House Communications and Technology Subcommittee I will continue to work with my colleagues to ensure that the FCC does not overstep its authority on the issue of network neutrality.”

Lance continued his attack on Net Neutrality in February , “The Federal Communications Commission has voted in favor of a net neutrality plan that is the most dramatic government intervention in the Internet in two decades. The FCC’s proposal to regulate the Internet will hurt consumers and discourage new investment and innovation in broadband. It is Congress, not an unelected federal commission, that is tasked with modernizing our Nation’s telecommunications laws and today’s action is a blatant overstep of authority that threatens to stifle one of the Nation’s most important economic engines.”

The FCC’s Release of the Net Neutrality regs on Thursday, Rep. Leonard Lance (NJ-07), seized on the opportunity to condemn what he views as “Depression-era” rules.“The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has finally released its sweeping proposal following weeks of secrecy and stonewalling. The American People now have an opportunity to read the FCC’s 300-plus page plan to regulate the Internet as a utility — a plan I believe will hurt consumers, discourage new investment and innovation in broadband, and lead to billions of dollars in new fees and taxes. That’s why I have joined many of my colleagues on the House Communications and Technology Subcommittee and introduced H.R. 1212, the Internet Freedom Act, that will put the brakes on this FCC overreach and protect our innovators from these job-killing regulations.”

Posted on February 23, 2015 February 23, 2015

Fox’s Neil Cavuto Admits Yes Mr President its All Fox News Fault

Fox’s Neil Cavuto Admits Yes Mr President its All Fox News Fault

Fox’s Neil Cavuto breaks out the sarcasm: Yes, it was somehow Fox that caused the IRS to crack down on conservative groups, Fox that told people you could keep your doctor under Obamacare. Calling ISIS the “JV team”? The measles outbreak? Blame Fox.(Brent Bozell)
Saturday Night (Pointed) Humor: Cavuto Admits That It’s All Fox News’s Fault

By Tom Blumer | February 21, 2015 | 11:59 PM EST

Thursday on his Your World show, host Neil Cavuto went after the Obama administration’s near obsession with the coverage it gets on Fox News.

While Team Obama can count on the Big Three triumvirate of ABC, CBS and NBC to toe the line, promoting its points while generally avoiding damning information, Fox has generally remained fair and balanced, an approach which has clearly gotten under their ultra-thin skins.

The occasion for Cavuto’s rant, which veered into some impressive sarcastic humor, was Eric Holder’s claim that Fox wouldn’t have anything to talk about if it wasn’t noting the failure of the administration to call Islamic terrorism what it is, i.e., Islamic terrorism:

Transcript (bolds are mine):

NEIL CAVUTO: All right, folks. I have a confession to make.

I did it again. Eric Holder caught me.

ERIC HOLDER (taped): We spend more time, more time, talking about “What do you call it?” instead of “What do you do about it?” I mean really, y’know, y’know, if Fox didn’t talk about this, they’d have nothing else to talk about.

CAVUTO: Yeah. If not for us at Fox News making such a big deal out of saying “Islamic extremism,” no one would be making a big deal out of the White House not saying “Islamic extremism.” Not this Democratic congresswoman or this former top Obama intelligence official. They say words matter too, but it’s Fox News making the big stink, so, well that’s all that matters now.

And it got me thinking. You know it happens sometimes. I know, I’ve heard this before, this whole White House mentioning this Fox News thing before.

(shows a series of derisive or negative references to Fox News by Barack Obama and Josh Earnest)

CAVUTO: Well, I am so busted. Pick a crisis, any crisis, you name it. Fox News is behind it. Worse yet, Fox News created it. And I’m here to admit the White House ain’t telling you the half of it. How clever we are, how devious we are. If only I had known that you had known.

If only I had known that Fox News said you could keep your doctor when you couldn’t keep your doctor, and it wasn’t the President saying that.

Or that it was Fox News’s plan to send your health insurance premiums skyrocketing and not the President’s plan.

Or that Fox news dismissed ISIS as “the jayvee team” and not anyone on the President’s team.

Or FOX News was the one spying on our very own James Rosen, and not the Justice Department spying on our very own James Rosen.

That Fox News was the one targeting conservative groups, and not the IRS targeting conservative groups.

Very clever. God knows what other controversies we caused. I’m sure it’s just a matter of time before it all comes out.

So let me just fess up now and spill the beans. Everything bad, Every time … Fox!

All this frigid weather? Yeah, Fox News. Don’t ask, we just did it.

This whole measles outbreak thing? Bingo! Fox News!

This tepid economic recovery? Sorry, Fox News.

The housing meltdown that preceded it? You guessed it. Fox News started it.

The Internet bubble? Fox News created it, then we burst it so could keep milking it.

The energy crisis back in the 1970s: Fox News — which is amazing, because we weren’t even around in the 70s!

But that didn’t stop us from having a role in the JFK assassination. Yeah, that was a Fox News guy in the grassy knoll.

The Titanic. Yeah, the captain, see the captain? So Rupert Murdoch wth a beard, don’t you think? And now you know why the movie was so good. We damn near wrote the script!

Pearl Harbor: Fox News knew the Japanese were coming!

The potato famine. Even Fox News’s Irish-American anchors (i.e., Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity — Ed.) did nothing, nothing to stop it from coming. They’re the culprits!

“Tsunamis: Fox News! Earthquakes: Fox News! Tornadoes: Fox News!

That meteor hit in Russia that blasted buildings a couple of years back? Well, (that was) Fox’s little Putin payback.

Oh yeah-yeah-yeah, this goes way back, to the Dinosaurs: Fox News killed them off.

And the Big Bang? Fox News started life itself up, only to toy with all living creatures since, and make a mockery of political leaders today.

– See more at: https://newsbusters.org/blogs/tom-blumer/2015/02/21/saturday-night-pointed-humor-cavuto-admits-its-all-fox-newss-fault#sthash.GzLAOv4L.dpuf

Posted on February 21, 2015 February 21, 2015

The Government’s War on Freedom of the Press

The Government’s War on Freedom of the Press
Press freedom has declined in recent years.
Ken Silva | February 21, 2015

The U.S. plummeted to a dismal 49th place on the Reporters Without Borders annual Press Freedom Index, marking the country’s second lowest ranking since the list was created in 2002 and its lowest since 2006. Other countries ranked in the 40s and 50s include Haiti, Mongolia, and Chile .

The index cited “judicial harassment” of New York Times reporter James Risen, the arbitrary arrest of at least 15 journalists during the Ferguson, Missouri clashes, and the fact that U.S. journalists are still not legally entitled to protect sources who reveal confidential information about their work.

The U.S.’s slip in press freedom rankings mirrors its seven-place drop in Freedom House’s Global Press Freedom Index from 2013-2014, though the country still ranks among the 14 percent of countries whose press is classified as “free” in the latter scale.

Reality may be even worse than the rankings suggest. Legal protections for the press have only eroded since the 2006 trough year when the Bush Administration threatened to prosecute Risen for publishing stories chronicling warrantless wiretapping of citizens’ phone calls.

https://reason.com/archives/2015/02/21/the-governments-war-on-freedom-of-the-pr

Posted on February 6, 2015 February 5, 2015

64% of reporters say Feds spying on their email, calls, online searches

64% of reporters say Feds spying on their email, calls, online searches

By Paul Bedard | February 5, 2015 | 5:28 pm

In a survey of investigative reporters that makes Richard Nixon’s enemies list look like child’s play, nearly seven in 10 said they believe that the Obama administration has spied on their phone calls, emails and online searches.

According to a Pew Research Center survey of 454 media figures, 64 percent “believe that the U.S. government has probably collected data” from their calls and email and eight in 10 believe just being a journalist jumps the chance Uncle Sam is spying on them.

The survey follows multiple reports of actual spying by federal officials on reporters, and the White House’s effort to track down those who leak information to reporters despite long-forgotten promises to be the most transparent administration ever.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/64-reporters-say-feds-spying-on-their-email-calls-online-searches/article/2559854

Posted on February 2, 2015 February 2, 2015

Sharyl Attkisson: Obama Administration Treats Journalists Like ‘Enemies of the State’

Sharyl Attkisson: Obama Administration Treats Journalists Like ‘Enemies of the State’

Ben Smith / @bmcsmith92 / January 30, 2015

Investigative journalist Sharyl Attkisson accused the Obama administration of stifling press freedom by systematically cracking down on reporters—even treating them like enemies.

“If you cross this administration with perfectly accurate reporting they don’t like, you will be attacked and punished,” Attkisson said. “You and your sources may be subjected to the kind of surveillance devised for enemies of the state.”

Attkisson, a senior independent contributor to The Daily Signal, testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday about the Department of Justice’s treatment of journalists under outgoing Attorney General Eric Holder.

Loretta Lynch’s nomination to replace Holder is awaiting Senate confirmation, prompting Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, to call on Attkisson to give her own personal account of troubles with the Justice Department.

“The job of getting at the truth has never been more difficult,” Attkisson said at the hearing. “Facets of the federal government have isolated themselves from the public they serve. They covet and withhold public information that we as citizens own.”

Attkisson highlighted the “bullying” tactics that she claims the government, and specifically the Justice Department, have used against journalists.

Government officials called and threatened her superiors when she was at CBS News, launched a “frenzied campaign” against her with surrogate bloggers, and even denied her and other journalists access to federal buildings.

“Let me emphasize that my reporting was factual,” Attkisson said in reference to her work on the Fast and Furious gun-walking scandal. “It was not because my reporting was poor.”

Attkisson also reiterated her own problems with alleged government snooping, which included “keystroke monitoring, password capture, use of Skype to listen into audio.”

The Justice Department sought to push back on some of Attkisson’s claims yesterday with the release of an inspector general report.

Attkisson concluded that freedom of the press is “under assault due to government policies of secrecy, leak prevention, and officials’ contact with the media, combined with large-scale surveillance programs.”

She urged Lynch, if confirmed, to “chart a new path” as attorney general.

“If we aren’t brave enough to confront these concerns,” Attkisson said, “it could do serious, long-term damage to a supposedly free press.”

https://dailysignal.com/2015/01/30/sharyl-attkisson-obama-administration-treats-journalists-like-enemies-state/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=thffacebook01312015

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