Mar 20, 2015 4 min read

Excerpts from recent editorials in newspapers in the United States as compiled by the Associated Press:

Just in time for Sunshine Week – the annual celebration of open government and transparency – Congress has taken up bipartisan legislation that will strengthen the Freedom of Information Act.

The FOIA Improvement Act of 2015 requires agencies to consider FOIA requests under a “presumption of openness” while restricting the application of exemptions to situations where a specifically identifiable harm could occur.

A similar bill last year seemed poised for passage. It, too, had bipartisan support, but the clock ran out in December after the Senate dithered. This time, there’s no excuse to keep a good bill from becoming law.

The federal Freedom of Information Act, along with similar laws in all 50 states, is based on a simple notion: Government that acts in the people’s name must keep the people informed.

Journalists often use FOIA, but it isn’t just – or even mainly – for journalists. It is for the citizens, based on the fundamental understanding that a functioning democracy requires an informed citizenry.

For seven months, the United States has been engaged in military action – war, to put it plainly – against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. Yet it’s not clear that Congress will provide explicit authorization for airstrikes and the commitment of uniformed advisors.

President Obama in February asked Congress to approve an Authorization for Use of Military Force against the fanatical and bloodthirsty group that has scored significant military victories, and the administration insists that a new authorization is a priority. But it’s hedging its bets by continuing to insist that it already possesses legal authority to wage war under action taken by Congress in 2001 that authorized the post-9/11 invasion of Afghanistan and a 2002 resolution approving President George W. Bush’s use of force against “the continuing threat posed by Iraq” – the Iraq ruled by Saddam Hussein, that is.

A new AUMF is necessary primarily because it’s legally and politically wrong for the administration to rely on congressional enactments more than a decade old that arose from vastly different circumstances.

It’s ironic that some Republican senators who tried to insinuate themselves in negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program – clearly the province of the president – are apparently willing to give the president a pass and not assert their much clearer constitutional responsibility to authorize war against Islamic State.

Eastern Kentuckians in Harlan and Perry counties recently received two rude reminders of why Congress should get behind President Barack Obama’s plan to accelerate payments for cleaning up safety and health hazards from abandoned coal mines.

On March 6, an abandoned underground mine blew out above the historic coal town of Lynch in Harlan County, sending a torrent of mud and debris into the downtown and buckling a major road.

Fortunately, no one was injured and only basements were flooded. But such lurking physical legacies of a century of coal mining are poor advertisements for economic development in a region that desperately needs new businesses and jobs.

In Perry County, three recent landslides were caused by damage from past mining, and the state says repairs will cost $1.32 million.

Kentucky will get just $18.2 million in fiscal year 2015 to clean up an inventory of $344 million in high-priority hazards from abandoned mine lands. The money comes from a federal tax levied on the coal industry for the specific purpose of cleaning up damage and hazards from old mining. The abandoned mine lands fund contains almost $2.5 billion owed to places such as Harlan and Perry counties.

And, yet, Congress traditionally sits on most of the money the coal industry has paid to clean up after itself, dribbling out funding in amounts far short of what’s needed.

If only Capitol Hill oozed with mud and poisons, we might see some action.

Congress, especially the Kentuckians in Congress, should support sending the AML money where it’s owed – now.