GOVERNMENT --

LET THE SUN SHINE IN: The second annual Sunshine Week -- an effort to highlight the importance of open government -- begins in a cloud of darkness. The Bush administration is working to tamp down on leaks by putting in place "initiatives targeting journalists and their possible government sources" and by prohibiting government officials from "discussing even unclassified issues related to the NSA [spying] programme." Former Press Secretary Ari Fleischer -- who said in 2003 that the Bush administration is "more accessible and open than many previous administrations" -- has recently stated that "this administration is more secretive." A new Scripps poll found that 59 percent of the American public believe there is "too much secrecy" in the federal government. Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests -- essential to an open U.S. government -- have gone unanswered under the Bush administration. Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, then Attorney General John Ashcroft said he supported agencies withholding information in the name of national security. FOIA requests "pending at the 15 executive departments at the end of Fiscal Year 2004 was 147,810, a 24 percent increase over the previous year."