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WASHINGTON Its the biggest secret in a city known for not keeping them.

The nine Supreme Court justices and more than three dozen other people have kept quiet for more than two months about how the high court is going to rule on the constitutionality of President Barack Obamas health care overhaul.

This is information that could move markets, turn economies and greatly affect this falls national elections, including the presidential contest between Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney. But unlike the Congress and the executive branch, which seem to leak information willy-nilly, the Supreme Court, from the chief justice down to the lowliest clerk, appears to truly value silence when it comes to upcoming court opinions, big and small.

No one talks, and thats the way they like it.

Contrast this with the rest of the government, which couldnt keep secret President Barack Obamas direct role in supervising an unprecedented U.S. cyberattack on Irans nuclear facilities or the existence of a double agent inside al-Qaidas Yemen branch who tipped the U.S. to a new design for a bomb to put on a jetliner.

As Republicans air their suspicion that the leaks might be deliberate to enhance the Obama administrations stature, Attorney General Eric Holder has appointed two U.S. attorneys to investigate those two disclosures and probably additional recent national security leaks. Because far more people, of necessity, know about such secret national security operations, those investigators must examine hundreds, even thousands, of federal workers who might have known at least a chunk of the guarded information.

The Supreme Court is expected to rule on the law in the upcoming week or so. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, speaking to a lawyers convention June 15, noted a steady stream of rumors and fifth-hand accounts in the media about what the high court was likely to do.

My favorite among the press pieces wisely observed: At the Supreme Court ... those who know dont talk, and those who talk dont know, she said.

The justices, of course, know, having officially voted on the results the same week they heard arguments. But they are not the only ones in the loop: Each of the nine justices has four clerks who know not only how their justice voted but also how the other justices stand because these clerks help research and craft the majority opinions and dissents that are circulated for justices to sign if they agree.

In addition these 45 people surely in the know, there are an assorted number of secretaries, aides, security guards, janitors, support staff and family members keenly attuned to the inner workings of the Supreme Courts upper floors where the justices keep their chambers. At the last moment possible, printers who prepare the paper opinions to be handed out will know.

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Mum really is the word on Obama health care ruling

Calcutta News.net Sunday 24th June, 2012

Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama has criticised the Chinese government's censorship policy as morally wrong and said 1.3 billion people of China have a right to know the reality.

"Totalitarian regimes like China's have for several decades depended far too much on cruelty, so fear and distrust are part of their atmosphere. This is why they try to conceal reality," the Nobel Peace laureate said.

"The 1.3 billion Chinese have a right to know the reality of their situation and they have the ability on that basis to judge right from wrong. For this reason, censorship and restricting people's movements are morally wrong and limit their creativity," he said in an interview with a magazine in Scotland Saturday, according to a post on the Central Tibetan Administration website here.

The Tibetan leader remarked: "This approach is short-sighted and has to change. Prime Minister Wen Jiabao too has spoken about the need for change and even democracy in China."

On the issue of Tibet, he said: "We are conducting a non-violent struggle in the spirit of reconciliation. It is worth supporting, because it must succeed. Our failure will support those who argue that you can only achieve your goals through force and violence."

He said self-immolations by Tibetans was very sad but showed a commitment to non-violence. "However, they are a clear sign of desperation."

The Dalai Lama along with many of his supporters fled Tibet and took refuge in India when Chinese troops moved in and took control of Lhasa in 1959.

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Censorship in China is morally wrong: Dalai Lama

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Censorship in China morally wrong: Dalai Lama

THE Greens will try to gazump the government by releasing their own proposal for a public-interest test governing media ownership before Cabinet finalises its plans.

Last week's restructure announcements by News Ltd and Fairfax Media, which publishes the Herald, and a push into Fairfax by the mining magnate Gina Rinehart, have put the issue under the spotlight.

The Greens will announce today the introduction of a private member's bill seeking to ensure diversity of media ownership and editorial independence.

The public-interest test would apply to nationally significant media enterprises - defined as those which control the content they deliver, have an Australian audience of at least 500,000 a month, and derive at least $50 million a year in revenue from supplying media content in Australia.

The Greens' bill proposes that the statutory media regulator, the Australian Communications and Media Authority, publishes guidelines, and the application and enforcement of the public-interest test. There will be opportunity for submissions and possible public hearings. Any decisions by the authority could be appealed in the courts.

The Greens' test would take into account whether the acquisition of an organisation would diminish the diversity of ownership and content, the impact on editorial independence, on free expression of opinion, and on the fair and accurate reporting of news.

Last week, the Communications Minister, Stephen Conroy, confirmed that new media ownership laws under consideration would take into account the public interest as well as competition concerns.

The laws, to be based on recommendations from both the Convergence Review and the Finkelstein review commissioned by the government, are set to be signed off soon.

Continued here:
Greens grab headlines with media probity plan

THE Greens this week will introduce a private member's bill for a public interest test to be applied when there are changes in control of major media companies.

As the government considers its media policy, which will include a public interest test, strongly favoured by Communications Minister Stephen Conroy, the Greens said their bill would be based on recommendations from the government's convergence review and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

Greens spokesman on communications Scott Ludlam said what was happening in the case of Gina Rinehart was ''one individual buying a controlling stake in a media organisation with the clear purpose of shutting down dissent against her other corporate and financial interests and deliberately stifling debate about issues of science, of fairness, of great community interest''.

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Matters to be taken into account in the Greens' public interest test would include the effect of a change on diversity of ownership and the likely impact on editorial independence, the free expression of opinion, and the fair and accurate presentation of news.

Asked about the impact if Ms Rinehart effectively took control of Fairfax, Foreign Minister Bob Carr predicted a ''degradation of the quality of those mastheads.

''I think Australians would be entitled to be very, very concerned. I think it would be impossible to separate her position as a controlling influence on the board from the way the paper behaves. I think the independence of Fairfax, which has been its glory, its boast, its pride, would be diminished,'' he told the ABC.

Meanwhile the debate over the government's media policy could be influenced by information revealed in the Federal Court case brought against Speaker Peter Slipper by staffer James Ashby, with suggestions that Mr Ashby connived with News Ltd and politicians. Opposition Leader Tony Abbott said yesterday he categorically rejected that the Ashby case was ''some kind of a Coalition stitch-up''.

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Fresh focus on media changes