Since I already have The New York Times website pulled up after briefly researching wikilinks, I believe it will be interesting to find a recent article that will to some degree demonstrate the state of the Freedom of Information Act--is it alive and well? Are government organizations adhering to the law which compels them to disclose?
The first article (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/29/us/politics/29issa.html?scp=1&sq=freedom%20of%20information%20act&st=cse) that appears on a search for "freedom of information act" on the Times database reports on a Republican representative's (Darrell Issa) efforts to obtain a comprehensive list of everyone who has requested information under the FOIA and any communications between requesting parties and relevant federal agencies between 2005 and 2010. The article mentions that requests for information are routinely delayed (often due to the resources of the organizations involved being sapped by oversight requests such this one) and concludes with the reminder that Congress is exempt from FOIA provisions.
A single recent topical article, in which mention is made of a Congressman attempting to track those who dare to request information, bureaucratic delays of information release, and our own representatives circumventing the legislation they passed in the name of transparency, all of this in the first 13 paragraphs that randomly appeared on the subject. It is safe to conclude that the FOIA is very much alive, but was never quite well--but on a more optimistic note, the amount of effort which is expended to thwart the FOIA is proof of a sort, that the legislation is in part doing what it was intended to do, if it weren't, conservative opponents of federal accountability (such as Congressman Issa) wouldn't be so concerned about it.
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