Mails

In the contentious debate over immigration policy, three groups have dominated public and political attention: the roughly 11 million undocumented immigrants seeking to become legal, the skilled foreign workers bound for high-tech jobs and relatives waiting to be reunited with their families. Then there are those who won the green card lottery. This tiny visa program, aimed at diversifying the pool of immigrants to the United States, selects 55,000 applicants at random each year.

I agree 100 percent with Ernest Nussbaum [" Why can't junk mailers pay up? ," letters, May 14] regarding the U.S. Postal Service. At first blush, it would seem that the Postal Service would profit from handling bulk mail. But in reality, the bulk mailers require the Postal Service to have the necessary amount of equipment and personnel to move it. I continually have recycling bins full of unsolicited mail. Without so much bulk mail, the Postal Service could move to a three day-a-week delivery schedule.

WITH EACH passing week, the fate of e-mails generated by President Bush's staff grows more curious and troubling. While evidence has not emerged of a deliberate effort by the White House to destroy sensitive electronic messages, there's reason to be concerned about the potential loss of historical records. In response to specific allegations of missing e-mails by two groups accusing the Bush administration of violating the Federal Records Act, spokeswoman Dana Perino said last April, "I wouldn't rule out that there were a potential 5 million e-mails...

The hundred pages of Benghazi e-mails released this week tell us almost nothing about how four Americans came to die so tragically in that Libyan city. But they are a case study in why nothing works in Washington. Rather than reading these messages for their substance on Benghazi (on which officials were still basically clueless three days after the attack), try perusing them as an illustration of how the bureaucracy responds to crisis — especially when officials know they will be under the media spotlight.

In attacking the National Civic Art Society's report on the Eisenhower Memorial (March 20), Philip Kennicott did not note that his own opinions are scrutinized therein. We severely criticize his recent defense of Frank Gehry's design, and note that in 2010 Mr. Kennicott wrote the following in The Washington Post : "[T]he columns have a mute blankness that may read as Soviet, and their scale overwhelms even the Mall's most overtly authoritarian structure, the National World War II Memorial.

It used to be the witch doctors and then dictators, the church and some governments who were the guardians of "truth. " Our list must now be enlarged to include the "scientists" who preach on anthropogenic warming. Michael E. Mann's defense of hacked internal e-mails, quoted in the Nov. 22 news story "In the trenches on climate change, hostility among foes," that "we shouldn't expect the sort of refined statements that scientists make when they're speaking in public," is completely inadequate.

The Aug. 15 news article " Energy program staff was told not to use personal e-mail " reported that Jonathan Silver, formerly of the Energy Department, warned his colleagues not to use personal e-mail addresses in work correspondence, because those e-mails could be subpoenaed. For organizations like mine, a government accountability group, the question remains — for the media and members of the public who seek transparency from their government — are government employees' e-mails, when sent at work from personal accounts, subject to the...

The White House and two nonprofit groups announced a settlement Monday in a long-running lawsuit over more than 22 million e-mails that were missing during the Bush administration because of poor labeling and other technical problems. The National Security Archive, a historical records group, and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a watchdog organization, sued the Executive Office of the President in 2007. They alleged that millions of White House e-mails were missing from March 2003 to October 2005, in violation of laws...

JUNEAU, Alaska--The state of Alaska on Friday released more than 13,000 e-mails Friday that shed light on Sarah Palin's tenure as governor — before she became a vice-presidential candidate, a reality-TV star, and an undeclared heavyweight in the 2012 race for the White House. At 9 a.m. Alaska time — 1 p.m. in Washington — 24,199 pages of printed-out e-mails that Palin either sent or received on her official account became public. The e-mails cover her first 21 months as governor, from December 2006 to September 2008.

A Nevada man who sent e-mail threats to two former Virginia Tech students a year after the massacre at the university was ordered to be released from jail yesterday when a federal judge in Roanoke decided he had served enough jail time during the 15 months he was waiting for his case to conclude. Johnmarlo Balasta Napa, 28, pleaded guilty in April to one count of sending an e-mail threat. Napa had been held without bond since being arrest in April 2008, when authorities...

TANEYTOWN, Md. — Maryland's Fire Marshal is investigating after a pipe bomb was found in a mailbox in rural Carroll County. Officials say a Taneytown man discovered a pipe bomb in his mailbox Wednesday afternoon when he went to check his mail on McMullen Road. The man called 911 and Carroll County Sheriff's deputies who responded determined that the device appeared to be a threat and called in the Office of the State Fire Marshal. The fire marshal's office says bomb technicians were able to render...

The Obama administration released 100 pages of e-mails Wednesday that reveal differences between intelligence analysts and State Department officials over how to initially describe the Sept. 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya. The internal debate did not include political interference from the White House, according to the e-mails, which were provided to congressional intelligence committees several months ago. Since the assault that killed four...

White House spokesman Jay Carney on Tuesday accused Republicans of leaking a falsified e-mail to the media in order to buttress their case that the Obama administration lied about aspects of the Benghazi crisis. "They decided to fabricate portions of an e-mail and make up portions of an e-mail in order to fit a political narrative," Carney said during the regular White House briefing. House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio), the spokesman said, is "obsessed" with the...

New details from administration e-mails about last year's attacks on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya, demonstrate that an intense bureaucratic clash took place between the State Department and the CIA over which agency would get to tell the story of how the tragedy unfolded. That clash played out in the development of administration talking points that have been at the center of the controversy over the handling of the incident, according to the e-mails that came to light Friday.

Correction: An earlier version of this article misidentified the union that represents Foreign Service officers. It is the American Foreign Service Association, not the Association of Foreign Service Officers. The article also erred in describing Gregory Hicks as part of a slate of candidates endorsed by the association's leadership. Hicks, one of two vice-presidential candidates seeking to represent Foreign Service officers at the State Department, is on the only slate of...

A government watchdog group says the Prince George's County school system "crossed a line" when a schools official sent an e-mail late Monday that urged residents to join a petition drive that opposes the county's new school governance structure . The school system sent the e-mail to parents and community leaders in District 6, informing them of a Citizens for an Elected Board meeting to discuss circulating a petition that opposes giving...

A scientist who is one of the central figures in the uproar over pirated e-mails from the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit announced Tuesday that he is stepping down as the unit's director while the university investigates the incident. Climate skeptics have seized on several e-mails from Phil Jones to other researchers as evidence that prominent scientists have sought to silence their voices in the debate over global warming. Jones's e-mail account was apparently hacked and his e-mails were posted online last...

After Philadelphia's housing director refused a demand by President Bush's housing secretary to transfer a piece of city property to a business friend, two top political appointees at the department exchanged e-mails discussing the pain they could cause the Philadelphia director. "Would you like me to make his life less happy? If so, how?" Orlando J. Cabrera, then-assistant secretary at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, wrote about Philadelphia housing director Carl R. Greene.

I moved away from Atlanta almost six years ago, yet I still receive the newsletter that the organizer of my old farmers market sends out. The growing season there has about a one-month jump on the Mid-Atlantic's. Reading about strawberries and asparagus — and, later, tomatoes — weeks before I'll see them here is a small torment. But I open the weekly e-mail because it's an easy way to connect with a place I used to call home, where that market was a treasured part of my routine.

D.C. Council candidate Elissa Silverman has released e-mails she sent last week to fellow candidate Matthew Frumin in which she asked him to drop out of the race. Silverman, one six candidates in Tuesday's election , released the e-mails to bolster her argument that she did not explicitly try to link Frumin's departure with her future support of him in a race against Council member Mary M. Cheh (D) in Ward 3. On Monday, the Washington Post reported that Silverman and her campaign treasurer,...