Mexicans: providing the emails Texans won’t

A Milwaukee researcher seeking four days worth of e-mails from Texas Governor Rick Perry’s office was told he can have them — for two thousand bucks.

[John] Washburn, who has a history of open records activity in Wisconsin, Florida, and now Texas, says he has never before encountered a charge for staff time, although it is standard in the Lone Star state.

He did tell me that he was surprised by what he called Perry’s ‘gambit.’ He said he thought Perry would take the ‘drag-it-out’ approach to stifling records requests.

“Before, I thought it was just going to be stretched out,” Washburn says. “Now, they’re hoping that I won’t come up with the money.”

So far, Washburn has requested the governor’s emails from preceding days on Nov. 6, 9, 13, 20, and 23. The objective, Washburn said, was to stop a pro-forma email destruction policy that Perry’s office had in place — and which it said it inherited from Governor George W. Bush.

Texas Governors — by design — have no real power  and really don’t do very much.  Why Washburn wants to read Rick Perry’s email is beyond me, but I’m sure they’re not worth two thousand bucks.  For that price, he can have four months of correspondence with my editor, and all those  all the offers to loan me money, requests for my bank account so Nigerian princesses can launder their late husband’s ill got gains, sell me discount viagra and extend my penis.

Meanwhile, the Instituto Federal de Acceso a la Información (IFAI) in Mexico ordered the Secretaría de Gobernación to make available ALL e-mails sent by then- Secretary Carlos Abascal from 1 October to 1 December 2006.  These are crucial dates, dealing with the transition from the outgoing Fox Administration to the incoming Calderón Administration, and the crackdown on dissent in Oaxaca.  The Secretaría de Gobernación is the highest ranking Federal cabinet officer, with broad responsibilities for national security and policy implementation.

Whether Carlos Abascal got spam offering to extend his penis I don’t know… but his emails will be available at a much more reasonable price — FREE.