Intimidation tactic serves to hide all manner of government
secrets.   When President Obama talked about reporters and
reporting last week, he struck a conciliatory chord. Obama said
he was troubled "that leak investigations may chill the
investigative journalism that holds government accountable," and
government needs to achieve "the right balance between our
security and our open society."  OPPOSING VIEW: Threat to press
freedom overstated  Impressive words. But the actions of his
Justice Department have been all chill and no balance. Two
recent disclosures make the department look as if it's waging
war on the news media and on your right to know what your
government is doing.  First came word that federal prosecutors
had seized two months of records from 20 Associated Press phone
lines in an investigation of a 2012 leak about a foiled Yemen
bomb plot. The secret seizure ignored the department's own
decades-old guidelines to notify news organizations and try to
negotiate for records before going to court.