There's always a lot at stake with the ringing in of a new year. With challenges abound both at home and abroad, 2009 is no exception. President Obama's leadership is critical in making sure America weathers the storm and lives up to its promise. But he's not the only one who must be held accountable in this effort.

The United States Food and Drug Administration ("FDA") discovered the industrial chemical melamine in samples of baby formula sold in the United States and notified the manufacturers of its findings but not the American public.

Hey, remember the U.S. attorney scandal? Fishy potentially-motivated-by-partisanship firings of nine U.S. attorneys by the White House?

Well, Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, hasn't forgotten. At the Democratic National Convention yesterday, Talking Points Memo's David Kurtz asked Leahy for reaction to the news that a U.S. district court judge has refused to stay an order that former White House aide Harriet Miers is legally required to testify about the firings.

I was canvassing in Louisiana in favor of the restoration of the Gulf Coast.  While doing so, I encountered certain ordinances or other restrictive regulations that restrict access to housing in certain areas, like closed subdivisions or limit access at certain times.  I believe that having an executive government in place at the federal level that tries so hard to keep information from its citizens, allowing these type of restrictions that negatively impact canvassers's ability to disseminate information to the public is very bad.  Since it seems to be local government bodies and public officials that have either put these restrictions into place directly or else have allowed them to be adopted, we need to take a closer look to see if these actions run afoul of the First Amendment.