Taking a lesson from the Pentagon's success in controlling negative imagery coming out of Iraq, FEMA has now clamped down on the recalcitrant mainstream media. First they're denying the press permission to photograph anything related to the recovery of the bodies; now it looks like press are being systematically denied access to key points in the city.

Excuse me, but isn't public photography of public officials carrying out official duties in plain view still legal? Ah, but perhaps not in the post-9/11 US. I think FEMA should take a page from Google's book and just refuse to talk to Geraldo for a year.

Note, the original source for this, Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo, is pretty overtly partisan and opinionated. Whether that makes him more or less reliable is left as an exercise for the reader.

Update: The NPAA (National Press Photographers Association) has reliable documented reports of their members being confronted at gunpoint and slammed against walls by armed authorities. These, apparently, are not isolated incidents from overtired cops. According to the NPAA, "some television networks have hired armed private security firms to protect their journalists".