Judicial Watch recently got an official rejection letter involving a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request that dates back to 2002! It almost seems like a joke, but it’s not. As part of a broad investigation into the 9/11 terrorist attacks, JW submitted FOIA requests to the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and the National Security Agency (NSA) in September 2002.

It’s quite common for federal agencies as well as the White House to flip the finger at FOIA requests that could expose wrongdoing or shed a negative light. In fact, JW often must file lawsuits to get “public” records that should not require litigation to obtain. In this particular case, it took the DIA and NSA a whopping 11 years to determine that the information falls under the “release authority” of a different agency—the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS).

This means that the NCIS must now take the time to consider the records request, which requires a “classification review,” according to the 11-year-old response JW got recently from the Navy. “Your request has been placed in our complex queue. At this time we are unable to provide you an approximate completion date.” Reading between the lines, this means that no one should hold their breath since there appears to be no intention of furnishing the records.

At least the Navy’s letter, laughable as it is, offers an apology for taking 11 years to respond. “We apologize for the delay in processing your request.” Again, it’s not uncommon to get the run-around during the FOIA process and lawsuits are par for the course, but this shatters all records. Perhaps this one should be framed.

These types of obstacles don’t stop JW from rooting out government corruption, however. When it comes to 9/11 JW has been a leader in exposing much of what the mainstream media has failed to report. Earlier this year, for instance, JW obtained documents from the State Department indicating that the FBI knew days after the 9/11 attacks that Anwar al-Aulaqi, assassinated by a U.S. drone in Yemen in 2011, had purchased airplane tickets for three of the terrorist hijackers.

This is relevant because al-Aulaqi, who was born in the U.S., was detained and released by authorities at least twice and had been invited to dine at the Pentagon. Yet the feds knew he had purchased airline tickets for the following 9/11 hijackers: Mohammed Atta, America West Airlines, 08/13/2001, for a flight from Washington, DC, to Las Vegas, Nevada, to Miami, Florida; S. Suqami, Southwest Airlines, 07/10/2001, for a flight from Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, to Orlando, Florida; Al-Sheri, National Airlines, 08/01/2001, for a flight from San Francisco, California, to Las Vegas, Nevada, to Miami, Florida.

Nineteen of 20 presidential cabinet-level agencies blew off the law requiring disclosure of public information, according to an analysis conducted by a major news syndicate. What are they mostly withholding from American taxpayers? The cost of travel by top officials, which is supposed to be public information. Other federal agencies did the same, with only 8 of a total of 57 meeting the 20-day window required by the federal law known as the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

FOIA is a valuable tool in Judicial Watch’s work and we too see it violated consistently. To be fair, it happens in every administration—both Democrat and Republican—and JW regularly must go to court to obtain public records that should be furnished without the need for litigation. Obama promised this would all change, that there would be a “new era of open government” when he moved into the White House.

It hasn’t materialized. A former longtime director at the Department of Justice (DOJ) office that monitors the government’s FOIA compliance, put is simply in the news story; “When it comes to implementation of Obama’s wonderful transparency policy goals, especially FOIA policy in particular, there has been far more ‘talk the talk’ rather than ‘walk the walk.’”

In the news agency probe, the administration failed to provide records for the taxpayer-funded travel expenses of cabinet secretaries and top officials of major departments. This includes heads of agencies that publicize their events in the media, including Attorney General Eric Holder, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. Requests for the travel costs of other cabinet officials—including Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, Energy Secretary Steven Chu, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson—have also been blown off.

This is just a snippet of the stonewalling, which is nothing new since the administration has repeatedly violated transparency laws throughout its tenure. It even built additional hurdles for the most basic FOIA requests. Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton offered a long list of examples during congressional testimony last year. Additionally, on major transparency issues, the Obama administration has consistently come down on the side of secrecy.

The White House has ordered agencies to submit recommendations by May 2012 to help create a new directive that will ultimately transform the government’s notoriously inept record-keeping operation. In the end, there will be an efficient and uniform records management system never before seen in the bloated federal government.

The agencies will report their ideas for improving the way they store and manage electronic files, including emails, blog posts and social media activity, according a news report that cites a White House memo issued this week. The goal is to make better use of electronic document storage technology and to create a government-wide records management framework.

This 360-degree turnaround is laughable considering the current system, which lacks any sort of uniform rules. At most government agencies employees decide which emails they think they may be required to keep, which is comical to say the least. And, as the political magazine that reported the story points out, this significantly raises the risk that emails will be lost or misplaced or that employees won’t accurately determine which messages must be archived.

Additionally, 95% of agencies fail to meet statutory requirements for maintaining files, according to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). How did the NARA come up with this figure? Based on agency self-assessments that indicate most aren’t saving the proper records or storing them electronically to ensure that they can be retrieved in the future. In other words, they openly admit that they’re blowing off record laws.

This development comes on the heels of a separate but equally disappointing move by the Obama Administration, which promised unprecedented transparency, involving public records. For nearly a year, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), a cabinet-level agency within the Executive Office of the President of the United States, has failed to approve recommendations for improving public records requests under the federal Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

The recommendations were created by a branch, the Office of Government Information Services (OGIS), created two years ago to mediate disputes between those who request public records and the agencies that process the requests. The OGIS is also tasked with recommending policy changes to the president and Congress that will bring transparency and efficiency to the FOIA process.