"The Department of Justice is going on the offensive against critics of the USA Patriot Act," PR Week reports. Civil liberties advocates criticize the legislation for removing checks on law enforcement and undermining Constitutional rights, prompting some state and local governments to pass resolutions condemning the act. "Attorney General John Ashcroft and department spokespeople are now aggressively speaking out to the public and the press with an eye toward setting the record straight," PR Week writes.

Journalists in Guatemala have recently been attacked, one fatally, by mobs supporting former dictator Rios Montt who is campaigning to become the country's president. '"The press is the only functioning institution in this country. That is why they either have to control it or scare it,'" said Mario Antonio Sandoval, vice president of the daily Prensa Libre and president of the 6-month-old cable channel Guatevision.

Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush's War on Iraq, the new book by Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber, arrives in bookstores on Monday, and early book reviews have already begun appearing. We have compiled a list of book reviews and will be updating it periodically.