Richmond Times-Dispatch columnist Bart Hinkle is one of the region’s shining editorial lights. But on the matter of Ken Cuccinelli’s request for documents in the Michael Mann/UVA imbroglio, I think he’s off base. Principled, to be sure. But his column doesn’t go nearly deep enough in its exploration of what Mann’s defenders inside and outside the University of Virginia are doing to thwart the commonwealth’s freedom of information laws.

In his latest column he makes several appeals to authority to justify why former UVA professor Michael Mann’s work product while a state employee at the very public Universitry of Virginia should remain beyond the Attorney General’s investigatory powers.