Evans: It’s no secret gov’t keeps secrets
by Tucson Citizen on Jul. 26, 2008, under Opinion
Mark B. Evans
Pssst. Want to know a secret? The federal government classified about 2,600 documents as secret every hour, on average, in 2007.
It’s no secret the government keeps a lot of secrets, especially since 9/11.
But a new analysis by the nonpartisan advocacy group Openthegovernment.org shows the government is drowning in secrets.
Its July 12 report, “Government Secrecy: Decisions Without Democracy 2007,” details how secrecy has grown under the Bush administration.
“Citizens deprived of relevant information cannot participate in their government’s decisions or hold their leaders accountable,” says the forward, written by Republican Bob Barr and Democrat John Podesta.
“Without this check, government officials are more likely to make decisions contrary to the public interest, abuse their authority, and engage in corrupt activities.”
In a related development, Attorney General Michael Mukasey testified Wednesday at a House Judiciary Committee hearing on a federal shield law for reporters.
The proposed Free Flow of Information Act would protect journalists from having to reveal sources except in some extreme circumstances.
Mukasey and President Bush oppose the bill.
The irony of Bush’s opposition should not be lost. The Valerie Plame affair revealed that his operatives, including consigliere Karl Rove, leaked like rusty faucets to the press, all confidentially.
That New York Times reporter Judith Miller went to jail to protect the identity of an administration source, prompting more than 80 media companies to call for the shield law, only compounds the irony.
The national press has relied increasingly on confidential sources because of the government’s madness for secrecy.
The day after Mukasey explained his opposition to the shield law – it would protect lawbreaking leakers more than it would journalists, he said – a Washington Times reporter was before a federal judge trying to protect his source and stay out of jail.
Bill Gertz had written a story about the growing military threat from China.
He relied on secret grand jury documents leaked to him in order to report on a worker for a U.S. defense contractor convicted of conspiring to give U.S. defense technology information to China.
The contractor, Chi Mak, wants to know who leaked the documents. The judge on Friday ruled for Gerz but said the reporter may still be compelled to reveal his source to a new grand jury.
The shield bill has passed the House but has been hung up in the Senate over concerns about leaks of national security secrets.
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has said the bill would be “disastrous” to the fight against terrorism.
Among its supporters are both presumptive nominees for president, Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain and Illinois Democratic Sen. Barack Obama.
The chief opponent to the bill is Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who carries water for the administration on national security issues.
In May, Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Penn., told The New York Times about the administration’s efforts to defeat the law: “I’ve been around a while, and I’ve never seen such an avalanche of letters coordinated in such an unrealistic, emotional, unwarranted attack on a piece of legislation.”
Supporters are confident the bill will pass the Senate. Whether there is enough support to overcome Bush’s promised veto remains to be seen.
But if the president wins this battle, he may soon have another. Two bills progressing through the House would crack down on government use of classification to make documents secret, especially Homeland Security records.
The bills are among several efforts planned to force the government to let the sun shine in on the millions of records it makes secret every year.
Of course, Bush and Homeland Security oppose both bills.
Mark B. Evans is a Tucson Citizen assistant city editor. Reach him at mevans@tucsoncitizen.com or 573-4614.
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To read “Government Secrecy: Decisions Without Democracy 2007,” go to:
