from Federation of American Scientists:
“Congress must take the lead in challenging the laws and practices that have allowed excessive secrecy to become the dominant feature of our national security culture,” the American Civil Liberties Union urged in a new report on government secrecy.
“The excessive secrecy that hides how the government pursues its national security mission is undermining the core principles of democratic government and injuring our nation in ways no terrorist act ever could,” wrote Mike German and Jay Stanley, the authors of the ACLU report. “It is time for Congress to make the secrecy problem an issue of the highest priority, and enact a sweeping overhaul of our national security establishment to re-impose democratic controls.”
The report provides a fluid account of current secrecy policy, along with a critique from first principles as well as from recent experience. Highly readable and thoroughly footnoted, the 51 page report covers a spectrum of secrecy issues, from the state secrets privilege to secret law to the role of national security whistleblowers, and a lot more. It concludes with a menu of recommended reforms that Congress could and, the authors say, should undertake.
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